12 Inspiring & Fresh Ideas for Company Trips

One of the best perks of working in a company would be getting to go for company outings and almost all expenses paid, work mode off, and all you have to do is just be there, have fun and enjoy all the moments they have to offer.

However, company trips are also one of the toughest things for human resources officers to come up with ideas to make these trips as pleasant and delightful as possible.

The pressure of organizing a nice outing for the company is also greater especially when you hope the trip brings great experiences and wonderful memories to your company employees.

Sometimes, you just feel like doing away with company trips at all since planning and organizing one can be quite a pain but nope, you still have to do it anyway.

Clueless about activity for your company outing? Below is our 12 Fresh Ideas for Company Trips, wildly brainstormed and carefully picked to give you the best company outing suggestions!

Importance of Company Trips

Before we reviewed 12 of our fresh company trip ideas to you, what makes company outings so important that each year, many companies set aside a portion of their budget solely for these road trips?

Better teamwork, baby! Company trips tend to increase teamwork among employees as the many events that occur throughout the trips usually require them to help one another and work as a team to ensure the success and smoothness of their outing.

Great teamwork also requires a high degree of fondness working together with your colleagues, which is why companies like Eventbrite and Vungle organise fun outings for their employees to engage with each other on a more personal level, leading to future improved collaborations when it comes to work.

Stronger bonds than UHU glue? Outings also help to tighten relationships between employees as they are now socialising out of working hours and exposed to a more casual side of their colleagues.

Seniority and position are usually put aside in these occasions, which allows employees to get to know one another better without having superiority to become a barrier in their communication, as mentioned in the article by Mashable.

Creativity, recharged! Creative ideas and inspirations at work come only when the brain is relaxed and works productively. And the way to achieve this is through team outings; with an informal setting and the chance to slack and take things easy, this will help spark great ideation and innovation post-trip.

Companies like Wildbit acknowledges this fact: and that’s why they host annual 7-night retreat as an effort to pause the stress mode that comes with work and focus on rejuvenating their team instead.

Now that you know the importance of company trips, it’s time to plan one!

12 Fresh Ideas for Company Trips in Malaysia

1. Cooking Class, so that your company pantry becomes the next Masterchef kitchen

As unconventional as it sounds, sending your colleagues away for a cooking class is a lovely way to let them bond over food. This is a great chance for them to learn cooking, which could be a plus point if your company ever needs helping hands in preparing food for some small function. Not to mention, it also acts as a handy survival knowledge for their own benefit.

While attending a cooking class may sound like something couples do for dates, look at it from a different perspective learning to cook together promotes teamwork among employees from prepping ingredients to cooking dishes.

If you are thinking of something practical for a teambuilding cum company outing activity, this is the perfect event.

And the next thing you know, your company pantry gets transformed into the next Masterchef kitchen!

2. Survival Camp, so that your employees can survive another work day

Yes, you heard us right: you could consider signing up your company team to a survival camp. In Malaysia, you can find many jungle survival camps for teambuilding purposes, where participants will be guided and taught in a jungle setting on the basic survival knowledge such as shelter construction, tying knots, making fire, identifying medicinal plants and more.

While this outing is not your typical company getaway trip, a survival camp serves as a terrific avenue to sharpen employee critical thinking skills and promotes creativity and innovation in a way (think Bear Grylls when it comes to surviving in the wild).

Not only that, this is the activity where you get to know who is best skilled at which area, which is crucial and applicable to your company’s work setting in times of emergencies and crises.

3. Group Yoga, the perfect activity to relax and unwind with colleagues

Yoga has become one of the most popular activities in the recent years as it is a great way to exercise and maintain your overall wellbeing. A study was published online by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, stating that yoga helps to improve the condition of low back pains. Other benefits of yoga include improved flexibility, respiration and energy, as well as reducing stress and sharpening concentration.

Why not take the opportunity to have your employees attend a yoga session so that they can manage their stress in a healthy way? Let your employees rest, relax and unwind via yoga so that they can return back to work feeling revitalised.

4. Hiking, for a nice sweaty exercise, bonding time and improved mental health

If yoga is not your kind of exercise or company outing, you can consider making your company trip a group hiking session instead.

Just like yoga, hiking gives you plenty of health benefits and also boosts your mood. A study done by Gregory Bratman, a graduate student at Stanford University showed that walking in a natural environment helps raise your creativity and happiness level plus improve your mental health you can expect a happier and calmer lot of co-workers after a hill or mountain hike.

Not only that, hiking also provides a platform for employees to mingle around and bond with one another, chatting about casual things they otherwise would not have done in the air-conditioned office.

5. Group Photography Class, for a fun photo taking session!

Employees love to take selfies and wefies and groupfies? It’s time to send them all for a group photography class to enhance their photo taking skills!

On the surface, group photography class may seem like a boring thing to attend but give it a shot (pun intended), and you will find that it helps your co-workers explore and sharpen their creativity in a fun, relatable way.

Taking photos is not just as simple as clicking that camera button in fact, there are many photography settings to play around with such as brightness, exposure, lens aperture, ISO and more to capture that perfect or near-perfect picture of the intended effect.

A photography class will challenge your co-workers on seeing things from different perspectives and appreciating the beauty of the different angles. Not to mention, your company could probably save on photography costs for company events now that you have an army of knowledgeable photographers!

6. Mural Painting, for the opportunity to unleash the Picasso within

This is something unique for a company outing: Mural painting. You have seen some walls in your city being painted with colorful murals, and these murals spark joy and liveliness in an otherwise gloomy, boring space.

Why not organize a mural painting activity to brighten your office areas or paint for the community (you will have to get permission first though)? Mural painting provides the opportunity for employees to work together to create art that lasts for a long time, fostering stronger relationships while having fun at that.

Mural painting can also serve as a brilliant advertising tool people will remember your company for beautifying the community, just like how they remember this one renowned artist Ernest Zacharevic for painting lovely murals and doing interactive street art in Penang that it was covered by The Star newspaper. Time to unleash the Picasso within your co-workers!

7. Comedy Show, the time to laugh your heads off

Say yes to comedy shows! A proven stress reliever, a comedy show is a refreshing way to rope your fellow co-workers in for a big laugh.

Well, what better way to bond with colleagues than laughing in a room together? While this type of outing sounds simple and effortless for employees, the frequent cracking up makes the company trip more interactive, vibrant and energizing.

What’s more important is that your employees will find themselves letting loose for once and enjoying the moments just laughing the day or evening away. After all, laughter is the best medicine for the mind and body, as affirmed by this HelpGuide article.

8. Field Trip, a learning vacation, the grown-up edition

Talk about field trips, and you will think back about the times you and your high school friends went to some museums or educational tours led by school teachers. The idea is exactly the same, except this time, it’s the grown-up edition.

Not everyone has been to the same places of interest or visited popular spots before so a company trip to these places would be a good chance for them to explore, experience and learn a thing or two about the venues. There are many places you could plan to host your company field trip: Historical sites, famous tourist spots, popular religious institutions.

So ready to go on a field trip, people?

9. Fashion Show, to find your company’s next Top Model

Rather than going out exploring the city, you could actually consider hosting a Fashion Show in your company or a third-party space!

Give employees a set of materials, tools and fixed time, and you will be surprised at how creative and innovative they turn out to be! You can get some ideas from Jambar Team Building’s The Fashion Show Game.

This is the time to test your co-workers creative juices and develop their communication skills as well as improving their task delegation when it comes to designing and presenting their fashion pieces.

Go for a Fashion Show if you are looking for a fresh change of event when planning for a company trip!

10. Coffee Tasting, for the love of coffee at workplace

Almost everyone loves coffee and need to have a cuppa to start the day. But not everyone is equipped with sound knowledge on the different types of coffee nor the skill to note the assorted flavor profiles.

With coffee tasting or otherwise known as coffee cupping, your employees will have a chance to learn in depth about the one beverage that unites the entire office.

Throughout the coffee tasting session, your co-workers will learn the proper way to check the quality of the coffee. They will be introduced to the various aspects of coffee notes: cleanness, sweetness, acidity, mouthfeel, and aftertaste. And the best part? They get to drink coffee of course!

11. Talent Show, an avenue for self-expression and creativity

Break away from the conventional company trip and host a Talent Show instead! Give your co-workers a space for expressing their deepest talents by transforming your company outing into a Talent Show equivalent to America’s Got Talent, a popular talent show series in the United States.

To spice things up, you could consider setting a time limit to their performance and preparing some rewards for winners of the show. You can host this at a venue out of your company, at event spaces for example.

Letting your employees participate in a Talent Show will prove beneficial in boosting their creativity while having fun performing in front of their other colleagues. Just let your co-workers showcase their talents and shine on stage for once!

12. Trash Pickup, as part-outing and part community service

Trash pickup, you say? We know you might have looks of disbelief but we can assure you this is a great initiative as part of your company outing and community service.

This trash picking activity helps to remind each and every employee about the importance of environmental cleanliness, which is applicable to their workplace. Apart from that, this outing also serves as a gentle reminder to remain humble, practise teamwork and to be environmentally conscious.

Trash pickup may not be the first company trip idea you have in mind but if you can make the environment a cleaner, better place to stay, why not?

With the many fresh ideas for company trips above, picking one may seem difficult. At the end of the day, it depends on the objectives and expected outcomes you have in mind when planning for company outings. You can always engage one of the travel agency like us to plan the trips for you though.

Company trips ideas do not have to be just solely vacations but they could be something more fun, different and refreshing as a way to bond and bring colleagues together in a light and easy setting. The most important thing is to have all employees participate and enjoy the processes and moments during the trips to achieve that rewarding feeling.

Enjoy reading this article? Preach it to others, people!

Have other suggestion for company trip in Malaysia? Feel free to drop your comments below!