10 Creative Walking Challenge Ideas to Get Your Employees Moving

ideas to get employees moving

10 Creative Walking Challenge Ideas to Get Employees Moving

ideas to get employees moving

Do you want to get your employees to exercise more? The best way is by making it fun. Put a fun twist on the old coin toss. Ask employees to stand and hold out their hands, one palm up and the other down. Turn over a quarter and let it land on the floor heads mean they have to switch hands, tails mean they stay put. The best 10 creative walking challenge ideas to get employees moving are explained below.

1) Put a sticker near the coffee machine that says “the first person to get back from taking a break gets this free coffee.”

2) Bring in some colored chalk for an indoor sidewalk maze. Every time you turn, draw another line. See if you can find your way out–or make loops to see how many times you can make a figure-8.

3) At the end of a hallway, put two small buckets, upside down. See how many steps you can take before spilling the “beads” (or whatever gummy/sweet/etc item you decide to use).

4) If your company is playing music over the loudspeakers, play some dance tunes and see who

5) Get a small ball for each person, something that bounces well but also fits inside an open hand so it can fit through a hoop on the ground. See how many hoops they can make the ball travel through.

6) Draw a tic-tac-toe board on the sidewalk with chalk, then take turns drawing Xs and Os. If you get three in a row, take three steps forward. First-person to reach the finish line wins.

7) Ask employees to come up with creative ways to put their desk/office supplies to use (e.g., stapler as a jump rope, calculator as weight, etc).

8) For golf fans, get two balls and one club for each employee. See who can make the “best” shot–where “best” is decided ahead of time.

9) Make up a wacky obstacle course and time employees as they complete it. This can be done outside or inside, just use your imagination.

10) See how many water cooler conversations you can have with other employees in one day. For each conversation, take a drink of water. At the end of the week, total how much water was consumed (and see if there’s a correlation between how much walking was done and how much water was drunk).

What Are The Benefits Of Walking At Work?

Regular exercise is a cognitive and mood booster that has been scientifically proven. Your first thought may be to send your employees to the gym, but not everyone in the workplace can afford it, and some people are opposed to sweating.

What Are The Benefits Of Walking At Work
What Are The Benefits Of Walking At Work
  • Promotes a healthy lifestyle
  • Boosts employee morale and facilitates socialization
  • Aids in weight loss
  • Improves concentration and productivity
  • Decreases the risk of heart disease and diabetes
  • Increases productivity and creativity.
  • Boosts self-esteem.
  • Fights depression and anxiety

Other Walking Challenge Ideas to Get Employees Moving

Walking is a great way to increase your energy, lose weight, and feel more productive. In addition, it helps you clear your head and focus on the task at hand. If you’re having trouble getting started, try one of the following motivational tips. Now we’re going to dive into creative worksite walking challenge ideas to get employees moving.

Walk the Talk

For this challenge, participants need to walk to work or take public transport instead of driving. Then, they must walk for at least 20 minutes every day. On days when they drive, they need to get out and stretch their legs for at least five minutes.

The 100 Mile Club

This challenge encourages employees to walk one mile for every mile that they travel by car or by public transportation each day over the course of 100 days.

The Office Sprint

Set up a walking track and sprint each day and see who can reach the target distance first. Employees pair up while walking and share something fun or meaningful while pacing back and forth. This is a good opportunity to learn more about your colleagues on a personal level.

Take A Stroll

take a stroll with employees

Employees can walk with their supervisor or a company leader every morning before work starts to learn about the day’s agenda.

Participate in a fitness club at least once a month, and enjoy monthly challenges to motivate each other during the entire process.

Lunchtime Fitness

Conduct a lunchtime fitness challenge and make it a competition between teams. The winning team can get anything from bragging rights to an extra day of vacation.

Take The Stairs

Participants need to climb at least five floors during work hours and track their progress in a log for 30 days or more.

Walk, Don’t Run

Participants walk instead of running during their lunchtime break and track their progress in a log for 30 days or more.

Any of these challenges can help boost morale, increase productivity, promote a healthy lifestyle, and support the company’s wellbeing initiatives.

Create A Challenge

create a challenge

If your employees are competitive – or if they just want to get away from their desks for a while – consider creating a simple walking challenge. You could use our 10,000 steps per day challenge as an inspiration to create something similar.

Incorporate A Stopwatch Or Tracker

You can inspire employees to walk more by getting them to track their steps with a stopwatch or pedometer. This makes it easier to see how much they’re walking and what sort of progress they’re making as individuals and as teams. You might even reward the most active team with an afternoon treat.

Get A Walk Buddy

We all want to feel like we’re part of something bigger than ourselves, and that’s exactly what happens when you walk with others. You can work as a group or encourage individuals to form walking buddy relationships. This way, there’s peer pressure (in a nice way) to move more throughout the day.

Set A Meeting Location Outside

When arranging meetings, consider selecting a meeting location outside of your traditional conference room or office space. This is a great way to make walking a part of your daily meetings and encourage communication outside of the workplace.

Work Out With Your Employees

Encourage employees to work out together during the day. They could go for a walk, run, or even do yoga. This is great for your employees’ health and helps them form relationships with one another. Organize a walking challenge and make it a contest against two teams. Employees need to step up and see who can log the most steps each day for 30 days or more.

Establish A Walking Route For Your Employees

walking route for employeesBuilding a walking route throughout the day is one of the best ideas to get employees moving and easy to implement. You can use an online tool and encourage them to try it out each day. This is another way to make meeting locations outside of the workplace and have walking meetings. Walking is a great way to increase your energy, lose weight, and feel more productive. In addition, it helps you clear your head and focus on the task at hand. If you’re having trouble getting started, try one of the following motivational tips.

Create An Outdoor Meeting Space With Seating

Create an outdoor meeting space (with seating) near your office where employees can meet outside. These types of spaces create a more collaborative environment and help break the monotony of indoor meetings. Plus, fresh air is always beneficial!

Ask Workers To Take Breaks Outside

You can also encourage walking by asking workers to take their breaks outside. This might sound counter-intuitive – you don’t want your employees talking too much or too loudly when they’re supposed to be getting fresh air – but studies show that employees are much more productive after returning inside.

Set Meeting Deadlines, Not Times

An easy way to get employees moving is to set meeting deadlines instead of setting meeting start times. This creates a sense of urgency and helps walkers coordinate their schedules so that they can arrive at the meeting at a specific time.

Play Music While Walking

It might be hard to believe, but listening to music while walking has been shown to motivate people tremendously and increase their productivity by about 20%. It helps walkers stay focused on the task at hand and forget about any distractions that may arise throughout the day.

Create A Walking Club

If your employees are serious about increasing their daily walks, consider creating a walking club. This not only encourages workers to walk more during the day but also helps build relationships between co-workers who have similar goals. All you have to do is gather walkers together and discuss why they’re taking part in the challenge.

Obstacles People May Experience

In today’s fast-paced and sedentary society where obesity is on the rise. It is more critical than ever to get your employees moving and work towards their fitness goals.

Here are some obstacles we found people experience while following these ideas to get employees in a walking challenge. They may feel:

  • Lack of motivation or enthusiasm for exercise.
  • Concerns about safety during difficult weather conditions such as extreme cold or rain.
  • Fear of embarrassing themselves if they’re not “walking” with the fastest group.
  • Absence of social interaction among team members due to commuting alone in private vehicles.
  • Lack of proper physical preparation and physical fitness.
  • Lack of knowledge about the correct walking technique and technique improvement tips.
  • Difficulties in tracking and recording daily steps and progress (which can lead to a lack of motivation).

To help overcome those obstacles, we have developed a creative series of “team-building”

It is important to not only keep your employees healthy but also help them stay happy at work. A walking challenge can be an excellent way for you and good ideas to get employees moving while having fun. The 10 creative ideas we’ve provided should provide some inspiration when planning out the details of your next walk-a-thon. We hope these challenges will motivate you and encourage you to come up with even more creative events in the future because health doesn’t always have to involve boring workouts or special equipment. Let us know how it goes for you. If you have any questions or comments just let us know.

A Word From Mantra care

If you are willing to implement an employee wellness program at your workplace to reduce stress in organizations. Mantra Care is a suitable healthcare organization. We provide several employee wellness programs that will help your employees attain good health. And will decrease the healthcare costs, absenteeism, and boost the productivity as well, of the organization.

Do you want to keep your employees happy, healthy, and productive? Join our employee assistance program and get a healthier workplace.

Try MantraCare Wellness Program free