Definition
Interest-based grouping is the practice of organizing employees into small groups based on shared interests, hobbies, or passions rather than their department, seniority, or location. The goal is to spark real connection between people who might never meet through normal work, using a common interest as the starting point. It treats genuine affinity, not org-chart proximity, as the foundation for building relationships at work.
Why interest-based grouping matters
When you group people by team or title, you reinforce the connections that already exist. Interest-based grouping does the opposite. It pairs the marketing analyst who loves hiking with the engineer who climbs on weekends, creating the kind of cross-team weak ties that make information flow and people feel seen across an organization.
These connections are a direct path to belonging at work. A shared interest gives people an easy, low-pressure reason to talk, which matters even more for remote and hybrid teams who lack the spontaneous hallway moments that used to do this work for them.
How to build interest-based grouping that works
Start by actually asking what people care about instead of guessing. A short interest survey surfaces the hobbies and topics employees would happily talk about, and that signal is far more reliable than assuming everyone on a team wants the same activity.
Keep the groups small. A handful of people with a genuine shared interest will form a stronger bond than a company-wide event ever could, and small groups make it realistic to meet, which is where connection actually happens. Done well, this becomes one of your most effective team building habits and a steady contributor to employee engagement.
How Nodly helps
Nodly runs interest surveys directly in Slack, then uses AI to cluster employees into small interest-based groups instead of leaving managers to organize this by hand. From there it coordinates real meetups end to end, handling who is in the group, when they can meet, and where.
Because everything lives where teams already work, interest-based grouping stops being a one-off offsite idea and becomes a repeatable rhythm. That consistency is what turns a single nice event into a lasting part of your remote culture.
Frequently asked questions
How is interest-based grouping different from regular team building?
Most team building groups people by who they already work with, so it reinforces existing connections. Interest-based grouping starts from a shared interest instead, which mixes people across teams and creates new relationships that the org chart would never produce on its own.
How do you find out what employees are actually interested in?
The most reliable way is to ask directly through a short interest survey rather than guessing from roles or past events. Nodly collects these interests in Slack and uses them to cluster people into small groups automatically, so the grouping reflects what employees genuinely care about.
Does interest-based grouping work for remote and hybrid teams?
Yes, and it is arguably more valuable for them. Remote and hybrid employees miss the spontaneous interactions that build relationships in an office, so giving them a small group organized around a shared interest replaces some of that lost connection in a deliberate, repeatable way.
Related terms
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