Today, the Collegewise crew will be departing for our second annual company meet-up. Since we work in offices spread out around the country, our meet-ups are the only time that we’re all able to gather in one place. But bringing everyone together is a significant expense, and we’re asking a lot of our employees to be away from home to spend four days of company time. So it’s important to make it count.
When we first began planning our meet-up months ago, we started with two deceptively simple questions:
1. What would a successful outcome look like?
2. How can we drive that desired result?
Our most important outcome was to send people back home feeling like they were better able to handle some of the more difficult parts of this job. A meet-up is the perfect opportunity to put some of our most experienced veterans in front of the group to show everyone exactly how they do what they do. And we scheduled time to discuss a variety of specific topics where counselors can choose which sessions to attend.
We also wanted everyone to leave our meet-up clear on our company goals for this year, and excited about how they could best contribute to helping us achieve them. We’re all in this business together, so we built in plenty of time for our leadership to talk about our plans for this year and to take questions from our crew.
And finally, we just wanted our counselors to leave with fond memories of connecting with co-workers and having fun together. Collegewise counselors work hard, often in the evenings and on weekends. This is a great opportunity for us to get some time off the clock and reconnect with each other. That camaraderie is important, and we wanted to give people every opportunity to relish it. So while we’ll spend a good chunk of each day working and learning, we’ll also be socializing together, hosting a talent show, holding an awards ceremony, and even building in plenty of downtime where we can each spend it however we’d like.
It’s surprising how two seemingly simple questions—what does a successful outcome look like, and how can we drive that desired result—can give you laser focus when planning any meeting or event, regardless of the size or scope. Throughout our planning, whenever we debated an idea of something to do or include, we went back to those two questions as our litmus test. If it didn’t pass, it didn’t make the agenda.
The next time you plan a meeting, retreat, or gathering, start with those two questions. I think you’ll find it makes it much easier to decide how to spend your time, money, and energy.
If you’re curious, here’s our agenda for the meet-up (“CAP,” which is referenced frequently, stands for our “Complete Admissions Program”).