When I first posted this page, it was understood that retreats were opportunities—for executives, project teams, or all staff—to meet together, in person. We took for granted that people would fly halfway across the world to work in conference rooms with their colleagues for one or more days to accomplish things that deserved special attention and collective focus.
The pandemic has changed this. Flying to attend a retreat? Only if it's really important. Sitting in an airport hotel meeting room for hours to talk with other people? Only if it's really going to help the team.
Teams still need to meet together, but are being more discerning about when to meet in person, and when a hybrid or 100% virtual retreat will suffice. And whether they make the extra effort to travel for it, or videoconference from their home office, they now have higher expectations for retreat design and facilitation.
Clients have long come to us for carefully designed in-person retreats that are engaging and successful. We know when to push a group forward to get results, and when to slow things down for more reflection and connection. We also excel at calling people’s attention to what’s happening in the moment, and helping participants become more aware of—and able to work with—the interpersonal, group, and power dynamics in the (real or virtual) room. Designing a hybrid or virtual retreat takes even more painstaking planning to hold people's interest despite the distractions of being online, while enabling them to get to know one another better and to build trust together.
People still want (and need) to come together. They're just getting more selective about when and where. We design and facilitate each retreat so that people will say, "Yes, I would love to attend," when they're invited to the next one.
