Team Building in Egypt: 10 Formats From a Giza Plateau Quest to a Red Sea Regatta

Team building in Egypt solves the problem that most corporate team building abroad never quite gets past: the choice between a memorable place and a programme that actually does something for the group. Here the two sit in the same trip. The pyramids, a museum full of originals, the Red Sea and the mountains of Sinai are all within reach of one hotel, and the flights and venues have been worked out for years. The real question is what to do with the team once it is there, so that a day at the pyramids does not turn into one more guided tour with a group photo at the end.

Below are ten formats we run in Cairo and Sharm El Sheikh: signature programmes written by La Royal Event, plus formats proven on our clients' corporate retreats. For each one you will find where it runs, who it suits, and two scores from one to five. Activity is how much walking, diving and driving is involved. Tension is how much darkness, live acting and countdown the script contains.

Team building in Egypt: 10 formats by activity and tension

1. A quest on the Giza Plateau: The Pyramid Code

An archaeologist's diary has been tampered with, and half of what it says is a lie. The only way to check it is against the stones themselves. Teams arrive on the plateau early, before the limestone heats up, and spend four hours moving between Khufu, Khafre and the Sphinx with a folder of evidence to test. Each genuine page hides a digit, and the chest at the finale opens only when all six teams bring theirs. Built for groups of twenty or more who have already posed in front of the pyramids and want a day here that asks them to think rather than nod. Giza Plateau, 4 hours, 20–100 guests. Activity 3, tension 1.

2. A quest in the Grand Egyptian Museum: The Last Page

The exhibition catalogue goes to print tomorrow, and its last page will be written by you. The group becomes the editorial team. At six objects it receives a confident, beautifully laid-out caption, and the only way to catch where it lies is to look at the original in the case. This is the calmest of the location formats and the right choice for people who have seen museums and would rather argue about the exhibits than hear a lecture about them. Giza, Grand Egyptian Museum, 4 hours, three streams of ten. Activity 1, tension 1.

3. A quest in historic Cairo: Four Hands, One Letter

Of all team building activities in Cairo, this is the one that happens on foot rather than through a coach window. A letter has been travelling to your team for seven hundred years and never arrived. Four people carried it, a calligrapher, a tea-house keeper, a coppersmith and a scribe, and one of them lied. Teams read the facades of Al-Muizz Street for a single carved detail, write one word of their own in Arabic script with a reed pen under a real calligrapher's hand, and hear two versions of the same story in a tea house. The letter is assembled in a courtyard from words written by your own hands, and its last line is addressed to your company. Historic Cairo, 4 hours, three streams. Activity 3, tension 1.

4. An evening quest in the Sharm El Sheikh Museum: The Archaeologist's Last Entry

A short, clever evening for a group whose day belongs to the sea and whose dinner is still ahead. The halls are empty of the daytime crowd, six display cases carry six captions, and not one can be taken on trust: the team places its tokens on its own version first and only then receives the translation of the museum label. If you want the whole evening, the sequel The Museum Comes Alive adds an hour and a half with actors, dinner and a confrontation among the cases. Sharm El Sheikh, 2.5 hours or 4 with the sequel, evening slot. Activity 1, tension 1.

5. Quests in your hotel ballroom: Treasures of Ra and Pharaoh: The Lost Expedition

Two formats we bring to you with full set design: overnight, a conference hall in Cairo or Sharm El Sheikh becomes a temple hall or the camp of a missing expedition. Treasures of Ra runs 90 minutes, 60 of them pure play. The team splits in two and works in parallel, and no find works on its own, because half of the keys are held by colleagues. Activity 2, tension 2. Pharaoh runs 100 minutes with live actors, a radio full of static and a silhouette behind a translucent panel; you set the tension level in advance, from dusk to full tomb. Activity 2, tension up to 4. Both are for teams that like to think with their hands and want a result by the end of the evening.

6. An evening in the Sinai mountains: Path to the Stars

For people who have done the jeep ride and want an evening that rests on the sky rather than on speed. By day, teams match a real ridge against the drawing in a missing cartographer's diary; then they sit on a rug with scalding tea and listen to a man who grew up here and finds north without a map or a phone. The last clue arrives with the sunset, and after dark an astronomer shows each guest their own star through a telescope. This is the one programme that welcomes families: no competition and no darkness without an adult nearby. Sharm El Sheikh, 6 hours including transfers, timed to the sunset. Activity 3, tension 1.

7. Desert safari

The simplest way to get a large group out of the hotel for half a day. Jeeps, the Sinai mountains, a Bedouin camp, tea and dinner under the open sky. The format needs no script and holds a group of a hundred or more comfortably, at the point where a quest in teams of five can no longer run as a single stream. This is how the desert day went on the EWA product retreat at Rixos Seagate: a group shot in keffiyehs against the rocks and an evening in camp. In summer we schedule it towards sunset; more on heat below. Sharm El Sheikh, half a day. On our scale, activity 3, tension 1.

8. Creative workshops

Painting, make-up artistry, dance: formats in which the person who never speaks at meetings suddenly becomes the most visible one in the room. On the seven-day NL International retreat at Park Regency the workshops ran alongside the business agenda, with sessions in the conference hall in the morning and easels and yoga mats in the afternoon. The strength of the format is scale: a hundred people split by interest and everyone picks their own. Among the signature programmes, the calligraphy inside Four Hands, One Letter belongs here too; the word written in ink under a master's hand goes home with the guest. Cairo or Sharm El Sheikh, in the hotel. Activity 1–2, tension 1.

9. Sport and evening formats

Archery, yoga on the lawn, dance classes: light physical formats that leave the group ready for dinner rather than for bed. Evenings are a genre of their own. For NL International the week peaked with a Luxury Egypt night and a White Party on a cliff under the open sky, where the bow and arrows became part of the show rather than a gym exercise. For EWA product the evening shows ran at the Marlin and Space venues with our set design. When an evening needs a plot, there is The Final Frame: a three-course dinner inside a 1959 film premiere, four suspects dining in the same room and an ending the audience votes for. Activity 1, tension 2.

10. A yacht day and regatta in the Red Sea: The Barque Follows the Sun

Team building in Sharm El Sheikh should end at sea. The simple version is a yacht for the whole group for a day, as on the EWA product retreat: wetsuits, gear and lunch on board; with several boats the same day becomes a regatta between teams. The scripted version is The Barque Follows the Sun: eight hours, four decks and two worlds. Half the team goes out to the reef with a guide, takes its first breath underwater or tries freediving; the other half works at a headquarters on the main deck over a chart and two logbooks, one of which has a rewritten line. The forgery cannot be proven without observations from the water, so the chest is opened by everyone together, at the moment the yacht turns onto its homeward course into the sunset. Made for teams with certified divers and people who will not go near the water: their contributions count the same. Sharm El Sheikh, 8 hours, a yacht plus working boats. Activity 4, tension 1.

How to choose a format by goal and group size

All ten signature programmes are designed for 20–100 guests in teams of five. What differs is the purpose. This is how we usually sort a client's brief.

For a multi-day retreat the formats are usually combined: one location quest, one evening and one day at sea. The seven-day NL International programme was built that way, from business sessions, workshops, team quests and two parties, and no two days repeated each other.

Heat, season and start times

The first rule of outdoor programmes in Egypt is the start time. From May to September the quests on the plateau and on Al-Muizz, like the safari, begin early in the morning or after four in the afternoon. We do not put Giza at noon in summer at any price: The Pyramid Code is built with shade and water at every stop and an early start. The evening formats, the Sharm museum, Path to the Stars and The Final Frame, are independent of the heat by definition, while Treasures of Ra, Pharaoh and the Grand Egyptian Museum run indoors. At sea the eight hours come with rest areas, towels and water, and everyone chooses their own depth, from the headquarters on deck to a first dive.

What the team keeps afterwards

We are against souvenirs for the sake of souvenirs, so in every programme the object you take away is tied to something the team made itself.

• —The Pyramid Code: the restored route with photographs of every team, the expedition letter and a fragment of the solar seal for each guest.
• —The Last Page: the layout of the assembled catalogue page with the captions of all teams and your company's name in the imprint.
• —Four Hands, One Letter: a card with your word written in ink under a master's hand, and a copy of the assembled letter.
• —The Archaeologist's Last Entry: a diary page with six station stamps and your own line; in The Museum Comes Alive, a personal seal with your name in Egyptian signs.
• —The Barque Follows the Sun: a personal seal with your name in hieroglyphs and footage from the instructors' cameras.
• —Path to the Stars: a card with your own star, signed by the astronomer.
• —Treasures of Ra: the golden expedition token and the shot of the whole group passing through the portal under the countdown.
• —Pharaoh: an expedition seal with your archaeologist's name and photographs with the actors by the lit sarcophagus.
• —The Final Frame: a group shot framed in film stock, and your name in the credits.

The rest cannot be measured by an object. Every script is built so that a team can get it wrong but can never be left without the ending: everyone hears it. That rule is written into each scenario as a separate line.

How a programme is prepared

• —Lead time: from four weeks for The Barque and Path to the Stars to eight to ten for the first staging of Treasures of Ra and Pharaoh with their sets. Those weeks cover a site survey, prop making and the personal details: your company's name, the date, a fact from its history.
• —What we ask of you: the date, the number of guests, the hotel, the group's language and one questionnaire, from which the finale is assembled.
• —What is included: the script, host, Egyptologist guides, actors, coordinators, all props, transfers along the route with our own drivers, and entrance tickets. Permits for the Giza Plateau and the museums are on us.
• —How to decide: for the people making the decision we run a forty-five-minute rehearsal of one station, with no obligation and no charge.

Corporate team building abroad is worth choosing by one criterion: what the team will still be talking about a year later. The pyramids and the Red Sea will be remembered on their own; our job is to make sure the argument at a display case, the word written in ink and the click of a lock that opened only for everyone together are remembered with them. La Royal Event has worked in Egypt since 2004, with its own team in Cairo and Sharm El Sheikh, direct contracts with hotels and venues, and a duty office around the clock. Send us the date and the number of guests, and we will come back with a proposal the same day.