Kraken Bingo

Human bingo for new hires — without printing a single card

Sixteen small missions that get a new starter talking to people, spread across their first month instead of their first meeting.

Create a game

Why this works as a bingo card

Human bingo is usually a photocopied grid handed out at the start of a workshop. Find someone who speaks three languages, someone who has run a marathon, someone with a twin. It works for about eleven minutes, which is exactly what it was designed for, and then it goes in the bin.

The awkward part of joining a company isn't the first meeting, though — it's weeks three and four, when the welcome lunches are over and asking a stranger for twenty minutes of their time feels like an imposition. A digital card fixes the mismatch: the same game runs for a month, gives a new starter a legitimate excuse to knock on any door, and gives the people around them an easy way to say yes. Nobody prints anything, nobody loses their sheet, and the card ends up as a record of who they actually met.

Set it up in five minutes

1
Create a team
Use your existing company team, or make one just for this intake if you onboard in cohorts.
2
Add a game and pick the board
A 4×4 card is right for a first month — 16 missions is a couple a week, not a second job.
3
Paste the tasks
Paste the missions below. Swap in the names of real teams and rituals; specifics beat generic prompts every time.
4
Invite everyone
Put the QR code on the welcome desk, in the offer email, or in the onboarding doc. One scan and they're in.
5
Play, and prove it
Each mission is finished with a photo or a note. The buddy or manager can watch the card fill up.

16 tasks you can copy

A 4×4 board needs exactly 16 tasks, so this list fills a card with nothing left over. Copy it and paste it straight into the bulk task field.

1Find someone who has worked here longer than five years
2Have coffee with someone from a team you'll never work with
3Learn what the oldest running project is called
4Ask three people what they wish they'd known in week one
5Find out who to ask when something breaks at 6pm
6Sit in on a meeting that isn't about your work
7Learn one internal acronym and what it actually stands for
8Find someone who started the same month as you
9Ask someone senior about a mistake they made here
10Discover where people actually eat lunch
11Get a tour of the part of the product you don't touch
12Find out which customer people talk about most
13Ask two people what they do all day, in detail
14Learn one thing about the company that isn't on the website
15Introduce two people who hadn't met
16Ship something small, however small

Recommended setup

Board size: 4×4 — 16 missions, a comfortable first month
How long to run it: The first 30 days. Start it on day one and close it at the end of the first month.
Worth turning on: The QR invite. Onboarding is exactly the moment when the friction of creating accounts kills a good idea, so let people scan and join themselves.

What makes it work

Photo and video proof

A photo of a coffee, a screenshot of a shipped change, a note about what someone said — enough to show the mission happened, and enough for a manager to see the card working without asking.

A live ranking

In a cohort, the ranking turns a solitary first month into a shared one: new starters compare cards, and the person who found the answer tells the others where to look.

Everyone in one chat

The team chat means questions land somewhere public rather than in a private DM to the one person they already know, which is the habit you want them to build anyway.

Frequently asked questions

What is human bingo?

A card of small social missions — find someone who has done X, ask someone about Y — completed by talking to people. Traditionally printed for the start of a workshop; here it runs for weeks so it also works for onboarding.

How is this better than a printed card?

It lasts. A printed sheet is a ten-minute warm-up; a digital card runs across a whole first month, keeps a record of what actually happened, and doesn't need anyone to hand out or collect paper.

Can I run it for a whole cohort of new starters?

Yes. Everyone in the cohort draws from the same pool of missions, so they can compare progress and swap answers, and the ranking gives the month a bit of friendly shape.

Should the missions name specific people?

Name teams and rituals, not individuals. "Have coffee with someone from support" ages well; "have coffee with Martin" breaks the moment Martin leaves or the card is reused for the next intake.

Is 16 missions too many for one month?

It's about four a week, and most take a single conversation. If your onboarding is unusually intense, use a 3×3 card with nine missions instead.

How do people join without an admin creating accounts?

Share the team's QR code or invite link. Each person signs themselves up and lands directly in the right team, and a team admin approves them if you want that check.

Start your first card

Free to create, no card needed, and your team joins with one link.

Create a game

Other ways people play

Team building bingo that runs for a month, not an hour

Give your team a card of 25 challenges, a few weeks to finish them, and a shared album of everything they did.

Give people a reason to talk to strangers between the talks

A sixteen-square card, a QR code on the badge, and a conference where the hallway works as well as the stage.