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Yes, video games can improve short-term workplace team performance, but they are not a guaranteed way to create trust or lasting cohesion. In a 2021 randomized experiment, newly formed teams played either Halo or Rock Band for 45 minutes before completing two different team tasks. Compared with control teams, the gaming groups improved more on both tasks. The same experiment found no increase in broad team cohesion, so the most defensible use of gaming is a structured coordination exercise with a clear follow-up objective—not a promise that coworkers will automatically become closer.
What did the 2021 workplace gaming experiment actually test?
The study by Mark J. Keith, Douglas L. Dean, James Gaskin, and Greg Anderson used a randomized laboratory design. Teams competed against other teams while playing a video game for 45 minutes. One group played Halo and another played Rock Band. Control teams spent the same amount of time working alone rather than gaming. Afterward, every team completed two separate tasks, allowing the investigators to look for transfer beyond the game itself.
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How much did performance improve?
| Follow-up task | Gaming teams | Control teams | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Geocaching task | 49.6% average improvement | 20.3% average improvement | 29.3 percentage points |
| Tower-building task | 72.1% average improvement | 49.5% average improvement | 22.6 percentage points |
The reported treatment-effect test was F1=8.760, P=.004. A flow-based model explained 40.6% of performance improvement, compared with 18.5% in earlier related work cited by the authors. A more detailed model explained 62.3% of the variance in team performance across the two tasks. Those figures describe this experiment’s statistical models; they are not a promise that every office gaming session will produce the same gains.
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How could a game improve teamwork after the game ends?
The proposed mechanism is flow: focused immersion created when a task is challenging enough to demand attention but manageable enough to remain controllable. A well-designed game can put teammates in a shared environment with an obvious objective, rapid feedback, and consequences for poor coordination. That combination may leave a team more prepared to concentrate on its next task.
The study’s results also warn against treating enjoyment as the mechanism. Focused immersion was associated with better performance, while heightened enjoyment by itself was associated with lower performance. A session can be entertaining without improving how people coordinate. Conversely, a demanding activity that is not everyone’s favorite may still help if it creates useful focus and interdependence.
What features create useful interdependence?
- Shared objectives: The group must pursue one outcome rather than four people completing parallel solo challenges.
- Complementary roles: Participants should need different information, abilities, or timing from one another.
- Visible feedback: The team should be able to tell whether a decision is helping or hurting its progress.
- Manageable challenge: Beginners need enough support to participate, while experienced players need enough complexity to stay engaged.
- Short learning loop: Teams should have opportunities to adjust their approach instead of being eliminated immediately after one mistake.
Do video games build trust and team cohesion?
Not automatically. The experiment found no increase in broad team cohesion, even though gaming teams performed better afterward. The authors distinguish task attraction, role-based cooperation, division of labor, and flow from a durable feeling of interpersonal closeness.
That distinction is essential for managers. Gaming may help a newly formed team coordinate on a defined assignment, but it does not prove that coworkers will disclose concerns, resolve conflict, trust one another in a crisis, or maintain stronger relationships months later. If cohesion or psychological safety is the goal, gaming should be one component of a broader program that includes facilitated conversation, fair work practices, and follow-up—not a substitute for them.
Which outcome are you trying to change?
| Target outcome | What gaming may plausibly support | What it cannot establish on its own |
|---|---|---|
| Short-term performance | Focused attention and faster coordination on a subsequent task | Improvement on every type of work |
| Communication | Practice exchanging timely information under pressure | Better communication in all workplace situations |
| Role clarity | Experience dividing responsibilities and adapting roles | Permanent agreement about job ownership |
| Morale | A shared break or novel activity for willing participants | Higher morale across an entire organization |
| Cohesion or trust | Opportunities for positive interaction | Durable interpersonal trust or conflict repair |
Are video games suitable for every workplace team?
No. Suitability depends less on whether a game is popular than on whether the format is accessible, psychologically safe, and relevant to the team’s objective. An action-heavy competitive game may work for one voluntary group and alienate another. The same title can also feel very different depending on platform controls, visual demands, language, audio, and prior experience.
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Check accessibility before choosing a game
- Ask about mobility, visual, hearing, and cognitive access needs privately and provide alternatives without requiring people to disclose medical details publicly.
- Check controller options, remappable controls, subtitles, color settings, text size, motion effects, and audio dependence.
- Provide a non-player role—such as navigator, strategist, observer, or debriefer—only if it is genuinely valued and not a punishment for opting out.
- Offer an equivalent non-game activity for people who do not want to play. Participation should not affect performance evaluations.
- Explain the content and intensity in advance, including violence, time pressure, voice chat, and competitive ranking.
Balance competition and psychological safety
Competition can create energy and a clear goal, but public losses, elimination, trash talk, or a large skill gap can produce embarrassment and silence. Use mixed cooperative-competitive structures when possible: teams can compete against another team while still sharing rules, practice time, and a chance to recover from mistakes. Establish conduct rules, stop harassment immediately, and avoid recording or broadcasting players without explicit consent.
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Start with the work outcome, not with a favorite game. The organizer needs a specific objective, an accessible format, balanced teams, reliable equipment, a facilitator, and a way to observe whether the target outcome changed afterward.
- Define the target. Choose one primary outcome—such as coordination on a project handoff, communication under time pressure, or role negotiation. Do not label enjoyment as proof that the target was achieved.
- Choose the interaction pattern. Select a game in which teammates genuinely depend on one another. A title that lets everyone play independently may be entertaining but offers little practice in coordinated work.
- Set an appropriate challenge. Give beginners a short tutorial or practice round. Avoid difficulty so low that players disengage and so high that novices cannot contribute.
- Make participation equitable. Publish the format, content, duration, accessibility options, and opt-out alternative in advance. Rotate roles so the same experienced player does not control every decision.
- Prepare the technology. Test accounts, controllers, displays, network access, privacy settings, audio, and backup equipment before participants arrive. Have a no-fault plan for a disconnected player.
- Explain the rules and conduct standard. State the shared objective, how teams win, how decisions are made, and what behavior is unacceptable. Keep instructions concise, then confirm that every participant knows how to ask for help.
- Facilitate without taking over. Watch for exclusion, confusion, or one person dominating. Intervene with a prompt such as “What information does the rest of the team need?” rather than solving the challenge for them.
- Debrief immediately. Ask what coordination pattern helped, where information was lost, how roles changed, and what the team will try in its real work. Connect observations to a specific upcoming task.
- Follow up later. Recheck the chosen work outcome after the team has had an opportunity to apply the lesson. A short survey alone cannot show whether coordination actually changed.
What should the debrief cover?
A debrief turns an isolated activity into a work-relevant learning event. Keep the discussion focused on observable behavior rather than personality judgments.
- Information flow: Who knew what, and when did that information reach the people who needed it?
- Decision rights: Was it clear who could make a call when time was limited?
- Role changes: Did the team adapt when a strategy failed or a player became unavailable?
- Inclusion: Whose ideas were heard, and what made it easier or harder to speak?
- Transfer: Which one behavior will the team use in its next real project meeting or handoff?
What are the main risks and failure modes?
The most common failure is confusing a lively event with an effective intervention. A team may laugh, finish a game, and still learn nothing that transfers to work. Other problems include inaccessible controls, a dominant player, humiliating competition, technical delays, unsuitable content, and pressure to participate.
Symptoms that the format is not working
- One person gives all instructions while others become spectators.
- Players cannot explain the shared objective or how their roles connect.
- Teams optimize for individual scores instead of the group result.
- People stop asking questions after making mistakes.
- Participants describe the event only as “fun” but cannot name a work behavior to carry forward.
- Opt-out participants receive a less respected assignment or are excluded from the debrief.
When these symptoms appear, pause and change the structure: lower the difficulty, redistribute roles, add a practice round, switch to a cooperative scenario, or stop the game and move to a facilitated exercise. Continuing because the schedule says so can deepen exclusion rather than build teamwork.
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Are virtual games effective for remote teams?
They can be, but evidence from virtuality research should not be mistaken for a direct test of workplace video-game sessions. A 2022 meta-analysis covering 73 samples and 5,738 organizational teams examined how technology-mediated or distributed work relates to productive, performance, social, and team-member outcomes. It provides context for remote collaboration, not proof that any particular online game improves a remote team.
Remote sessions add practical constraints: inconsistent bandwidth, different hardware, time-zone fatigue, home distractions, and unequal familiarity with voice or text chat. Use a platform that runs on the equipment participants already have, provide a low-bandwidth alternative, and schedule enough time for connection problems without penalizing the people affected. A facilitator should also watch the chat and voice channels because remote silence can hide confusion or exclusion.
What does the broader evidence say?
A 2023 systematic review concluded that digital games may support team cohesion or team building, while calling for more varied intervention lengths, broader outcome measures, follow-up assessments, more diverse samples, and better attention to reporting bias and game features. In practical terms, the evidence supports cautious experimentation, not a universal formula.
The 2021 experiment was conducted in a laboratory, and its authors explicitly noted that more work is needed to establish generalizability to ordinary workplaces. A publication notice also reported that the randomized study was not prospectively registered and advised readers to assess explicit or implied effectiveness claims carefully. These qualifications do not erase the performance result; they define how far it can be generalized.
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How should a company measure whether gaming helped?
Measure the outcome selected before the session and use a comparison that is realistic for the team. For example, record the quality or time of a defined handoff before and after the intervention, or have an independent observer code whether required information was exchanged. If the goal is cohesion, use a validated survey and a later follow-up rather than inferring cohesion from smiles or attendance.
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- Choose one primary outcome and a small number of secondary indicators.
- Collect a baseline before the event when feasible.
- Measure again after participants have performed a real work task.
- Record participation and accessibility issues separately from performance.
- Interpret changes cautiously when the group is small or the task changes.
- Ask opt-out participants whether the alternative format met the same learning objective.
The strongest conclusion a manager can draw is narrow: “This format helped this team with this defined task under these conditions.” That is more useful—and more honest—than claiming that a single game made the team stronger in every respect.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Which game formats are most defensible for work?
Prefer formats that make cooperation visible and allow recovery from mistakes. Cooperative puzzles, planning scenarios, shared construction, and mixed cooperative-competitive rounds can all fit that principle if the controls and content are accessible. The study’s use of Halo and Rock Band demonstrates that different genres can support a team intervention, but it does not establish either title as the best choice for every office.
Action-oriented content may narrow suitability for some workplaces, while music or rhythm formats may create different access barriers. Choose by interaction design, challenge level, and participant needs—not by brand recognition or the assumption that the most entertaining title produces the best transfer.
What is the practical verdict?
Video games are a credible option for a structured workplace team-building session when the goal is short-term coordination or performance on a subsequent task. The best case is a facilitated, accessible activity with meaningful interdependence, an appropriate challenge, and a debrief tied to real work. The evidence does not justify promising lasting cohesion, repaired conflict, universal participation, or automatic trust.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long should a workplace gaming session last?
The directly studied intervention lasted 45 minutes, so that is a defensible reference point for the play portion. Any additional time for onboarding, accessibility checks, technical setup, and debriefing should be planned separately rather than squeezing those steps out of the session.
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Should managers require employees to join a game-based team event?
Requiring participation can turn a low-stakes activity into a source of resentment or anxiety, especially for people with disabilities, cultural objections, or difficult prior experiences with competition. Make the learning objective mandatory only when necessary, and provide an equivalent non-game route to achieve it.
Can a video game repair conflict between coworkers?
There is no evidence here that gaming repairs existing interpersonal conflict. A competitive activity can intensify unresolved tension; conflict work should be handled through appropriate management, mediation, or facilitated dialogue before using a game as a shared exercise.
What if some employees have never played a video game?
Use a tutorial, pair newcomers with supportive teammates, and judge success by team coordination rather than individual score. A format with simple controls and reversible mistakes is safer than one that eliminates beginners after a single error.
How can a remote team include people with unreliable internet?
Offer a low-bandwidth or asynchronous alternative that practices the same coordination skill, and do not treat technical failure as nonparticipation. Design the debrief so both formats contribute observations to the same work-focused discussion.
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