Your Yearly Offsite – to Hold or Not to Hold?

Companies are doing everything they can to cut costs this year.  Meetings and events are being slashed.  Conferences are going virtual. 

Given this focus on savings are you wondering about your yearly management team offsite?  Should you hold it or skip it?

For help weighing the pros and cons, check out this HBR blog post from CEO coach, Melissa Raffoni:

This Year’s Management Off Site: Necessary or Negligent?

In addition to the posting, I recommend that you skim the reader comments.  Main themes seem to be that the management team needs to be more aligned that ever and that offsites can help to accomplish that.  At the same time, executives should remember to take the time to communicate why they are having the offsite and what the results/outcomes are. 

I believe that employees are craving more direction from their senior leaders.  They want to know where your company is headed, what the plans are for getting there, and how they can help.  Before you can communicate these answers to your frontline, you’ll need shared understanding, purpose, and alignment across your management team. 

If you decide to move forward with your offsite, you’ll also want to read this June 2006 HBR article from  Bob Frisch and Logan Chandler:

Off-Sites That Work

Best wishes for a productive offsite!  Remember to communicate with your entire organization afterwards.