10 Office Fitness Challenge Ideas

It is always good to have some fun while working. Consistent activity can significantly reduce sick days, keep stress level lower and energy level higher. At the same time, at-work but non-formal activity helps to bond with colleagues and the company itself. This, on the other hand, means more motivated employees and better performance. But how to organize an office fitness challenge?

Step Challenge (at Work)

Walking does not require equipment or the acquisition of a new skill. You can choose your own pace, place, time and, whatever the weather, you can walk almost all the time. However, if you turn walking into a challenge, participants do not need to have a device other than a smartphone to see how many times they have put one foot in front of the other on the way home.

It also does not matter whether workers are walking in the same country or getting their legs tested on different continents. So it is easy for an organiser to get a friendly corporate step challenge going and analyze the data later.

Virtual Training

Over the past 2 years, digital skills have taken on new dimensions around the world and computer screens have lit up homes day and night. So why not take advantage of this to refresh employees with home workplace challenges? There are people in every company who know how to challenge the muscles of their co-workers – so take advantage of this opportunity in the modern age.

But it is also easy to find a specialist in a particular sport on the internet, who, via webcam, can deliver a class to hundreds of employees wherever they are – be it yoga, bodypump or dance.

Active Meetings

Who has stipulated that meetings must necessarily be conducted sitting around a table? Since we have been attending many meetings in our own beds lately, why not go for a walk at the same time? Or do 7 squats every 10 minutes? First, it helps to keep the body awake and focused, but it also adds a little extra movement.

So why not make it a team tradition? It's what we do in YuMuuv – every morning during the team meetings we have a walk, ride bikes or do squats in different places through the phone screens. Not only are our meetings so mobile, but we can also help your company integrate activity into your company culture.

Collective Goal

There are plenty of opportunities to measure individual achievements with colleagues, but you can also set a team-wide/company-wide goal and then work together to achieve it. For example, collect 50,000 burned calories in a month with a team and then draw some prizes between participants or, if the target is achieved, the company makes a donation to a pre-agreed organisation.

The same can be done with steps, for example. If activity monitors are available, it can also be done with exercise minutes or with an activity index.

“Let’s Meet on the Stairs” Day

Probably the simplest, but most unpopular action – preferring stairs to lifts. Make an agreement with colleagues that on Wednesdays we will meet on the stairs and the lift doors will stay closed. That way you can get your pulse up just before you sit down at your desk, but also get extra steps for the day.

However, if the office is on the 26th floor and there's plenty of walking up and down, you could also take the stairs to the last 4 floors, for example – there are options for every situation!

Consistency Challenge

As we all know, habits are things that make the difference. That's why we developed a new challenge type – Consistency challenges. It means that now on you can do your corporate activity challenges based on a consistency. Awesome, right?

For example, there's 31 days in a month, and you set as a goal to get 10k steps a day. Then the participants have to accomplish that goal at least in 16 days (over 50%). We have written more about that in our annual plan blog post as well.

Charity Challenge

Charity challenges are getting more popular month by month. The logic behind that is easy – you set a goal and as a prize amount of money or things the corporate will donate per participant, who accomplishes the goal.

For example the goal is to make 200k steps in a month and per participant, who reaches it, corporate will donate a 10€ to physically disabeled people. We also have one example of active charity challenge in our blog.

Active Birthday Celebrations

Every company has its birthday, why not celebrate it actively instead of eating a cake? Not that cake is a bad idea, but maybe after a little walk? We have seen many step celebrations, and its coolest idea, a million steps for the 1st birthday and so on.

So for example, if your company is getting 50,why not to do the 50 000 000 steps? It's a bib number, but for example if you have 25 employees, it means that everyone has to do averagely only 5556 steps a day for a year and 50mil steps are yours! And then connect it with charity challenge and for example, donate 100€ to the local non-profit for every million steps you make together.

Burn These Calories

Calorie challenge can be really fun if you want to! Basically, in YuMuuv you always see how many calories have burnt in a day/week/month or if your challenge is even longer than a month then during the whole challenge. A user even sees that have (s)he burnt needed amount of calories during the day based on users' age, height and weight.

And if you have burnt a lot of calories, why not to eat some of them back?! That's what we have heard some of our clients do. They burn thousands of calories and then have a fun lunch together to eat all the good stuff. Spirited time together!

YuMuuv Annual Plan

Yep, we have it, and you don't have to worry about anything! All is prepared for you and inserting these goals will take maximum 10 minutes. 10 minutes and during the whole year you don't have to worry about it. Every challenge is justified and carefully placed. You can check out our example annual plan.

If you think it would be great to organise workplace wellness challenges for your employees, but you don't have the energy and time to put into it, don't worry, book a demo or contact us – we'll take the pressure off you and offer more exciting opportunities!