Potluck

Potlucks can be done in many different ways. Three can be a theme, such as "dishes from your heritage" ; "holiday food from your heritage" ; salads; comfort food; soups, breads, and salads; food of xx(team) colors; food from your garden/local; desserts only . . .

Break the ice, get to know each other, enjoy, socialize, raise awareness of diversity . . .

• Small
• Medium

Blueberries, strawberries, blackberries.

Each person brings food to share. Provide places to eat, eating and serving utensils and dishes. The organizers could provide a portion of meal, such as beverages, desserts, and/or the main dish. Cards and markers for each person to indicate ingredients (these could be distributed ahead of time, so that people can bring them already filled out).

Because individuals may have food allergies and dietary restrictions, it is good to communicate about this ahead of time. Circulate a memo or post on a bulletin board a list for people to add to of foods and ingredients they cannot have. It could be set up to maintain anonymity, if preferred. Ask people to find alternatives to such ingredients if possible, and if not, to make sure they note the presence of the ingredients. Schedule the event when everyone could attend and have adequate time for sharing. Potlucks could be "put the food in the break room and everyone just come and get it when you can," but it is much more conducive to team-building for all gather and eat together. Seating in small groups is more conducive to conversation than long or wide tables.

Set up food, serve, eat! If the group is large and/or not everyone knows each other, the organizer could ask people to switch places halfway through the meal or before each course, as a get-to-know-more-people mixer.

Discussions can including how to do a different themed potluck the next time, whether people would like to collaborate on making dishes together, inviting other teams, selling each other the food and donating the proceeds to charity . . .

A coopertively6 themed dish, such as build-a-taco, tortilla pie, or salad, with everyone bringing any appropriate ingredients to add in. People could bring in the recipes for their dishes and archive a team cookbook collection.