Teamwork: The skill that can make groupwork actually enjoyable

Teamwork is one of those words that gets used like a lucky charm. Along with "leadership", "prioritizing", and "circle back". We say them in a kickoff meeting, and everyone nods, but then the deadline hits, work gets messy, and suddenly teamwork means, “someone competent will quietly fix this.”

That is not teamwork. It turns into a rescue mission and most teams don't have access to a Henry Cavill, Tom Cruise, or Alan Ritchson.

Teamwork is what happens when a group can coordinate under pressure without needing a hero (although I would argue that every team everywhere would benefit from their own Witcher).

It is role clarity without rigid roles, it is communication that changes behaviour, not just vibes, and it is a skill, which means it needs reps and practice.

That is why I keep coming back to commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) games.

Not because they are “fun", but because they reliably create the practice conditions most workplaces avoid: interdependence, time pressure, incomplete information, and fast feedback.

A group of young professionals collaborates on a project, taking notes and sharing ideas around a table with a laptop and coffee. - Wix Stock Images

What teamwork skill development actually means

Teamwork is not “getting along.”

It is a bundle of behaviours that show up when the task is bigger than any one person.

In practice, strong teamwork looks like:

• Shared mental models, the team has the same picture of what is happening and what matters

• Role coordination, people take ownership, hand off cleanly, and adapt roles when the situation changes

• Mutual performance monitoring, teammates notice what is missing and fill gaps early

• Communication under constraint, short, specific, and timed to the moment it is needed

• Recovery without blame, the team can reset after a mistake and keep moving

  
  

If that list feels painfully specific, good. That's the point. Teams do not fail because they “lack teamwork.” They fail because one or more of these behaviours collapses under load.

Why traditional teamwork training often does not stick

I am not here to dunk on workshops. I build them, but most teamwork training is structurally limited.

1. The practice is low

We talk about teamwork more than we practice it which is like trying to improve passing in soccer by watching a webinar on passing.

2. The feedback is slow and political

In real work, you can coordinate badly for weeks before the consequences show up. When they do, the feedback arrives as stories, blame, and “lessons learned.” These are not clean signals.

3. The stakes are too high for experimentation

In a live project, nobody wants to test a new handoff method so teams default to what feels safe, and that usually means siloing, over-functioning, and quiet resentment.

Why games are a weirdly good teamwork practice lab

Game-based training is not automatically good training, but games can create the right conditions for teamwork reps. There is a growing research base showing game-based and simulation-based interventions can support collaboration and team performance outcomes in team contexts. (JMIR Serious Games, 2021). (PLOS ONE, 2025).

Here is my practitioner take: The value is not “gamification", the value is that the game forces interdependence. It creates immediate consequences and it makes coordination visible.

Then the debrief does the real work.

The game creates the experience. The debrief creates the learning.

Teamwork in action, 3 COTS games worth stealing from

You want games where teams cannot succeed through parallel solo play.

1. Overcooked, teamwork under time pressure

What it pressures: role clarity, proactive communication, adaptive handoffs

Overcooked is a teamwork drill disguised as kitchen chaos.

If the team does not define roles, communicate intentions, and adjust constantly, they do not ship plates.

Workplace transfer:

• Running work during peak load

• Making clean handoffs

• Sharing status before it becomes an emergency

  
  

2. PlateUp!, teamwork as process improvement

What it pressures: workflow design, delegation, continuous iteration

PlateUp! forces teams to build a system, test it, break it, and improve it.

It rewards teams who can spot bottlenecks, negotiate changes quickly, and keep service moving.

Workplace transfer:

• Operational problem-solving

• Cross-functional coordination

• Retrospectives that lead to real process changes

  
  

3. Portal 2 Co-op, shared mental models in real time

What it pressures: explaining thinking, timing, and learning from failure together

Portal 2 co-op is the purest teamwork puzzle I know.

One person sees a possibility.

The other sees a constraint.

Success is building a shared model, not being individually clever.

Workplace transfer:

• Coordinating interdependent work streams

• Explaining complex ideas to teammates who do not share your context

• Reducing rework by aligning understanding early

  
  

The bigger question this raises

If teamwork improves through practice, why do we keep designing teamwork training that minimizes reps?

Teams do not need more posters.

They need better practice conditions.

Games are not the point.

Practice conditions are the point.

Games just happen to be one of the easiest off-the-shelf ways to create those conditions.

J