High-Stakes Moment: Are you prepared for your 2022 offsite?
Flights are booked, hotel event space is secured, and carefully crafted agendas are coming together. Leaders around the world are fine-tuning their talking points.
But, it’s not 2019. It’s 2022 and the offsite that we all loved and hated is back on the calendar. We are out of practice. Every executive I work with is asking themselves, “How do I make sure this meeting is impactful?
This first in-person get-together might be the highest stakes moment of the year. It's easy to see why: it’s been two years since the pandemic forced employees all around the world to work from home, logging into meetings with their real lives happening for all to see in the background. But now, teams are eager to interact face-to-face. They don’t just want information and updates from a talking thumbnail on their screens – they want to sit with their colleagues, have meaningful dialogue, and hear real-time perspectives. They want to feel connected and part of a team.
While the idea of an actual real-life meeting is exciting, don’t forget that we’re also in the age of the Great Resignation (or the Great Reshuffle or Great Contemplation or whatever term defines the exodus and migration of burned-out talent). Spend 30 seconds scrolling LinkedIn and you’ll find countless announcements from people at all ranks who are moving on to new opportunities or management teams trying to hire for a wave of open roles. It seems like everyone is doing a reset, re-thinking their purpose and what makes them happy. All the while, company leaders are working hard to bridge the gap between longtime team members and new hires. They’re cheerleading collaboration efforts, dreaming up incentive programs, and trying to generate a favorable chatter so they can move the business forward.
These factors – the pressure of an exceptional, make-it-or-break it in-person experience coupled with dizzying turnover and changing priorities, creates intense pressure for top executives to deliver a perfectly on-point message, in a way that will inspire connection, loyalty, and motivation from the entire team.
One event, the pressure to get it right
The offsite puts everyone in the same room, buzzing with anticipation and palpable energy. The objective? Get everyone on the same page, unified behind a collective goal. This might be when leaders step onto the most important stage. Why? Because before they can sell to clients, raise capital, or conquer their next product iteration, they must first sell to their own teams.
This 2022 offsite isn’t a typical presentation. It requires careful strategizing, planning, and practice. How are you going to make people feel endeared to you and your company? How are you going to emotionally tie them to the organization’s purpose and product? How will you inspire them to work hard? How will you convince them to stay? As an executive, you have a lot to consider in crafting your message so you strike the right tone and motivate the team to work toward your vision.
Build your offsite around purpose
This is the time to win the hearts and minds of your team. I encourage leaders to dig deep into purpose and vision. Think hard about how your company is serving society and creating change. What is the underlying, long-lasting impact or outcome you’re seeking? How are you meeting the needs of employees so that they can in turn deliver the best service to customers?
In the age of the Great Resignation, think of your purpose like a tether. It’s going to be what roots your team in the trenches with you. It’s what will drive enthusiasm, camaraderie, and innovation. When you highlight purpose and tell stories in support of this mission, you inspire a common goal and a more cohesive organization.
Let stories be your guide
Tell stories that help your audience instantly understand and relate – and get on board with your initiatives.
Think: inspiring customer success stories. Stories that highlight your culture. Stories that demonstrate your impact on the world, long after a sale happens. Stories of overcoming, of teamwork, of invention. Describe the lesser-known moments about coming together as an organization and what the results were – and what they can be – when teamwork ignites.
Lean into vulnerability
Great leaders know when and how to be vulnerable to land a message. Your team wants to work with a human, not an overly scripted robot. The offsite is the time to be real and talk about all the things that have been hard – the mud! – and to help your audience hear that you have felt that, too.
It's okay to touch on failures, speaking to them as opportunities for how to move forward in a positive light. It’s okay to get personal, to acknowledge what you’ve felt and seen from behind your laptop camera. To connect deeply, you need to be raw and imperfect.
Give your team what they deserve
For your next offsite, lean into your purpose. What is the driving message your team can rally behind? Through story, and vulnerability, and even an imperfectly perfect delivery, let’s rally our teams in the way that they deserve to be rallied after the last two years. We can lift our employees, give them the connectedness they long for, and together, deliver on meaningful outcomes.
The last few years have taught us that anything is possible.
(And that preparation is still king).