We all know them. We all hate them. But we have to keep doing them.

Of course, I'm talking about icebreakers.

Every time we start a new job, join a new organization, or want to know the real interesting details of someone's life we play an icebreaker. They can be as simple as, "Tell me a fun fact about yourself" or as weird as "Move Your Butt If...."

Inevitably, when you play an icebreaker you will get the one person that either doesn't want to play along or who takes things too far. In the case of the "favorites" icebreaker, a question such as, "What's your favorite zoo animal?" can get a response of something like "I think zoos are inhumane." The "move your butt" icebreaker always turns into someone announcing their sexual proclivities. (Maybe that's just because I'm in college.)

So why don't we just quit with icebreakers. They're weird and make people feel uncomfortable about their quirkiness.

The answer isn't to quit icebreakers all together, but rather to be creative with them. I don't have an answer to the most creative one, but if you're on a leadership team planning a training, think outside the box. If you go with one of the standards, chances are we've already played them somewhere else, you've bored us by your lack of creativity, and now we all are just going to be awkward in front of our new coworkers because we don't know how deep our answers are supposed to be.