Leadership Retreats: Mistakes to Avoid Part 1

Rania Francour: Welcome everyone. I'm Rania Francour and today we're going to talk about leadership retreats, leadership off sites, executive retreats, whatever you call it. We're going to share our perspective on some of the do's and don'ts and mistakes that people do that sabotage their retreat. We want to make sure that all that time and investment that you're putting into your retreat will have a sustained, positive impact on your organization. Uh, so to kick us off, we're going to have Randall Craig, the CEO of the Brain Trust Professional Institute, uh, share a few ideas to get the ball rolling. We'll flip into questions then from you, some questions for me. And as usual, Randall is in the hot seat. He has no idea what questions are coming his way. So for those of you that are new to Randall, I'll share a little bit about him. He has founded several successful startups. He held a longtime position at a big four consulting firm. He was a senior executive at an American public company, the author of eight books. He's in the speaker hall of fame. He's a master facilitator, he's helped over 100 organization scale, and he works with me at the, the Brain Trust Professional Institute, helping organizations grow through executive retreats, executive coaching and facilitating conversations with teams. So Randall, where do you want to begin today?

Randall Craig: So I, I think it's, it's, it's very, very interesting when we, when, when, when we get a call about can you help with that with our retreat? And, and um, you know, it's always nice to get the call, but, but uh, when they ask the question, well, why do you want to actually have the retreat? You know, what, what, what's happened in the past and everything. The number of responses that we get are well, you know what, we've done the same thing over and over or you know, something. We, we, we, we sort of, you know, people just see it as a perk, but we don't actually accomplish anything or we've got this wonderful experience and then we get back to the, the office and, and everybody. There's no actual substantive change that actually happens with the organization or um, uh, Jeep, last time we did a retreat suddenly put us through the process. We discovered our why, we discovered our whatever it is and then, you know, why was it relevant to us? It was a good experience, but it really wasn't relevant, etc. Um, and I think that's such a shame. The cost of doing retreat is absolutely massive. I'm not talking about our fees or anything like that or even the venue. But if you've got everybody from the organization off the job, okay, and actually doing something, um, you know, the job doesn't go away. The value of everybody who's actually around that table is huge, just absolutely huge. So therefore it makes a lot more sense to say, how do we plan one a little bit more strategically? How do we make sure that anything that we actually accomplish together as a group actually makes a real difference and sticks, uh, well beyond the retreat itself? Excuse me. How do we make sure that we're actually addressing the underlying, uh, you know, barriers to actually moving the organization and the leadership group to that next level? When I say leadership group, you know, I'm talking about whether it's a, it's an executive team or whether it's a divisional sort of group or whether it's a scrappy startup or a not for profit or an association board or a corporate board that is doing a board education, whatever the particular group is. I'm just going to use the word leadership, uh, retreat or executive retreat, just to meet, um, just to describe all of them. Um, so that's, that's one sort of thing that I think is important. And um, if there's questions along those specifically, of course we'll, we'll do our best to answer. Uh, the second thing is, um, you know, particularly with, in industries where there's significant change, either external change or an internal change, maybe there's a bunch of new people, maybe there's a merger that happen, maybe there's a new CEO, new leadership or new board direction, whatever it is, um, and the group gets together, excuse me, um, you know, what's the actual purpose of the retreat itself? You know, is the purpose for the CEO to help build alignment with their team or sort of help change direction? Is it just to build relationships and that's it. Is it to solve a particular problem, say strategic planning, or maybe some executional issue, uh, some tactics, or is it uh, more of a training exercise? Is it a reward? And if we have an understanding of what those objectives are, that sort of uh, makes it a lot easier, uh, to actually execute, actually to put together, but it won't necessarily make it successful. And the reason why is that when, uh, you take a leader out of their normal day to day and say for a day, two, three days, you're going to be m with this group and we're going to accomplish something things, uh, that sounds very good, but you've got your own blockers, you've got your own challenges, your group, if you will, that you're responsible for the accountabilities. Don't go away. So one of the things that's actually, I think, very important is, is to, to find a way to make a retreat. One where, um, pardon me, all of the individual people around the table feel like they're actually getting something for their time investment, you know, which is, which is one of the reasons why, uh, people are engaged when they feel like they're getting something. But for them specifically, the CFO might feel that they need this, because whatever, another group, another, um, leader might feel they need this. Okay. Uh, somebody else may feel we need this. And songs, all these, this is, are addressed within the context of the overall objective. The, the retreat will be a success because when people leave, they'll say, okay, I've got something very specific I can use moving forward. Okay. To solve my particular issue. Not just that team dynamic. Yes. There are things that we can only do together as a team, and the retreat provides the opportunity to sort of lock that in. Right. But everybody there is an individual with individual accountability, so we want to make sure they get something too. So, you know, um, I think I'm going to stop talking. We've got a fair number of interesting people, um, on the line. Thank you for coming. Um, and why don't I pass it over to all of you and Rania to facilitate and let's see about getting your specific answers, your, uh, specific questions

Rania Francour: answered, uh, to keep things going. I'll get things started, but absolutely, the floor is yours. I want to start, Randall, by talking about, um, values and corporate values and how we can be, like you said, more than just, you know, throwing the retreat together because we do it. But how can we be strategic to highlight and reinforce the desired culture and desired behaviors we want and how to cook that into the retreat design? So I have some ideas that I could share, but I'd like to ask you, Randall, if you want to share some perspective on how to be more deliberate with infusing those corporate values into the agenda.

Randall Craig: Gee, wouldn't it be easier if you just sort of pass me your questions beforehand?

Rania Francour: I can get us started with an example if you want me to.

Randall Craig: No, um, well. Well, um, let me just tell you what comes to mind. First of all, you know, it's not what you say, it's what you do. I mean, that in a certain sense is a definition of a brand. Right? You know, what you say, what you do, you know, equals what you represent. Right. And so the question of, you know, if, for example, you know, here we are at, you know, you know, top of the, of uh, of the, of the triangle, the mission, vision, values, etc and then eventually so it goes down to sort of how people sort of act, how they treat each other, what the culture is and, and everything. So during the retreat design, during the retreat itself. Okay, the question really is, is how are you actually modeling those. Right. And, and um, it's really, really, really hard because if you say yes, we're a collaborative culture, just as an example, and the CEO starts off by saying, this is what we're going to like the opening remarks, I'm talking, this is what we're going to do and this is what we're going to do and this is what we're going to do. That does not live leave much space for other people to sort of chime in other than okay, I guess this is how. Right. Um, it's a lot easier, for example, if the CEO modeled what they wanted in terms of that culture within the retreat itself. You know, it's an open conversation, uh, that is part of the desired culture. Well, guess what then there should be open conversation within the retreat. It's a safe space. Right. So, so that's, that's one part of it. I've, I've got a, Excuse me, I, I've got uh, a few other ideas but Rania, you uh, said you had one. Just uh, throw it on the table and see what people think.

Rania Francour: We, we've all been there. But I'll give a classic example so no one has to feel too singled out. You, we, we've worked with teams before where deadlines are an issue, things come in late and you know, lots of fallout from, from, from that when things do not run on time. And then we get to a retreat. The clients spent hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars on this retreat for this large executive team. And then the CEO gets up and they've been given a 15, 20 minute time slot. They run for over an hour. Right. So the team, the company has a chronic problem of being late. Everyone's worse. Meanwhile, the CEO is, what are they? Role modeling. Right. So this is sort of a very easy example, but how you choose to block your time and the topics you're choosing to focus on with your team, you're sending the message, this is what's important to us. We are all spending this time together to talk about this, to get on the same page. And I think that where we help the client a lot is really matching up where they're lacking, you know, where they, where they want to Go and putting that into the retreat design, I,

Randall Craig: I think that's an interesting thing. I'll just expand that a little bit. Um, you know, the whole question of, of what happens with the elephant in the room, in the retreat, you know, um, things that everybody knows but nobody wants to talk about. Um, let me share. And I don't think this is rocket science. That's probably the thing that should be talked about, right? Because if you're able to address the elephant, then whatever it is, and people may have different views on what the elephants should be. And it's not a question of discomfort, it's a question of how do you lead people along a journey where there is, um, um, there may be tension at the very beginning because it might be an elephant. But on the other hand, at the very end there's a release, right? There's a, there's the conversation. There's a question of how to address it if, if, if indeed is a very, very big one. You know, there's a question of how does, uh, um, call it micro coaching sessions. How, how do those sort of play into the retreat? Those little conversations, for example, that I might have with the CEO or with a, with, with somebody around the table about, you know, if this is going to come up, um, how might we actually have uh, a conversation in a way that is both respectful but also, um, clears the air so that real substantive conversations can take place or at least that elephant's addressed.

Rania Francour: I think it's talking about the elephant is really, really where the magic happens. That usually happens between closed door conversations with individual, uh, CEOs and leadership teams. But I want to talk about team building and more specifically team building activities. Okay. You can honestly, if you look up retreats off site, uh, corporate retreats, it's all fun, fun, fun and barbecue parties and ropes courses. And it's like, where is the learning? Where are these executives being executives? It's very hard to find that, that content anywhere online. Are those examples of what that is. So, um, uh, my question is how does team building happen? And we work with people the best, well meaning internal teams. They go, we're going to go to a wine tasting, we're going to do different tours and blocking off a chunk of time for a team that works apart different sites of geographies together. To do intensive team building is like saying, I want to lose 10, 20 pounds. I'm going to go to the gym for 12 hours today. That's not how you build health. How you build health is going to the gym every day. Or three days a week, whatever your routine is. And that's how you build health. And same thing with the team. You're only going to team build every day with your team. So I wanted to open Randall to share your views, our views here.

Randall Craig: And, and the real question is, gee, if you've got a day, two, two and a half days, whatever it is, how do you magically go to the gym all at once? Okay. And the answer is, is traditionally been something that, that I think is. I uh, don't want to let me be controversial, a waste of time. Okay. If, if people do trust falls, if, if people do yet another high ropes course or, or, or yet another wine tasting, that's not team building, that's might be at best relationship building. And I think relationship building is actually very important. You go on nature hikes together and you end up talking about business stuff along the way, etc, but doing high ropes courses and hikes and wine tasting, um, that's not in my view, um, that might be necessary. It's not sufficient. And I think a big opportunity is lost within the retreats themselves. If we take a look and say how do we do team building in a way that's actually uh, models and is sustainable beyond the retreat itself. And here's a perfect example of how that can happen. So, um, if you've got a particular problem on the table, um, there's several different uh, modalities where you have small groups working on a certain aspect of the problem or looking at through different lenses, etc. And if you've got these three person, four person subgroups or pairs, there's several different ways of doing it, actually working on a common problem. And then we bring everyone together and whether it's presentation or debate or some other format where there's a communication of what the findings of them are, okay, fine. Everyone sort of learns all about it. But the actual team building itself happens when people actually are working as a team. So if we're able to have an objective, focused segment of the day where people are actually working together in small groups, that's one way of doing it. And that's very, very, very powerful. Why? Because if for example there's a, that team dinner that night, uh, yeah, there'll be good relationship building, but there'll also be conversation about the experience and what the outcome of, of the small group work might be. Right, Same thing with respect to um, you know, fine, if there's gonna be an activity that's a hike for example, or, or, or, or, or, or anything like that what if you give people suggested topics to talk about? Okay, thought, uh, starters, you know, things that get them having to not just learn about how each other think but where there's good conversations between the pairs etc, but just by saying, okay, well you know what, because we're in Napa, huh, uh, we're going to go on a wine tour because it's Napa, uh, and then we're going to do this and that, whatever and then magically teamwork happens. No, it's got to be paired with what happens within the content. Right. And, and uh, unless you've got people actually working together as if they're working outside remotely because everyone's in different places nowadays, it's very hard to sort of magically expect that to happen afterwards. Uh, I have to admit certainly as a former uh, um, uh, senior executive public company, I've gone on my share of retreats where, where, where, where there's wine tours or you know, kayaking in uh, in the ocean or you name whatever it happens to be. But I can't remember any kind of, I don't know if that really built the team that built relationships. Right? So we need the relationship part but we need to manufacture into our retreats mechanisms where people are working in pairs, small groups, etc. Uh, as well as the overall facilitated sessions or the training oriented sessions because that's where we start to do it. I think also another way is to say is it possible that there's some pre work beforehand, okay, where we can get small groups working beforehand or what can we do after the retreat itself to get other small groups to work on particular short term time frame, um, ah, projects that might move the agenda forward. Um, whatever was decided within retreat itself is that way between the before, during and after. You've got a bit of a continuum of, of team building that actually happens via team building. Also say that it's very hard when you've got a group of leaders together. It's not everybody is used to following. So how do you, you know, for some groups it's a question of saying well you know what, let's spend some time talking about the team dynamic and how you can build that team dynamic with your team, uh, when you go, when you leave the retreat. But the meta, uh message really the meta program is guess what, we're going to be doing that here today and we got a chance to sort of do that as a bigger group, as a leadership group. Um, probably one of the um, most impactful parts of several retreats. Rodney. Uh, and I have done is, is when I ask this question and uh, if you're open to it, um, put into the chat and say, and, and uh, and, and just the number of people that are on your team. Just, just, just now just put a number in the chat if you could. Okay. It'll take you two seconds. And, and I'm demonstrating this for you because, and there's a point to it. Hopefully you'll do it. Um, because very often people have a very, uh, different view as to what, what their team is. Okay, we've got some responses too. 15. Okay. Um, there could be other numbers, but think about that numbers. 11, 8, 2000. Oh my. 2000. That's a pretty big team. I'm impressed. Right. Um, but here's the thing. Uh, what I call 10, what I call your team one, it's not those people to report to your team. Team one is the people around the room is an incredibly powerful concept that, gee, even though you responsible for all these people in your organization, on your team, if you will, Team one is the people in the room. And so doesn't it make sense, for example, as a leader to spend as much time thinking about what Team one dynamic is like, not just the team before, uh, but below, I should say. Right. And, and so, so, you know, if we're able to spend some time on, on, on that kind of idea, all of a sudden people say, yeah, I never thought of it that particular way. You know, who, who's your team one? Right. Um, I think there's also another dynamic. Sometimes decision making is a bit of a problem. Right. If you had a whole bunch of people in the room, does everyone need to be, you know, is it always a group decision or is there some person who's a decision maker? Well, that's an easy one to understand. Right, but what's, uh, the different roles of everybody else on the team are some people, for example, just, just need to be consulted, you know, because they've got some specialist knowledge of, of one thing or the other, some interesting relevant experience, or can be involved in the implementation or something like that. So some people just need to be informed of the decision at the end. Or some people need to be omitted, right? Who assists? You know, so, so, you know, you may have heard of a framework racy ratio. Those are two of them. Um, maybe we need to talk about what the different roles are within the team. Right. If teamwork, for example, is a particular issue. So you know, I know we're diving deep into content and ideas and everything, but, uh, but what actually ends up on the agenda is a function of what the actual people around the room need. Okay, as well as what? That, uh, the, the. The leader, the, the CEO, the executive director, whoever it is, uh, you know, what they're. What their North Star actually is.

Rania Francour: So I had a thought about, uh, team building. If I could share. Uh, we talk about having them work together, create something together, solve problems together. These are all super, super, super important. But Randall, everybody has their dance that they do. Every, every team, you know, uh, and different teammates, and they have their patterns. And it's very, very hard to break out of your patterns. And even if one person on the team or a few people want to change, it's very hard to, uh, change the team. So something that we see very often, the feedback that we get is that people learn a lot from the role modeling that Randall and I provide. That there's the dynamic that we have that they sort of see, like, oh, there's a different way of doing it. I want to talk about managing expectations. Okay, so when you talk about what's. Is a retreat successful or not, so, so much of happiness and satisfaction rests on met or unmet expectations. So let's everybody in the room here to all our listeners and watchers, uh, like going into a retreat, how do we set those expectations? Whose job is it? What's appropriate, what's inappropriate? We have clients who, you know, individual people, they're. Everyone in the room has different expectation. And then when they get negative feedback, it's like it's not matched against what the goals were.

Randall Craig: The magic that happens at a retreat doesn't suddenly sort of poof into being like, uh, a couple of days beforehand. You know, uh, I can't speak for anyone other than the brain trust and retreats we do, but, um, recently, you know, we spend about an hour, hour and a half or so at least with each individual person around the table. Uh, and we've got a whole bunch of questions that we ask them, uh, just to get a sense as to what they need and their perspective and so on. And then we'll go ahead clustering that, etc. And we get a good sense as to. From what each individual person needs in terms of what they want from the, the retreat. Sadly, the expectations are so low, uh, from so many people because so many retreats are. Just don't generate that roi, um, that it's not so hard to, to do a. To. To hit it out of the park, which is like, sad. Um, but, uh, it starts with that conversation. It also Starts with the conversations that we have with the CEO or the head of HR or the cfo, whoever is doing the, the taking leadership for the planning. Right? What are the communications that are going out? Okay, what are you saying within your team meetings or your team, uh, communications to, to everybody, you know, um, what should your role be? Uh, beforehand, you know, gee, what's the culture of the organization with respect to the um, potential of doing something beforehand before the retreat so that everyone, everyone is there like we're running. Right? Um, um, is it pre work for example, is it to get on a, a ah, pre call? Is it to uh, do some reading or I don't know, whatever it happens to be. Same thing with respect to the accountability afterwards. Is there some short term accountability that's actually useful uh, to put in place? How do we overlay anything that comes out of the retreat onto the existing processes and systems? We're not recreating the wheel, um, in, in a retreat while we're doing this. We're building uh, the alignment that needs to happen and sometimes some, you know, some upskilling and, and relationship building and so on. So, so these are all, these are all the kinds of things that, that can address the issue of expectations there on the day of the retreat or the days of the retreat. There's also something else that's interesting. Um, you know, so who's actually doing the facilitating? Okay, so, so I'm usually the primary facilitator when, when we do that and, and Ronnie will take a ah, couple of sessions as well. But whoever's not in front of the group is on, is doing what we call overwatch. Okay. Uh, watching everybody in the group making notes as to who needs a conversation, providing up to the note feedback, um, thinking about gee, do we need to alter slightly the agenda going forward based on what somebody said, you know, preparing some of the other things. So, so that way at every single break or every little turn we're able to sort of shift a little bit and pivot along the way to make sure that, that we're on track in terms of meeting the overall objectives. And also if, if there's certain things that you know, aren't going well for a particular person. For example, uh, we can take some time and either do a, a micro coaching session or some one on one time with the other person, et cetera, and doing the touch base obviously halfway uh, through the retreat with, with the leaders saying okay, how's it going and all that. And then afterwards to make sure that um, what's going on with all the individuals. You know, if when we have that meeting a month after the retreat saying, okay, so how's it going? What happened with all the accountability? Here's some other things that we noticed that during the retreat that we think that would be valuable to you. Actually we do that much before a month. But, but all these kinds of things help close that gap. Part of it setting expectations. Part of it is, is um, delivering with flexibility. Part of it is the touch basings. Part of it is the micro coaching. Part of it is the after the fact. But pretty much all of it has to do with what's the design process to actually putting the uh, the retreat together. It's too important just to sort of wing it. Um, and uh, uh. And it's too important to put people through some contrived kind of, you know, um, um process that does not. That's not purely customized for the people who are sitting around the table.

Rania Francour: I had a thought to share about expectations. So we meet with teams, we ask them about their experiences in past retreats and sometimes they'll say like, no impact. So I would give that like a little bit of a thumbs down. And oftentimes we will hear there was some change, but it fizzled out after a while. Okay, so is that success or not success of all? Quote, a book that Randall often recommends to clients. The book Traction Gino Wickman, this eso operating. And he says nobody can keep the momentum and inspiration and grit going more than three months after that. We need another shot, another infusion. So like, if, if all the research is telling us that people can only, you know, hold it, hold strong for three months, then you have to give more infusions every three months. But if there is momentum after a retreat and then it fizzles out, it's a management issue and maybe a topic for the next retreat is how can management keep those fires going longer than three months.

Randall Craig: Yeah. And to be clear, you know, one of the reasons for fizzling, if you want to use that technical term, is that um, the message and the alignment that happened at the leadership level, there wasn't a mechanism to actually have that same aligned message throughout the rest of the organization. Right. There either wasn't, you know, uh, management cascading. Okay, There, there wasn't, for example, it wasn't embedded into uh, um, the communications function there. There was no, you know, um, town hall. There was no, like a lot of these kinds. There was no coaching. Like there's all these different things that, that are possible just to keep it going. And to start to build, you know, in a retreat you build a, A uh, new common vocabulary amongst the leadership team. Right. But how do we infuse that new common vocabulary or the more prioritized vocabulary amongst the entire organization? Right. And uh, I'd say if we achieve alignment amongst the leadership and more powerful relationships and the ability and some new skills, perhaps that'd be a good thing too. Um, then it'll be a, ah, success. Right? But when people leave a retreat saying the same old, same old, I don't know. I don't think that's, that's not success. That's building cynicism and frankly poor culture too. Let's take some more questions. Rania, if we don't have from anybody else here.

Rania Francour: Um, Ren asked curious your experience on pros and cons of pre and post work for a retreat. Uh, interviews and co creation of the retreat with not just the leaders but also the participants prior to the retreat and any follow ups.

Randall Craig: So, so let me take that. Thanks Rhett. So, um, uh, I love the idea of pre, pre work. I love it, I love it, I love it. I love the idea of post work. Okay. I, I just absolutely love it for a million different reasons. I don't think most people in this call would, would sort of not, not know what those reasons are. You know, expectations, upskilling, uh, some early teamwork. Right? It means we can hit the ground running at the retreat itself. Excuse me. Um, it shows that this is not the usual retreat. Okay. But also say uh, and same thing with respect to post work which frankly helps um, with the cascading of information. It locks in the concepts, it improves relationships, all those good things and more. Right. Um, um. But I also recognize that every organization's culture is different, right? Um, and we don't want pre work and post work to be make work stuff. Right? We want it to. Even if we were not doing the retreat, we want there to be intrinsic value in those particular uh, things. Even if it's something as simple as read this white paper, right? And this, they've got to get something out of it. You know, it's kind of like at every single touch point, every time you ask a leader to actually spend some time doing something, um, what's going to happen? Either it'll be a good experience if it's a bad experience, okay? Trust goes up, trust goes down, right? Uh, they think this is ah, fantastic and very helpful or it's just a colossal waste of time. Right? So we want to make sure that um, there is value Very specific value and how a different culture in an organization looks at those kinds of things. It means that you can't just say this is the official pre work and this is the official post work. Um, you've got to make sure it's customized. Uh, the idea of interviews and co creation with retreat, yeah, we do that hugely. I think that's incredibly valuable. But it's not just performative interviews. We're going to spend half an hour, 20 minutes with each person, get to know them, et cetera, and vice versa. It really is the question of saying, okay, um, and the questions we ask are sometimes really hard questions. Right. Ah. And because we need to very quickly understand what's really going on in an organization as outsiders is very hard. You know, certainly when I'm wearing my executive coaching hat and a client says, you know, we'd like you to also facilitate the retreat. Um, gee, I know a lot more about what's going on in the organization. A lot. That frankly not, uh, everyone around the table knows that. I know, right. But we don't always get that kind of, uh, benefit of having done that kind of deep work with the client. So we need to understand, and I'm not talking about we as brain Trust professional institute. I just can't understand how uh, if you're actually facilitating a retreat, you can't do this in detail, detail, detail. It is a huge amount of data that sadly, uh, I can't sort of do because despite having a bunch of questions, the conversations go into all kinds of different areas that, that are just absolutely brilliant, you know, very, very important. Um, the post work is also something that's very, very different because we, you know, everyone's got a day job, everyone certainly at the senior level, um, only has so much time during the day. Then it's filled with other things. If we're doing a board retreat or board education day, uh, these people are all part time. You know, we can't do a whole bunch of stuff afterwards. So the question of, of what kind of post work that we can do, um, it's got to interlay into the processes and systems that already exist. It can't be net new. Okay. There are some things that are very short term net new that we, that we would, that we implement all the time. You know, can you make two calls in the next two, three weeks? Right. With, with somebody else? And, and here's what you're going to say. And, and here's here, here's kind of what they're going to say back. Um, the answer to that is. Yeah, absolutely. Because that is a very, very small ask. Okay. In terms of the bigger asks, you got to make sure that there's capacity, otherwise they'll resent it. Right. You'll never get the outcomes you want. It won't, uh, amplify the effectiveness of what you've accomplish during the uh, retreat. It'll, it'll have the opposite effect. So, so a good question. And, and thank you, Ren, for your, for your uh, for your feedback as well. And you're, you're, you're asking those questions, Randall.

Rania Francour: I'm sure we'll see. We're seeing the same thing. But um, when I hear you say, you know, if you're coaching an executive or leader and they ask you to do the retreat for the leadership team, um, you have all this huge amount of knowledge with the organization that you can, you know, inform the retreat. Yes. But you've heard it all from the perspective of that executive. Right. And the perspective of the executive is not the perspective of the other people on the team. Right. And perception is reality. And I find when we talk to the team, there's huge AHAs, huge gaps that are filled and huge backstories that are filled. And some of it is fantasy, uh, and some of it's exaggerated and some of it's perception. But we're able to do so much clear cleanup and alignment. And I find that 360 really helps the leader more post. If you're, if you're in a relationship with the leader as a coach, then it does actually help the retreat. With that, we're going to break right here on this topic of leadership retreats, mistakes to avoid. We'll pick up with more Q A in part two. But if any of the things we talked about so far resonate with you, if you're planning your next retreat and would like our input, would like our resources, like our ideas, do, reach out, we'd be happy to have a conversation. You can contact us at ah@infor randallcraig.com or book a call at www.randallcraig.net 30 and we'll see you back for part two from our Q and A.