Play Well, Work Well
One of our guiding philosophies at Weathervane Strategies is that we want our clients to know that they can reach us 24/7. Stress rides high on a grant deadline, and we make ourselves as available as possible to our clients—even if they need to call us on the weekend or after office hours.
But in order to give our best service to our clients, we also need to regroup and recharge.
So last week, we took our own advice and held a staff retreat in Juneau. We’re amazed at what we accomplished in just three days. We shared our hopes and fears, and identified our goals and milestones for the upcoming year. We found ourselves making some big decisions, too, especially regarding our services in strategic planning, project development, and research.
Since we’re still giddy from the results of our big week, we decided to share some of our tips for hosting a successful retreat:
Get Inspired
Weathervane Strategies used our retreat to focus on our goals and dreams, as individuals and as a team. There are always daily tasks that need to be done and processes that need to be refined. It’s easy to lose your vision when you’re buried in details. Take this time to revisit some of your past goals, consider the progress you’ve made on them, and make revisions so that you can plan activities that will move you towards your better goals, or even new ones!
In the last two years, we used "Your Best Year Yet." While it's not designed for strategic planning, with a little creativity, it's hugely inspiring for any goal setting process.
To take one example, one of the 10 questions in the book is: "What roles do you play in your life?," referring to roles like "Mother" or "CEO". When we considered this question broadly, we came up with some of our own roles, like:
"Weathervane Strategies fosters partnerships within the community."
"Weathervane Strategies facilitates productive conversations between individuals and agencies."
"Weathervane Strategies provides guidance for effective program approaches."
Then we thought about what we really loved about those roles; how we are able to be successful in those roles; and how we can continue to improve our performance in those roles. Finally, we thought about the roles that we've neglected; the ones we really want to highlight for the upcoming year; and the types of projects that would help us to do that.
A retreat is a good time to get everyone together.
Be Prepared for Unexpected Emotions
Sure, it’s just a retreat - but if you're doing it right, you're confronting all of your flaws head on and trying to figure out a better way to operate. Sometimes that means tearing down some approaches that you might be pretty attached to and trying something different. Be prepared for casualties. One way to keep it positive is to have a clear vision of what it is that you really love about the work you do. This way when you make changes, you can show yourself and your colleagues that those changes are leading directly to the positive change that you all desire.
Assign a Facilitator
When you’re brainstorming and sharing your heartfelt perspective, it’s easy to get off track or for emotions to run high. You want someone in the room who can remain objective and keep the conversation focused. You can assign this role to a staff member or even hire someone like us to help facilitate the conversation. It’s helpful to have someone in the room who isn’t buried in the day to day, because they’ll more easily be able to see the forest for the trees and offer your agency valuable perspective.
Get Away
Another way to keep your discussions stress-free and positive is to host your retreat on common ground and in a neutral place. This location should be away from your place of business so that there’s none of the daily distractions, and preferably not in a staff member’s home. If you have a smaller team, a hotel or conference center is more space than you really need. For more affordable and comfortable options, look into house rentals. We ended up hosting our retreat at a house managed by a local university. Not only did this end up being an affordable option, the house was also really well equipped for business. WiFi was available anywhere in the house, and the television had an HDMI adapter to use for presentations from a computer. The house was also located in a forested area so we could take short walks in nature to clear our heads.
Learn Something New
A retreat is a great opportunity to do some serious brainstorming. But you don't want to plan on too much creative thinking and discussion, or you’ll be burned out by the first afternoon! Maybe you want to try having some fun activities. We recommend doing some training that’s more fun to do in a group. For example, our team always needs to learn new technologies and the retreat gave us a good opportunity to test out some of our online meeting ideas. For our particular team, online meetings aren't a chore - it's an exciting new way to communicate. We planned this activity for the second day, to reinvigorate ourselves for the third day when we could get the last of our goal setting done and leave the retreat feeling accomplished and pleasantly tired, not exhausted.
Refocus on a Past Topic
It happens—we have great ideas for projects or new workflows, but we don’t have the time to implement our ideas straightaway. A retreat provides a chance for us to shake the dust off some great ideas that we haven’t given much time to yet, kick strategies for development around, and see if these ideas are worth more of our attention in the coming months. Our team revisited the amazing online project management tool, Asana and better ways we could use it for our projects.
Unwind after a Stressful Period
Or, maybe all this focusing and refocusing is exactly what your team doesn’t need. If you’ve had a killer workload for several months, perhaps your team needs some pampering and play rather than brainstorming sessions. Though not every team-building activity will work with every team—the Weathervane Strategies team probably wouldn’t be real enthused with a round of paintballing, for example—there are so many great activity ideas and you’re bound to find a few that will resonate with your staff and let everyone relax.
Reward Hardworking Staff
Sometimes, the best retreat is a party. Use your retreat to say “thank you” to your staff and remind them of the awesome things they’ve done for your mission and in your community. Reward them with some recognition, your gratitude, and the challenge to go out and do it again!
Encourage Feedback
Retreats are also a good time for team leaders to get some appraisal from team members. As part of your retreat, set time aside for feedback on things that are working—and not working—in your office culture. Be sure to ask for input on better ways to do things that you’re already doing well, too.
There are so many tips to get the most out of your retreats. Have any ideas we didn’t mention here? Let us know in the comments!