Team Retreat: Go slow to go fast

We retreated. At the end of September 2021, after the same year and half of social distancing that everyone else experienced, our team finally gathered in person. It was a logistical feat to gather 30 people from five provinces and seven states during a pandemic. It involved covid tests and mask protocols and quarantine plans in case anyone needed them.

But we knew that we had to make the most of the window that presented itself - the lift in border restrictions, the low case count, and the moment of reprise before winter meant another season of unknown pandemic implications. So we retreated.

We spent three days together. We're a start up. We're scrappy. Every day, every hour, counts. But we knew the value of closing computers, of setting aside client demands and strategic plans, and of connecting. Before we met, we asked our team what they most wanted to get from the retreat. The signal was resoundingly clear: a chance to connect, to build trust, to build relationships, to get to know each other. Yes also some more clarity about vision for the coming year. But more importantly a chance to collaborate with people on other teams and to deepen connection with people on the same team who had never met in person.

Every part of my Type A COO personality wanted spreadsheets and whiteboards and outcomes we could measure. But I've spent enough time building teams to know the value of goings slow to go fast. I've made the mistake enough times to learn the lesson that teams move at the speed of trust. So I resisted timelines, and milestones and overly facilitated sessions - and we sat in circles and in groups, focused on stories and purpose, and surfaced fears and hopes for ourselves and the organization.

I'm sharing this story now because it's two months later. And I'm more sure today about the value of our retreat than ever before.

As we head into the next winter and into the budget season, and as we continue to onboard a growing team, I'm reflecting on the value of that time together - and thinking about how we build on that. With that in mind, I'm sharing a few lessons and principles for maximizing the value of in-person time for teams that will continue to be dispersed and remote. Our team will continue to be largely remote, but we'll plan more regular in person time focused on the aspects of collaborative work that are uniquely enabled by sharing time and space.

1. Focus on relationships: Zoom is fine for many things, but it's really pretty bad at enabling relationship building. Provide ample time for people to simply get to know each other. Weave this goal into everything else that you do! When folks need to ask for time or input or feedback or understanding from one and other, these relationships will be everything.
2. Build Trust: This requires taking some risks together. Risks takes different shapes for different people, but the important part is doing them together, and emerging safe and supported. I suggested a facilitator that incorporates theatre games, and art night, something outdoors and sporty and some questions in small groups that invite vulnerability. Trust enables smart risk taking, and that risk taking is key in a start up.
3. Tell Stories: Tell the companies story. Tell individual stories. Connect to your purpose and your experiences. Most of use learn and make sense of the world through story, so create space for story. That learning will be some of the most profound and long lasting. It's also worth noting that this requires vulnerability and builds relationships, so clearly these things aren't mutually exclusive
4. Work collaboratively and creatively: It's hard to get creative and dynamic and collaborative on zoom. It works fine for presentations and linear planning, but no matter how much we use miro and brainmaps and other online tools, there is nothing that compares to the energy of a group of people who trust and respect each other - and who think very differently about a problem - working together on solutions. Once you've established some of the trust and relationships, deepen those relationships by working on a meaningful organizational challenge in teams.
5. Have dialogue with leadership: Again, focusing on what's kinda hard on zoom, make space for some real talk with leadership. We had two 20 min presentations about vision and strategy for the next year, and then spent the rest of the time in questions and conversation. The questions got richer, deeper and more complex over the three days.
6. Give down time: The only constructive feedback I got was that folks needed a bit more downtime. We filled our days, and folks who are used to spending a lot of time alone - and who are taking in a ton of information and building those relationships - need to time to process and recharge. If you are also a Type A extrovert, double the downtime planned!