Here's a scenario I've seen play out more times than I can count. A company decides to build sustainability into its culture, new policies, new commitments, fresh language in the annual report. Then they book their leadership retreat at a resort burning through 500 liters of water per room per...
Picture this: your leadership team is standing at the edge of a Tuscan vineyard at 7am, arguing, productively, about go-to-market strategy while the morning fog lifts off the hills. Nobody is checking their phone. Nobody is thinking about the office. The conversation is the best one they've had...
Here's a scenario I encounter more than I'd like to admit: a company spends months planning a retreat, books a beautiful property, flies everyone to Europe, and then fills every waking hour with back-to-back sessions. The team arrives exhausted. They leave more exhausted. And three weeks later,...
Here's a number I keep coming back to: most companies spend 40-60% more than they originally planned on their first corporate retreat. Not because they're irresponsible with money, because they didn't know what they didn't know. The venue deposit went down, then came the catering minimum, the AV...
Here's a scenario I run into more often than I'd like: an HR director messages me in January asking whether we can pull together a European retreat for 18 people by late April. They have a venue in mind (a resort they found on a travel site), a rough idea of activities ("something cultural, maybe...
Opening: When the Schedule Falls Apart Before You Leave Picture this: your CFO is standing in the Florence train station, luggage in hand, staring at a handwritten itinerary that assumes a 9:47 train connection with a 12-minute layover in Bologna. The train is running 20 minutes...