Two Truths and a Lie

Choose this exercise

Purpose: Share verifiable personal facts across a team while practicing active listening and deductive questioning.

Use it when: Use at the start of a multi-day training or during team orientation when group members need low-stakes conversation starters.

Skip it when: Skip when group members hold strict personal disclosure boundaries, when total session time permits fewer than 15 minutes, or during formal evaluative meetings.

Group arrangement: Subgroups of 3 to 4 participants. Any remaining cluster of 5 splits into one group of 2 and one group of 3 so everyone shares.

Timing: 20 minutes suggested by UWT to allow quiet drafting, unhurried parallel subgroup turns of 3 minutes per speaker, and a full-room debrief.

Materials and tools

• One index card or scrap sheet of paper per person
• One pen or pencil per person
• One visible session timer or stopwatch

Before participants arrive

1. Distribute index cards and pens to all seats.
2. Arrange seating into clusters of 3 or 4 chairs.

Say this to open

Take an index card and write down three statements about yourself: two must be true, and one must be false. Make the lie believable. You will read them in any order to your small group, and they will try to spot the lie.

How to run it

1. Draft statements 3 minutes

   Distribute cards. Speak the opening script. Participants write three statements in private. Emphasize that all items must remain workplace-safe and comfortable to discuss. Offer prompt categories from the worksheet. For example, 'I have visited five continents' is a common travel format. Anyone who prefers not to share personal facts may invent an alternate persona or use general trivia.

2. Question, vote, and reveal for first speakers 6 minutes

   Form subgroups of 3 or 4. Each member takes up to 3 minutes total for their turn. Person 1 reads their three statements aloud without revealing which is false. Group members have 45 seconds to ask up to two brief clarifying questions about specific dates or details. Group members vote on the count of three by holding up 1, 2, or 3 fingers to identify the lie. Person 1 reveals the lie and shares a two-sentence background story on one true fact.

3. Complete remaining subgroup turns 8 minutes

   Subgroups repeat the full reading, brief questioning, voting, and reveal sequence for Person 2, Person 3, and Person 4. Each turn takes up to 3 minutes. Subgroups with 3 members use any remaining time to compare which strategies made the lies most convincing.

4. Debrief and close 3 minutes

   Reconvene the full room. The facilitator selects one debrief question from the list and invites two volunteer responses from different subgroups to share what they noticed or learned.

Debrief questions

• What made a lie believable compared to an unusual true story?
• Which specific clarifying questions helped your group test the claims?
• What was one surprising skill or experience you discovered about someone today?

Finished output: Completed index cards with three statements and revealed truths across all small groups.

Remote

Conduct individual drafting for 3 minutes. Send participants into video breakout rooms of 3 to 4 people for 14 minutes. In turn, each speaker pastes their three statements into breakout chat or reads them on camera. Teammates ask up to two quick clarifying questions via mic or chat within 45 seconds, then vote using numeric chat numbers (1, 2, or 3 to identify the lie) or hand signals on camera. The speaker reveals the lie and shares a two-sentence background story on one true fact on mic or in chat. Reconvene in the main room for a 3-minute reflection.

Hybrid

Pair in-room participants with other in-room participants in physical pods. Assign remote attendees to dedicated virtual breakout rooms. If mixing remote and in-room participants in one pod, provide each hybrid cluster with a dedicated laptop and headset so questioning, chat voting, and reveals proceed without room echo.

Access and participation choices

• Participants may pass on personal life details by using professional trivia or an invented persona.
• Participants may present statements written on paper or posted in chat instead of speaking aloud.

If the session gets stuck

A participant cannot think of an interesting lie or true fact under pressure.

Direct them to the supplied idea prompts, such as everyday food habits, childhood pets, or commute oddities.

One speaker takes too long telling lengthy backstories, exhausting the subgroup time.

Remind the room to cap clarifying inquiries at two questions per turn and keep the final backstory strictly under two sentences.

Terms used here

• Clarifying question: A brief factual inquiry testing details, dates, or context without demanding extensive proof.