Many organizations take advantage of the window of time between the end of summer and the beginning of the holiday season to evaluate existing or develop new management strategies for the future of their business. You might say, 'tis the season of the annual leadership retreat.

Over the years I've been both a participant and a facilitator of such management events and it is not unusual to hear a short time later something like this... "Our leadership team went off-site to a resort for our annual strategic planning retreat, but, as usual, the energy we felt while we were there evaporated pretty much as soon as we returned. We jumped right back into 'business as usual' and the ideas and plans we generated got put on the back burner or more likely will be forgotten altogether."

The frustration of repeating an unproductive exercise (however nice the surroundings may have been while there) can dampen the motivation of even the most enthusiastic supporters of future management planning. How many well-intentioned leadership teams come back from the mountain with a "strategic plan" that ends up being a dusty manuscript, rather than a working blueprint?

The heart of the issue may be in the conflict between trying to accomplish two very different objectives and so, ending up creating a barrier to achieving either one. RETREAT implies getting away for unwinding, relaxation, relationship building and personal reflection, while STRATEGIC PLANNING connotes business analysis, goal setting and the very hard work of collaborating to shape the organization's future. Frustration and disappointment (some say insanity!) comes from doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results...in this case, expecting serious work and commitment to come out of something that was billed as a "retreat."

I'm in the camp that believes in having a management retreat to get to know and learn to play well together first, then get down to planning a business strategy in a totally separate follow up session.

The best off-site strategy sessions are less about event planning and more about having candid, productive business discussions that result in realistic goals and decisions. It's not so much about where you are, as it is what you are doing and the value you place on the effort. Before you start gearing up for your next one, you may want to have a pre-strategy meeting to consider a few important questions in advance to help guide the desired outcome:

· Why are we doing this?
· Are we capable of working effectively as a team or do we need to work on that first?
· What are we trying to accomplish?
· How should we go about it?
· Would we benefit from having an experienced outside facilitator?
· Who should be included...are there others besides the leadership team?
· What information do we need to gather and consider?
· How will we know if the session has been successful?
· How and how much do we intend to communicate the results of our planning work?
· How often will we review and evaluate our progress on what we said we were going to do?
· How should we be held accountable for execution and results?