Display Shelf Business Game

Teams have 14 pieces of plastic shelving with grooves cut in various places, enabling them to fit together to form a display shelf. They have up to 60 minutes to develop an assembly method that can produce a finished display shelf in less than 30 seconds. Teams find it very difficult, but through planning and effective teamwork, it has been done in 15 seconds!

Effective planning, performance management and continuous improvement, teamwork, and the ability to work in small sub-groups are essential for success.

This training game highlights the importance of individual contributions to the achievement of group tasks. It is also very effective for drawing out the characteristics of effective management and leadership.

We also provide instructions and team briefing notes to run this activity in four different ways, including:

• Dividing into planning and implementation teams. See how well they work together and discover many learning points to apply in the workplace.
• Competing to see which team completes it quickest. They will soon learn “More haste, less speed” and “Failing to plan is planning to fail!”

If you think this is easy, try it. There is a lot to learn from this!

• The original Large Display Shelf shelving measures 105 cm x 95 cm.
• The half-size Table Top version measures 53 cm x 48 cm.
• The small shelving is just as challenging, but easier to transport and teams can try it on a smaller surface.

The focus of shelving is on developing teamwork, continuous improvement and problem solving.  This exercise also brings out these useful training areas:

• Communication
• Inter-team / Department
• Leadership and management
• Performance management
• Planning
• Problem solving
• Project management
• Team cooperation
• Time management.

It’s excellent:

• As an ice breaker or energiser
• As an assessment tool as part of your recruitment process
• For conferences, seminars, team building events and offsites.

See a video of a team making this activity look easy (after planning, practice and working together as a team).

Display Shelf construction game is also known as Planks, Gridlock and Shelving Exercise. Our version is made from plastic, which is lighter and cleaner. This means we have reduced the cost to buy and deliver the activity. Our trainer’s guide also gives you four variations of the activity to choose from.

• Display Shelf Business Game PDF
• Business Games Brochure
• Course Brochure
• Team Building Brochure

“Great value; we use it for many different training courses.”

“Easy for the facilitator to use, but challenging with lots of learning for the users.”

“I wish I found this game earlier it has so many uses.”

• Multiple games can be played at once to accommodate groups larger than 8.  One trainer can potentially facilitate up to four games.
• Additional materials and licences are required to play more than one game at a time:  Two games are required for 9-16 participants, three games for 17-24 participants, etc.
• There’s no restriction on the number of times you can use our games.
• You can buy the original large Display Shelf or the smaller tabletop size.  The game is otherwise the same.
• It is possible to play Display Shelf in other languages if the trainer verbally translates the English instructions.