Organizing a corporate retreat for your team is your opportunity to thank them for all the hard work they have done, to give them the opportunity to form better personal and working relationships, and to get the team aligned with the direction that your business is taking over the next year. However, it’s often underestimated how much needs to be planned in order for that retreat to go off without a hitch. Here, we’re going to need at what elements you need to fix firmly in place in the lead-up to the big trip.
Accommodation
The first thing you need to do is to decide where you’re going to go and make sure that there’s room for you there. What kind of accommodation you opt-in for, whether it’s a hotel, a cabin, a series of B&Bs or otherwise, is up to you. You have to make sure that you have room for all of the attendees, with separate rooms being a must for most people. Take the time to learn about the facilities that your accommodation has, if they have a space for your retreat activities or if you have to rent outside of what they offer, and how much of your budget it’s going to take up.
Travel
Some companies decide to leave travel up to the attendees entirely but, if you do that, you should expect that more people are not going to be able to make it as a result. Instead, it’s a good idea to hire a coach (and driver, if necessary) to pick you and your team up and take all of you on one trip to the location, as well as to book for the trip back. Think of the most convenient meeting spot, and make sure that you leave enough time for people to meet and get organized before the coach actually sets off. If there are some people who need to be picked up at different locations due to vehicle accessibility or disability, you may want to address it with them in advance, too.
Food
If the venue hasn’t provided a caterer or you simply want to make sure that you’re meeting all of the dietary needs of your group, then you should hire a caterer. With services like https://www.saintgermaincatering.com/catering/catering-in-virginia, you should check to make sure that they’re able to meet all of your criteria, able to feed the number of people that you have, and that you are well aware of all the dietary restrictions that might affect your team in advance so that you can make sure that everyone has something to eat. Catering is typically the second biggest part of any corporate retreat budget so you want to make sure that you leave plenty of room for it and get it organized as soon as you have a venue and a way to get there.
Activities
There are two kinds of activities you want to make sure that you have at your corporate retreat. You want to have team-building activities that can help enhance the cohesion of your group, but you also want to leave some room for good old-fashioned recreation, as well. For the former, you may want to hire some team-building exercise leaders, or at least find activities that are well-suited to it in advance. This can also include things like motivational or industry speakers, hackathons to come up with new business ideas, as well as more traditional activities like paintball, escape rooms, cooking classes and the like.
Information
You are not going to be leading your employees around the entire time that you’re out on your retreat. Both you and they are going to want plenty of free time to enjoy the destination that you’re at. The sooner you inform your team about the trip, the better, and you should also start giving them any information on recommendations for restaurants, sights, and activities in the area that they can go and see. If you’re running each day with a scheduled itinerary, then you can even give them an idea of travel times to-and-from your recommended locations and activities. It’s fairly easy to do when you know the locations, you just need to find the distance between them on Google Maps. You can even prepare leaflets for your attendees to take as they please.
You want your corporate retreat to be a success, so start planning for the above inclusions as soon as you can. The sooner you get everything concretely settled, the easier it might be for you to adapt your plans to any changes that may happen