Haka team building with authentic New Zealand Maori warriors
Join our in-house genuine Maori warriors for an incredible, traditional Haka team building session – for your best ever team event.
For centuries, the Haka has been used to unite people to face their challenges head-on with a positive mental attitude.
The Haka is still as powerful today as it has ever been and provides the opportunity for your team to grow stronger, together. It is surprising, entertaining, motivating, uniting…and different. Get a quote now. We can provide a quote within an hour. Full contact details are on our Contact Us page.
Group size:5 to 5000
Typical duration:30 to 90 mins
Ice breaker, energiser and team building workshop
Watch our video summary
Click the play button below to see a video summary of our Haka team building activities.
Haka is a great choice for team building
The Haka is a perfect choice since:
- it provides an amazing visual spectacle
- it is perfect for team building, with an uplifting story
- there is no set-up needed
- there is no equipment to dismantle
- there is no limit to numbers
- it provides great fun
- it provides powerful business and personal messages.
We can offer anything from a 30-minute energising ‘blast’ to a deeper 90-minute Haka team building workshop. Also, the Haka can be integrated alongside one of our drumming or other tribal activities. We often perform the Haka as a morning ice breaker and drumming as a finale.
Insist on genuine Maori warriors
We are one of only two companies with authentication from Tribal Elders in New Zealand to use Haka for team building. With so many companies offering non-authentic versions of the Haka, insist on your Haka masters being Maori. There is no substitute.
For the full effect, it is essential to understand the language, the story, each tiny ritual, the traditional welcome and the traditional close.
Our Maori team will amaze your group with their passion and knowledge of this famous ritual.
Watch our information video about Haka
In the video below, our Maori Warrior Bruce provides a Haka display. Bruce and Lisa Hunter then answer the following questions about our Haka team building activities, which we often receive from potential clients.
- Why are Haka events so popular?
- Can any size of group be accommodated?
- How does an event begin?
- Does the Haka make a good energiser?
- Why use Haka for team building?
- Can Haka promote strong leadership?
The typical structure of a Haka team building session
Nothing rivals the Haka for a dramatic and memorable entrance! Your delegates take their seats and all seems normal.
The doors shut behind the last guests and the world music, which has been playing as they enter, is increased in volume, signifying the start of the session. Suddenly…silence. Then, the roar of ‘the call’ – the loud and haunting tribal call of the lead tribesman – gives the team their cue to storm the stage. The team perform the Haka to the delight and surprise of your guests.
Within moments of our team finishing, we have everyone on their feet, and we take them on a whirlwind energiser where they will learn and perform the Haka as one unified team.
In his book Maori Games and Haka, Alan Armstrong explains that hands, feet, legs, body, voice, tongue and eyes all play their part in blending together the Haka.
Your group will experience 100% Maori passion from our genuine New Zealand warriors, some of whom are related to the original tribesmen who wrote this Haka.
Building towards a powerful finale performance, the group will go head-to-head in a bit of healthy tribal competition. Then the battle for tribal supremacy is on as we come together as one tribe for the ultimate Haka.
Haka is surprising, entertaining, motivating and uniting
The Ka Mate Haka is the story of a leader overcoming a new and life-changing predicament. Forced to trust and undergo a significant change in environment, he rises victorious by being open to new ideas and being adaptable.
The Haka is not just a male activity. In fact, the role of women in performing the Haka is regarded as sacred and acts as a vital tribe defence.
This traditional and ancient Maori tribal ritual acts as a powerful group activity, whether it is used for team building, a conference ice breaker or a meeting energiser.
It brings people together and gives them a shared emotional experience.
Download our PDF brochure
Please download our Haka team building events brochure (in PDF format), which provides further information about our authentic Haka events.
We have delivered over one thousand Haka events worldwide
We are trusted by many of the world’s leading companies, as shown by our client list and have delivered over a thousand Haka events across the UK and worldwide.
View a slideshow
of photos from our recent Haka workshops.
Testimonials
“Wow! Over 800 people taken on a journey through a days event to one ‘tribal culture’ with passion, energy, enthusiasm, hands-on coaching and above all tremendous fun. You provided HSBC West Midlands with a day to remember.”
“In fact, to quote one of the team, ‘The best day I have ever had in over 20 years working for the bank!'”
Leon Marklew, Regional PFS Director
HSBC Bank
“What a truly amazing way to start the day. Your team showed us what passion ‘maori-style’ was all about! The conference felt lifted afterwards – and people still talk about it now!”
“The Haka workshop was great! Now our finance department is ready to move forward and work as a team.”
Lorraine Copeland
AXA-PPP
Going deeper: the fascinating history of Haka Ka Mate
After our Maori Haka Masters stun and surprise their unsuspecting audience, they first explain the fascinating history and tribal context that surround this cultural experience. By understanding this history, our participants buy in and engage much more deeply with the activity. Our Haka instructors skillfully deliver the Haka history authentically and in a way that is also thoroughly entertaining.
Here for your further reading is some background information and a description of the story behind the Ka Mate Haka.
Our team building participants are often surprised to learn that there are literally hundreds of different variations of Haka. The most famous of all is the Ka Mate, which was composed by a chief named Te Rauparaha in the 1820s.
Te Rauparaha was the High Chief of the Ngati Toa. While being pursued by his enemies, and having to outmanoeuvre them for weeks, Te Rauparaha came to Chief Te Wharerangi and asked for his protection. Te Rauparaha explained to him that he feared that his own people would dissipate and his tribe would be lost if he was caught and killed.
Understanding that the pursuers were almost upon him, Te Wharerangi hid him in a pit. Crouching in the dark as his pursuers arrived, Te Rauparaha muttered under his breath, “Ka mate! Ka mate!” (I die! I die!).
Te Wharerangi explained to the pursuers that Te Rauparaha had left and gone and Te Rauparaha then quietly whispered “Ka Ora! Ka Ora!” (I live! I live!).
When the pursuers doubted Te Wharerangi, Te Rauparaha muttered “Ka mate! Ka mate!” (I die! I die!) once again.
Te Wharerangi eventually convinced the doubting pursuers and Te Rauparaha exclaimed “Ka ora! Ka ora! Tenei te tangata puhuruhuru nana nei i tiki mai whakawhiti te ra!” (I live! I live! For this is the hairy man who has fetched the sun and caused it to shine again). The hairy man in the Haka refers to the chief Te Wharerangi who gave Te Rauparaha his very unique protection.
Haka is about quickly adapting to a changing environment, just like in business
Because Haka in general is all about tribes working as one, being focused and powerful together, it is the perfect addition within team building days or conferences with similar strong messages.
In the Ka Mate story, we see a leader having to quickly adapt to a very changing environment and then be creative and unorthodox to ultimately survive and lead in the future.
This sounds like every mission statement or management goal that corporations are using all over the globe today. This is why the metaphor of this Haka is so relevant to business and team development. To survive, we must adapt to our changing environment.
Unleash the power in your tribe
There is a another reason to explain the growth of this corporate team experience, when groups of any size perform the Haka together, and that is the undeniable tribal power created. The Haka is very popular within general team building events or management training programs. It provides a window into distant tribal history, delivers a useful business metaphor and then ends with great physical euphoria.
Creative Team Events is very proud and extremely mindful that our first duty is to uphold and respect the Maori tradition. Bringing the Haka to a worldwide corporate audience provides our Maori teachers with the platform to spread their ancient knowledge to vast numbers of people.
The words of the Ka Mate Haka in full
Here are the full words of the Ka Mate:
Ka mate! Ka mate!
Ka ora! Ka ora!
Ka mate! Ka mate!
Ka ora! Ka ora!
Tenei te tangata puhuru huru! Nana nei i tiki mai! Whakawhiti te ra!
A upa…ne! ka upa…ne! A upane kaupane whiti te ra! Hi!
This translates to:
I die! I die!
I live! I live!
I die! I die!
I live! I live!
This is the hairy man who fetched the Sun and caused it to shine again
One upward step! Another upward step! An upward step, another … the Sun shines!
Please fill out the form below to get a quote within an hour
“If you’d like a quote, under absolutely no obligation, then just enter your details below and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”
Lisa Hayes, Director of Creative Team Events
Full contact details are on our Contact Us page.
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