Mountains, Beach or In-Town -- Try a Team Retreat to Plan and Play

VANCOUVER BUSINESS JOURNAL
April, 2000

Essential Management Concepts
JONNIE MARTIN

Many companies have discovered the lure of weekend retreats to build teams and plan creatively for their future. Away from the grind of daily responsibilities, you are able to engage in possibility thinking. You can see the forest AND the trees and across the horizon to new lands.

It does not necessarily have to be an expensive venture, and for all that matters, many companies manage to squeeze their retreats into day-long ventures in-town. Primarily it must be off-site and away from daily pressures. The needs of your team members should dictate whether a weekend trip is feasible.

In this part of the country there are many retreat locations only minutes away. There are numerous sites in Vancouver (including the gorgeous Heathman Lodge), up the gorge (Skamania lodge and its panoramic views), or across the river (McMenamin’s Edgefield location is a charmer). There’s the mountains and the beach only a couple of hours away. You can find conference centers and hotels at every price range, and very reasonable houses to lease. Many company owners utilize their own summer cottages or condos.

With this extended retreat schedule, you can afford to spend time dreaming, planning and playing. Here’s a few ideas of the types of subjects typically addressed in a retreat:

Strategic Planning: In this creative atmosphere, you are able to plan the company’s strategic direction, and outline an action plan for the coming year. By involving as many employees as possible, you also increase the rate of buy-in and support of the plan.

Company Culture: It is an excellent opportunity to frame company culture. Participants in the group setting come to embrace the culture and see themselves as the teachers for future generations.

Business Principles: In the group setting you can grow as business leaders, learning more about the economics of business in general and how your company makes money in particular.

Workshop Activities: The extended time periods allow time to watch training videos, participate in team survival games, tackle case studies, and practice new business skills of all types.

There are some excellent resources available for you to use in a retreat setting. I particularly like using teaming games, such as “Marooned” or “Swamped” which teach the synergy of a well-run team. The games take 1 ½ to 2 hours which does not fit nicely into monthly training sessions. They work much better in retreat.

The classic film, “The Abilene Paradox,” is both entertaining and informative. It introduces numerous business principles, including the need to speak up and take risks in the group setting. The film is 30 minutes long and can launch discussions and activities that last another hour or two.

Celebrate: Regardless of the other items on the agenda, it is particularly critical that you allow some time to celebrate the organization’s successes and the wealth of resources you have in your people. It is a good time for the individuals in the retreat to share their successes for the past year and to outline their plans and dreams for the future.

There should be a certain amount of play in a retreat, and that’s another reason for planning it over extended periods of time. Bring along board games that allow for group or team participation. I particularly like the new game Cranium, which is played in teams and accommodates most size groups. It is creative and combines the best of a number of games (Charades, Pictionary, Trivial Pursuit). You draw, act, work with clay, hum, think — and laugh a lot.

The bonding experience is particularly increased with overnight stays in a setting where you share housekeeping tasks. You build community when you prepare meals together or sit at the edge of the beach (sans makeup) for the first cup of coffee of the day.

Themes: Some companies use themes effectively for retreats. The theme may be used to focus attention on a particular issue, to help participants experience each retreat as unique, or just to add to the whimsy of it all.

In one retreat for attorneys who were just warming to the idea of marketing for clients, we used a “Jungle” theme. Invitations were issued with camouflage designs which carried over to our notebooks. We planted the idea that “it was a jungle out there and we better market if we want to survive.” We introduced the Guerrilla Marketing book series by Jay Conrad Levinson and at 10 am we were visited by the author of “Gorilla Marketing” — an actor in a gorilla suit, delivering bananas for our morning break.

No matter how big or small; how simple or ornate — companies that take the time to retreat from daily activities to plan and play, position themselves for a more powerful business year.