Desert Team Building
The desert takes away every familiar reference, and a team finds out what it has of its own
What it looks like
A day out among the dunes: the terrain, the heat, the team finding its bearings.
The desert is a landscape and it’s also a classroom. It’s the family that puts a team through real conditions, where the environment itself sets the problem: no shade, no signposts, no familiar landmarks, and a group that has to decide anyway. We run it across Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
A route to find with a map and a compass, a night shelter to build, a checkpoint to reach before the others: in situations like these the group has to decide quickly, with incomplete information and in uncomfortable conditions. They’re exactly the conditions a company makes its difficult decisions in, except that here it happens in a day and you can watch it while it happens.
Away from everything, group dynamics get simpler and louder. People who tend to take charge take more charge. People who tend to hang back do it sooner. In the debrief that material is gold.
Safety. Every Desert format runs with professional instructors, certified equipment and expert desert guides. The word extreme describes the environment and the feeling, and the level of risk stays controlled.
When it makes sense to choose it
It works well if
- the stated objective is handling pressure, a crisis or a change
- the team has already worked together and you want to go past the icebreaker
- the group is small or medium: below 30 people these formats give a great deal more
- there’s a genuine willingness to leave the comfort zone, which is worth checking beforehand rather than assuming
It works less well if
- the group is mixed and not everyone chose to be there: a desert format imposed on people produces resistance instead of learning
- the occasion is a company celebration, where Cooking, Music or Creative suit it better
- the dates are fixed in high summer: from May to September the middle of the day is out of the question, and the comfortable window runs from November to March
When what surfaces deserves an afterwards
An activity surfaces a great deal about how a team communicates, decides and works together, and sometimes what surfaces deserves more time, more depth and a method. That is where a Team Coaching path can begin: a different road, to be taken only if it is needed, to turn what the day made visible into a new way of working together.
Discover Team Coaching →
Let’s talk about your next team building
You don’t need to have picked a format yet. Tell us what you want your team to take home, how many of you there are and where you’ll be, and we’ll do the rest: within 24 hours you get a considered proposal for your case, with the formats that hold up against your numbers, and what each one leaves the team the day after.
Prefer to talk? +971 50 795 9666 · info @ teambuildingincentive.ae
The five formats
Orienteering puts a map and a compass in the team’s hands and a set of flagged checkpoints among the dunes, in a specified order, with a puzzle at each one. Survival takes away the usual resources and asks the group to manage with what the ground offers, alongside trainers who hand over the basics and then watch. Desert Training is the full day deep in the desert, on foot, by camel or in a quad, with challenges drawn from both of the others. Quad Orienteering adds the engine: staggered departures, a compass, a checkpoint card to stamp, and the fastest team with a full card wins. And the Treasure Hunt runs among the dunes as readily as it does through a city.
Desert Training
A full day deep in the desert, with expert desert guides. On foot, by camel or in a quad: endurance, navigation and decisions taken where there’s very little to draw on.
Survival
The group manages with what the ground offers, alongside instructors who hand over the basics and then watch. How comfortable it gets depends on how well it collaborates.
Orienteering
A timed challenge among the dunes with a map and a compass: one shared strategy, one leader, and nobody left behind.
Treasure Hunt
A chain of clues through a place chosen for its story, with actors playing the characters. It runs among the dunes as readily as it does through a city.