When did you last bring your team together for a day of learning, growing and celebrating?
Successful businesses with a strong culture have a consistent rhythm of connection (that is, when, where and how the team connects and communicates).
There's no question that a recurring and engaging series of 10-minute to 1-hour meetings spread throughout each month creates a culture of connection.
Short, sharp and purposeful meetings are super-powerful; however, the best performers in a high-performance culture are also usually biased toward learning and collaborating.
An often-overlooked part of a successful rhythm that meets your business and employees' needs is a commitment to in-person connection for the entire business.
That's where the investment in a more extended, half-to-full day in-person event can be the missing ingredient.
At The Physio Co, we have a once-per-year conference for our team known as TPC Swarm. It involves a full day of learning, growing and celebrating. The agenda for the day is pretty packed, starting with a morning Walk Club, followed by some scheduled time for a coffee and chat before we launch into a day of workshops from internal and external experts; usually some friendly competition in the form of soccer, pickleball or basketball and time allocated to rewarding and recognising members of our team with a series of annual awards - all planned with time to chat, eat, connect and collaborate.
There are plenty of variations on how you could design and run your conference or 'team day' - I've seen many of them - and you can definitely start small.
Your event could be an intimate event on-site in your usual building, possibly in the afternoon or evening (that's how TPC Swarm started).
Or it could be off-site in an interesting location like a co-working space with external speakers that inspire and support your work as a business owner.
Perth based legal firm, Curae Law, asked me to help them design and host their first-ever team day, which became known as 'Curae Connect'. That event was held in a dedicated, off-site meeting space with an important theme: To learn, grow, commit and connect to the Curae of the future.
Curae Connect was a big success. It was part of an ongoing project to reconnect and re-energise the Curae Law team as an innovative, mature business - and it worked!
Another example is a mid-year celebration that Bradyn and the team at Coerco put on for their 150-person team at their local footy club. The event, involving company updates, reward, recognition, learning and inspiration, ended with plenty of food, drink and time for chatting with fellow Coerco-ans (their term for members of the Coerco team!).
So, is it time you started planning an in-person event to take your culture to the next level?
Keep at it.
PS - Info about speaking and facilitating I do at events like Curae Connect and Coerco is over HERE.