PULTEVENT
Guess the coworker game: 6 rounds of facts, photos and pets
The screen reads: 'Owns a tortoise that is older than this company.' Forty phones light up. Most of the room bets on the finance director, because she once mentioned a garden. The answer is Tom from IT, who has said perhaps nine words at team events in three years. He goes red, then spends the next half hour explaining tortoise lifespans to a crowd. That's the whole point of this game.
★ Free for the first 3 days, no card required
Guessing which colleague a fact belongs to is one of the oldest team games around, and it keeps working because people are more interesting than their job titles. The weak version is a sheet of paper passed round the table. The version I run puts one fact at a time on the big screen, collects guesses from everyone's phone, and makes a small event out of each reveal.
It suits onboarding weeks, mixed-department days and any team that has grown faster than people's ability to learn names. You run it from a laptop browser connected to a projector or TV. Colleagues scan a QR code and guess on their phones, no app and no sign-up, as long as their phones are online.
Six rounds for a guess-the-coworker game
1 The fun fact round
One fact per slide, from harmless to astonishing. Has met a prime minister. Was an extra in a horror film. Can recite the periodic table. Phones guess the owner.
How to run it. Open with a fact that belongs to someone senior. It gives everyone else permission to be a bit silly.
It's the core of the game and the fastest way to get people talking to someone they've only ever emailed.
2 Baby photos
Childhood photos of colleagues, one at a time, and phones pick which grown-up this used to be. Then the reveal names them.
How to run it. Include a range of ages and departments. If everyone in the round is from marketing, marketing wins.
Reliable laughter, and the round that people ask to see again at the next party.
3 Match the pet
Photos of colleagues' pets. The dog in a raincoat, the cat asleep on a laptop, one very confident chicken. Phones guess the owner.
How to run it. Ask owners for a one-line caption to read out at the reveal: the pet's name and one ridiculous habit.
Pet photos cost people nothing to share, so even the shyest colleagues join in.
4 Which one isn't true?
Three statements about one colleague, two real and one invented by you. Phones choose the fake.
How to run it. Write the fake one with the colleague so it's plausible and something they're happy to be associated with.
It turns one person into the center of attention for a minute, in a way they agreed to.
5 Where did they grow up?
A multiple-choice round on hometowns, first jobs or the strangest place someone has lived. Good for international teams.
How to run it. Add a photo of the town to each answer reveal. It makes the moment feel like a small travel story.
People start swapping stories about places, which is how actual friendships at work begin.
6 Team final and the reveal of the night
Scores from all rounds collect on the team scoreboard. For the last reveal, bring the tortoise owner's name and photo up on a splash screen.
How to run it. Save your best fact for last and let the room chant a guess before you reveal it.
A game about people should end on a person, not a points total.
Facts collected in advance
Each person sends one surprising fact. Name and fact go into Guess the Guest, and any photo they send can become a card in Guess the Photo.
Everyone guesses at once
Phones answer together, so the room isn't waiting for one table to decide. The reveal lands for everybody at the same moment.
Names and faces stick
Each reveal puts the colleague's name on the screen, often with a photo. New hires leave knowing a dozen people by sight.
Teams keep it moving
Play in teams and the scoreboard gives the game a finish line and a winner.
Collecting facts without making anyone uncomfortable
Send a short private form a week before. One fact, optional photo, optional pet photo. Say clearly that 'skip' is fine and that facts will only be shown on the day. Then read every answer yourself before it goes on the screen.
Leave out anything about health, family troubles, religion, politics, money or relationships, even when someone volunteered it. People sometimes write things at their desk they wouldn't want read aloud to eighty colleagues. When in doubt, message the person and check. Nobody has ever been annoyed that I asked.
Why it works so well for onboarding
A new hire in their first fortnight knows names from email signatures and not much else. Twenty minutes of this game gives them faces, stories and something to talk about at the coffee machine. Mix new starters and old hands on each team so the veterans explain the context behind each reveal.
Ask new starters for facts too. The one where the newest person turns out to have rowed across a lake at night is the one that makes them part of the group.
Running it in the room and on a call
In an office, the laptop goes to the meeting room projector over HDMI and you keep the host console on your own screen. Guests scan the QR on the wall and guess from their seats.
For a remote team, share the stage window in your video call. Colleagues scan the code from their monitors and play on their phones, and the call stays for faces and reactions. Ask the person behind each fact to unmute for the reveal. Hearing them laugh about it is half the fun.
What you need
A laptop with a browser, a screen the room can see, and internet on both the laptop and every guest's phone. There's no offline mode. Office Wi-Fi or mobile data both work.
The host console is being localized into English, and each phone shows the guest screens in its own language. Since every fact in this game comes from your own team, there's no pre-written content to worry about.
Demo and license
Put five facts into the free 3-day demo and try it with a couple of colleagues, no card involved. Keeping it afterwards means a one-time license, no subscription. The price is on https://pultevent.ru/en/, and you can start at https://pultevent.ru/login.html?mode=register&next=/app/
About the author
PULTEVENT was built by Ruslan Barashkin, who has hosted events since 2014: more than 500 weddings, office parties and birthdays. TOP 100 Awards named him best host in Moscow in 2024 and in Saint Petersburg in 2023, and he still runs his own nights from this console. More at pultevent.ru/en.
How to run a guess-the-coworker game
- 1
A week before, send a private form asking for one fact and optional baby and pet photos.
- 2
Read every entry, drop anything too personal and check borderline ones with the colleague.
- 3
Add names and facts to Guess the Guest and the photos to Guess the Photo.
- 4
Split everyone into mixed teams and put the team list on the scoreboard.
- 5
Connect the laptop to the screen, show the QR code and let everyone join.
- 6
Play the six rounds, save your best fact for last and announce the winning team.
FAQ
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See also
Run brighter events — with PULTEVENT
All audience interactions, a second screen and timing in one app. Guests join by QR — internet is needed for you and for them.
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