How Edith Macy helps teams trade screen time for green time.
Summer is prime time for team bonding, but not in the “let’s sit in a conference room and brainstorm synergy” kind of way.
When the sun’s out and attention spans are short, the best team building isn’t a slide deck.
It’s an experience.
The energy in your team can shift dramatically when you take them off mute and offline.
Whether it’s to reward a successful quarter, kickstart a new initiative, or just shake the cobwebs out of the group dynamic, summer team-building events can be the spark your company didn’t know it needed.
Fresh Air, Fresh Perspectives
Moving beyond the boardroom is more than just a fun idea—it’s a strategy.
Outdoor team building helps foster creativity, break down hierarchy, and ignite authentic conversations.
Nature doesn’t just offer a beautiful backdrop. It reduces stress, increases dopamine, and opens up space physically and mentally for new thinking. Walking meetings, picnic-style strategy sessions, and trail-based breakout groups create natural momentum and spontaneity.
This is the time to ditch the PowerPoint in favor of power walks.
As Patti Caulfield at Edith Macy Center says, “We can have a meeting indoors and then move it outdoors… breakout rooms that are set along our nature trails or outside on our patios.”
Your team’s next big idea might be one hike away.
It’s Not About Trust Falls Anymore
Team building in 2025 doesn’t need to be cheesy. (Unless you’re hosting a wine and cheese offsite—which, fair.)
The best summer activities feel relaxed, optional, and maybe even a bit silly.
Here are a few ideas teams are loving right now:
- The Great Office Bake-Off: Use an outdoor space and let teams compete in light-hearted cooking or s’mores challenges.
- Trail Trivia: Combine a nature walk with a mobile quiz to engage minds and movement.
- DIY Olympics: Think obstacle courses, canoe relays, or cornhole tournaments.
- Silent Strategy Sessions: Split teams into small groups in quiet natural areas, give them a problem to solve, and see how a fresh environment changes their thinking.
Edith Macy, for example, integrates “team building that’s either facilitated or something that is included as part of your package,” says Caulfield. “We have so much that can reenergize your team, get them back on track, or reconnect them again.”
But even if you’re not working with a retreat center, a park or local garden can offer many of the same benefits.
The key is to blend light physical activity with intentional opportunities to connect.
Make It Stick
The best team-building doesn’t end when the sun goes down.
Follow up your summer offsite with actions that carry the energy forward:
- Let the team vote on their favorite moment and memorialize it (video, photo book, Slack badge—you name it).
- Reflect with a short group share on what they learned about each other.
- Reintroduce one small element of the retreat into your regular work routine (e.g., outdoor 1:1s, walking meetings).
Places like Edith Macy Center are great for helping teams reset because they know the formula: “We have so many options to choose from… you can skip some rocks, play games, or walk the trails,” says Caulfield. “We can make the options incorporate team building… and send them back better and more focused.”
But you don’t need a lake to skip rocks. You just need mental, physical, and social space for your team to show up as people, not just job titles.
Your Summer Strategy Starts Here
The office doesn’t have to be the only place where great ideas happen. In fact, summer might be the only season when not having a meeting might get you further. Use the weather, the longer days, and that collective yearning for a break to your advantage.
Go outside. Get messy. Let your team breathe a little.
Then bring them back stronger than ever.
Ready to book your summer team building event? Reach out to us here >>