A well-planned staff retreat is one that is likely to impart the greatest benefits to you and your team, not the least of which should include a greater sense of team unity and commitment to a shared objective.
The "where" for your retreat is less important than the fact that you'll be in a setting that will allow you to broach and unravel problems more slowly than you might otherwise in a normal staff meeting -- and you will have the opportunity to resolve complex matters away from the typical distractions of the office.
Introducing an element of fun into your retreat is fine and can be helpful in getting your staff more comfortable in terms of talking and sharing with one another. Your goal is to create a learning environment that is positive and relaxed, as well as one that encourages openness and a sense of shared understanding.
For a retreat to be productive it also needs to mesh with the current needs of your team. Doing this effectively will take some planning: Don't think that you will be able to formulate an agenda on the fly.
Set the agenda for your retreat by working backwards from what you want the specific outcomes of the meeting to be and what issues you plan to grapple with. You'll need also to have a vivid mental picture of precisely how you want the retreat to unfold. It also helps to have envisioned a positive conclusion for the gathering.
Also, decide who you want to serve as the facilitator; if you are the boss, you may not be the best person to lead the discussions because you want your team to feel entirely comfortable and uninhibited in their sharing. Whomever you tap to lead the discussion, make sure that person is skilled in managing group dynamics.
Regardless of the venue or format you choose for your company retreat, remember to adhere to a few basic principles:
- Pool the knowledge of every participant by making sure each has the chance to contribute to every facet of the discussion.
- Accommodate those who don't like the limelight, by directing people to submit written answers to questions posed to the group or have some other structured, orderly way of recording the opinion of each participant.
- Have the tasks you choose the group to tackle to be those that prompt them to think about how the team will work differently together in the future.
- Don't get drawn off-track by suggestions or issues that aren't within the rubric of what you are trying to accomplish, although you can record such topics and come back to them for discussion at the meeting's close.
- Divvy up the project, assigning different team members to tackle different facets of the challenge, and then draw everyone back together to share their insights and lessons learned.
- Be proactive about applying lessons from the retreat to your company's next steps.
