Now that many teams are distributed, saving some meeting time for some social interaction is more important than ever. However, engineers can sometimes be a little hard to get talking! Here are some of my favorite ice-breakers, ranging from 5 minutes to 15 minutes.
Time: 10-30s/person
Ideal for the start of a meeting, these questions provoke short answers but still get some conversation moving and help you learn something about the team. Be ready to call on the next person to give their answer.
Be aware of putting people in a situation where they would be uncomfortable. Asking "what was your favorite vacation" can lead to people who may not have had the opportunity to travel being put on the spot.
If you could go to any year in history, which year would you go to?
If you could have lunch with anyone from history, who would it be?
Tell us about a weird fact that you know for now particular reason.
What's a book (including audiobook), podcast or series you would recommend?
Which band would you join if given the chance?
Would you rather speak 5 languages or play 5 instruments?
Who is your favorite action hero?
If you could study a subject at university, what would it be?
Time: 1-3 minutes per person, plus thinking
This one take a little more setup. Ask everyone to come up with two facts about themselves, and add in one made-up story. You'll go through each person on the team, ask them to talk through their three facts, then vote as a team on which one you think is the lie.
Time: Flexible
The idea with this ice-breaker is to have a series of rapid fire questions, and get people to visually show where they stand on a spectrum from one "extreme" to the other. Talk people through a practice setup: designate one side of the screen as "cat person" and the other as "dog person", and then ask people to indicate where they lie on the spectrum. It's ok to be in the middle!
Get things going by asking the first couple of questions, then encourage the team to supply their own.
If you're in person, clear some desks out of the way and encourage people to move between one side of the room and the other to get people woken up and ready to participate!