Hi! Managers: Effective off-site meetings

They can be very beneficial, provided they are conducted in the right way. I am referring here to team meetings when you take your subordinates out of their regular environment in order to focus on one or a very few specific issues.

Here are some tips that have worked for me:

-Number of participants: seven to 12 people

-Facilitation: Depending on your needs, either an external or an internal facilitator are okay. Sometimes, I did the facilitation myself and sometimes, another team member did it.

-Frequency: I used to take my leadership team for an off-site meeting once every quarter.

-Duration: In most cases, our off-site meetings lasted from Friday morning until Saturday afternoon.

-Location: We used to go to nice hotels one to three hours drive away from our office. I consider a relaxed, informal and enjoyable atmosphere crucial for the success of an off-site meeting. The pleasant environment was also a kind of compensation or reward for my team members who were willing to sacrifice part of their weekend for our meeting.

-Important: I always asked my team members first whether they were happy with the schedule of Friday and Saturday. Obviously, you will only get the consent of your team members if you have succeeded in establishing a good working atmosphere.

-Agenda: Less can be more. Do not overload the agenda. Be generous with the time schedule. Balance business and leisure. Make the off-site meeting an opportunity for people to talk and share ideas. Make it a joint learning experience. Focus on only one or a very few topics. And, very important: use the meeting as an opportunity to talk rather than to show dozens or hundreds of (boring) Powerpoint slides. My personal learning curve shows that the fewer Powerpoint slides we used (sometimes we didn't use any!), the more effective and fruitful our off-site meetings became.

Team meetings away from the office are a great opportunity to strengthen the relationships among team members. They can be a chance to align the team behind a common cause, refresh strategy and goals, enjoy a joint learning experience or address a particular issue in an open way.

During our off-site meetings we were always able to create momentum and to revitalise and reenergise the team. Spending many hours closely together made us a much stronger team and gave us a lot of mileage and momentum when we had to discuss serious business issues in the office.

I have always observed further improved team spirit and improved bonding  after our off-site meetings. That is what I consider their biggest benefit. And, after all, isn't great teamwork the ultimate competitive advantage?

Heinz Landau is former chairman and managing director of Merck Thailand. Follow his articles in Hi! Managers on every second Wednesday of the month. He also writes a blog on caring leadership at www.thecareguys.com.