Holiday icebreakers are an effective variation of traditional icebreakers that a Scrum Team can utilize for warming-up before meetings. When working with Scrum, meetings are a must—the Daily Scrum and Sprint retrospective are literally written into the Scrum Guide. However, they often turn repetitive and become time-wasting events. Using a wide range of icebreakers can give each meeting a breath of fresh air and increase attendant participation.
In a time of holiday celebration, Holiday icebreakers can provide an injection of fun and playfulness into your meetings. As well as being topical and socially relevant, Holiday icebreakers will elicit greater levels of buy-in from your meeting attendees because they feel more comfortable and able to share with one another.
Holiday icebreakers should be part of a wide rotation of icebreakers and games that are used to warm up a team. There should be variation to avoid these warmups and meeting activities becoming overly repetitive and monotonous. Holiday icebreakers are recommended to be used around the holiday periods, so not to become overused. Looking for some icebreakers that aren’t related to this special holiday season? Check out these icebreakers below:
Holiday icebreaker questions are a great warm up before team meetings. This is because they combine the fun of holiday themed activities with the relevance of the workplace. The below holiday icebreaker questions for work are specially designed to be used in meetings to increase participation and collaboration between attendees:
Do you take time off work on holiday, or do you still work?
Have you ever taken time off to attend a conference? What was it like?
Do you take time off work in small chunks or save up for big breaks?
Have you ever gone on a holiday with a colleague?
Recommend a holiday destination to the person to your right.
Have you ever spent a holiday at the office? What was it like?
Pick someone in the room to go on holiday with. Explain why.
Fun holiday icebreaker questions
Holiday times are always celebratory and special. However, running meetings during holidays can be a drag for the team. By starting your meeting with these fun holiday icebreakers you’ll find that the team will engage more in the meeting, producing better outcomes; everyone will have something to say about these holiday icebreakers!
How long does it take your family to say goodbye after a holiday dinner?
Would you rather hear holiday-themed music forever, or never hear it again?
Would you rather visit a volcano or a rainforest?
Have you ever been to summer camp growing up?
Have you ever been to a Disney park?
Have you ever been out of the country? If so, what other countries have you visited?
Have you ever gone on a cruise? If so, where did you go and how long was the cruise?
Have you ever been to a theme park? If so, which one?
What’s your favorite holiday?
What is the longest trip you’ve ever taken? Where did you go?
What are the top five places on your bucket list to visit before you die?
What season best describes you? Winter, spring, summer or autumn?
What’s your favorite tradition or holiday?
Do you prefer beach or city vacation spots?
Would you rather spend a three-week trip visiting multiple interesting destinations or a single interesting one?
Where did you go on your last weekend trip?
You’ve been granted a one-way ticket to another country of your choice. Where are you going?
What's your best travel story?
Do you prefer traveling by airplanes or car?
Do you prefer to travel with others or alone?
Spring, summer, fall or winter: What’s your favorite season and why?
If money was no limit, what would be your dream holiday?
If you could visit any place in the world, where would it be?
If you could go to outer space for free, as a tourist, would you do it?
What essentials do you always pack?
Which option is better—check-in bags or carry-on?
How do you feel about staycations?
What’s the craziest thing that’s happened to you abroad?
Where would your ideal bachelor/bachelorette party be?
Do you pack last minute or days in advance?
How early before a flight do you arrive at the airport?
Have you ever had to do last minute holiday shopping?
Do you celebrate a holiday that nobody else celebrates?
You have a long weekend, how are you going to spend it?
What’s the longest journey you’ve ever taken to a holiday destination?
Have you ever lost your luggage?
Christmas icebreaker questions
The Christmas period is one of the most special times of the year. This time has a dramatic effect on the mood of most teams. Happiness and joy are somewhat abundant during this time and sentiment is usually high as people prepare for family time and time off work. What better subject to make people happy than to use one of the most happy times of the year. Using Christmas icebreaker questions leverages the positive feelings people have for Christmas and can use them for your meeting’s advantage; everyone always gets in a good mood when talking about Christmas!
What’s your favorite outdoor activity on Christmas day?
What’s the very first thing you usually do on Christmas Day?
What Christmas film do you always watch every year?
Describe a Christmas present you desperately desired as a child but never got.
Which Christmas song is your favorite or least favorite?
What humorous Christmas cards have you sent or received?
Which is better, eggnog or hot chocolate?
What’s your favorite Christmas tree decoration?
Did you used to wait up for Santa?
What toy or gift do you remember being on your Christmas list?
What’s your favorite Christmas dinner dish?
Thanksgiving Icebreaker questions
Have you ever had a tofurkey (tofu-turkey)? Fan or hater?
What is your favorite Thanksgiving dish?
What are you thankful for this year?
Do you have any Thanksgiving traditions?
How many people usually come to your Thanksgiving celebration?
Have you ever seen the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade live?
Pecan pie or pumpkin pie?
Halloween Icebreaker questions
Halloween is always a time that excites people, and these Halloween icebreaker questions are equally sure to excite your team with their crazy comparisons and made up situations. Spooky questions always get people excited and curious. Planning to have a team meeting around Halloween? Let your team’s imagination run wild with these fantastic Halloween icebreaker questions:
Would you rather have invisibility or flight powers?
Would you rather be in a zombie apocalypse or a robot apocalypse?
Would you rather be an Olympic gold medalist or an astronaut?
If aliens landed on earth and offered to take you with them, would you go?
If you became invisible for a day, what would you do?
If you could be any animal in the world, what animal would you choose to be?
If you could be any supernatural creature, what would you be and why?
If you were a superhero, what would your name be?
If you had a time machine, which time period would you visit?
If you had to swap your legs with those of an animal, which animal would you choose?
If you could have any superhuman power, what would it be?
If you could be any fictional character, who would you choose and why?
What is the greatest Halloween costume you have ever seen?
What's your favorite mythical creature?
If you could become a supernatural creature at night, what would it be, and why?
If you could live with any fictional character, who would you choose?
If you were reincarnated as an animal, which animal would it be and why?
Which fictional character would you want by your side during a zombie apocalypse?
It's your first day on the job as an evil villain. What is the first act of villandry you commit?
The zombie apocalypse is coming, what 3 people do you want on your team?
Would you choose teleportation or flying?
If you could have one superpower today, what would it be, and how would you use it?
If you could have any super power, what would it be?
What supernatural creature do you wish existed?
What superpower do you want to have?
New Year Icebreaker questions
Almost every tradition and culture around the world has a New Year's Eve celebration. These celebrations are always a happy and positive time for people as they reflect on the past, but also look to the future. These New Year's Eve icebreakers are perfectly designed to fit the theme and tone of New Year's Eve which makes them the ideal warm-up activity for meetings at that time of year:
What were your New Year's resolutions this year?
What have you never done before that you want to do next year?
Which bucket list item do you most want to check off this year?
Where did you celebrate your favorite New Years Eve?
How have you changed in the last year?
What three things would you like to accomplish this year?
Tell us one big problem you've been forced to solve this year.
Where were the best NYE fireworks that you’ve seen?
St. Patrick's Day icebreaker questions
St. Patrick's Day is a celebration of culture for around 150 million people all around the world. These St. Patrick's Day icebreaker questions have been inspired by the fun antics and celebrations of St. Patrick's Day. Use them to get your team in the right mood before your next meeting:
Do you have any crazy St. Patrick's Day stories?
Have you ever had Irish coffee?
Why do you think people wear green on St. Patrick's Day?
What do you think is really at the end of a rainbow?
Have you seen the Chicago River on St. Patrick’s Day?
Have you ever been to Ireland? How was it?
Wrapping Up
Holiday icebreaker questions are a great tool that every great meeting organizer should use. Using Holiday icebreakers will inject a new flavor of fun into your meetings; preventing them from becoming another dull and repetitive chore.
No matter the type of meeting: large, small, remote or in-person and regardless if it's a holiday period or not—these Holiday icebreakers, as well as other icebreaker games, should be used to best prime your team for a fantastic meeting.
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About the author
Ruth Hadari
Agile Advocate, Engineering Ops Expert
Highly experienced in leading multi-organizational teams, groups, in-shore as well as off-shore. The go-to person who is able to simplify the complex. An agile advocate, experienced in all common methodologies. Responsible for the entire software development lifecycle process from development, QA, DevOps, Automation to delivery including overall planning, direction, coordination, execution, implementation, control and completion. Drives execution, and communicates on status, risks, metrics, risk-mitigation and processes across R&D.
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