One Word Each
One word for how you're arriving. Round the room, no explaining.
Everyone gives a single word for how they are arriving, or leaving, with no explanation allowed. It takes two minutes for a room of forty and it tells you more about where a group actually is than any amount of asking how everyone is.
One word from each of you: how are you feeling right now? Not how you think you should be feeling — the honest one. Tired is a perfectly good answer. Just the word, no explaining it, and pass if you'd rather. Nearest the screen goes first.
You need to know where a room actually is before you start, or you want to close a session honestly in two minutes.
Props: None
Run this when…
If none of these is your room, pick another.Opening a session and needing an honest read
Closing a session or a difficult day
A team check-in that must not take twenty minutes
How to run it
Written to be glanced at mid-room, not memorised.
- Everyone stays seated. The person nearest the screen goes first, then round the room.
- One word each, no explanation, and nobody comments on anybody's word.
- If you want to set the level, give yours before the round starts — something honest rather than something upbeat.
- Move briskly. A room of forty takes about two minutes.
- Anyone who wants to pass, passes, and nobody remarks on it.
- At the end, say what you noticed about the room as a whole, not about individuals.
Running it well
Only the host sees these. Participants never do.
- Your own first word sets the ceiling for honesty. Say tired if you are tired, and the room will tell you the truth; say excited and you will get forty variations of fine.
- No commenting, from you or anybody else. One reaction to one word and everybody after it adjusts what they were going to say.
- Reflect the room back as a whole at the end — that is a lot of tired, or that is a livelier room than I expected. Never single anybody out.
Watch out for
Space, safety and the traps worth knowing before you start.
- Nobody moves and nothing is physical.
- One honest word can reveal more than somebody intended. Make passing genuinely normal by mentioning it before you start, not after somebody uses it.
Already seated
Nobody has to stand for this one.
Entirely seated and works down rows or round a table.
On a video call
The cards work as they are. This is what changes about how you call it.
Runs as written, and the order is the only thing to solve. Read the gallery out in order once, or call the next name yourself each time — do not say “whoever's next”, because on a call nobody knows who that is and you get four people at once. Passing stays a normal choice.
Run it yourself
Free for thirty days, no card. Put it on the projector and step through it — nobody in the room needs a phone.
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- Where
- Remote or in person
- Props
- None
- Big screen
- Required
- Teams
- Individual only