The company retreat meeting is slowly getting a much-needed makeover. There’s a special magic that happens when we get the entire team together in a room, on a ski slope, or in a bowling alley on our retreats.
Figuring out each other’s personalities face to face offers helpful information to take back when we resume our largely text-based communication. For non-remote teams, an offsite retreat can help shake up the status quo and get creative juices flowing in an environment that’s not the same oldoffice.
However, there are some key steps while planning a retreat. Keep reading!
Identify the retreat purpose
A retreat may have one, two or several purposes. It’s important to think carefully and clearly about retreat purposes since they become the foundation for the retreat design. In considering possible retreat purposes, you can as a leader consult with a leadership team or other key leaders – formal or informal – within your organization or team.
The most compelling reason for retreat failures is the lack clarity about purpose and what the organization or team is really trying to accomplish by having a retreat. As such, it is critical to share the purposes with participants and help set expectations about what the retreat intends to accomplish.
The agenda
There are a variety of ways to seek input that can help inform the development of the agenda. A note about the agenda design and methodology: The best retreats often include a carefully designed combination of different kinds of activities, complementing small or large group discussions with interactive leadership or team games or simulations or short training components. A good agenda usually features a mixture of these kinds of activities to help keep thingsactivefor all participants and, if designed well, learning and discussions from one kind of activity can contribute greatly to another activity.
Choose the right location
In general, high performing teams are able to work hard and play hard. Having fun at a retreat contributes to producing important results. Thoughtfully choosing an appropriate environment will help ensure that the “work hard – play hard” ethic actually materializes.
And the best way to choose the right location, is TROOP.
TROOP is a meeting planning softwareon a mission to reinvent meeting planning, taking what is an inefficient process today and making it simple and quick for anyone.
The platform powers decisions for global organizations across multiple industries by providing all the data required to make the best decision on how to meet, be it Covid related restrictions, costs of travel and accommodations, the environmental impact or the travel experience such as needing a visa or taking a stopover flight. It provides up to date data to make the right decision on whether to meet in person, virtually or in a hybrid format, which is a must have for companies nowadays.
Besides, the platform also takes into account staff wellness, which is key to optimizing performance in today’s workforce. It helps meeting planners understand the range of timezones people are attending and the time spent traveling to attend the meeting, which allows for more thoughtful scheduling of the meeting and choice of location.
Do you want to know more about TROOP? Visit us!