Why your away day didn't change anything on Monday
The activity is rarely the problem. Nobody in the room had to practise the thing you wanted to change.
Most away days do what they set out to do. People enjoy themselves, they talk to colleagues from other floors, and everybody goes home in a better mood than they arrived in. Then Monday comes and the meeting runs the same way it ran the week before. The same two people talk. Somebody's half-formed idea gets shut down. The handover that was supposed to be fixed is still broken.
That's not the away day's fault. A day out lifts morale, and a good one is worth the money. Changing how people behave in a meeting is a different purchase, and it takes practice.
Knowing it and doing it
Every team I work with knows the theory already. They know they should listen more than they talk. They know that shutting down an unfinished idea kills the next three. They have been on the course, the poster is in the kitchen, and two of them can quote the framework.
What they haven't done is practise it out loud, with colleagues, somewhere getting it wrong costs nothing. There's a long way between knowing how to behave and being able to do it while people are watching, and explaining doesn't close the gap.
“There's a long way between knowing how to behave and being able to do it while people are watching.”
What practice looks like
One exercise, so this is concrete. A pair plays a two-minute scene in which one of them politely blocks everything the other offers, the way it happens at work. The same pair then plays the scene again, accepting and building on every offer. Nobody has to be told which version worked. Then we ask where the first version happens in their week, and who does it to whom.
Ten minutes later they are recovering out loud from a mistake in front of the group. The first time is uncomfortable. By the fourth time it's normal, and that shift comes entirely from the repetition.
Three questions before you book anything
- What would be different on Monday if this worked? If you can't answer that, book a social and enjoy it.
- Will everyone take part, or will some people watch? Group size and facilitator numbers matter more than the activity does.
- Does anybody practise anything, or does somebody explain something?
Away days are still worth booking. They buy you something different. If the honest answer to the first question is that the same two people would stop dominating every meeting, an escape room won't get you there.
Applied Improv Scotland
Communication training for teams across the Central Belt. Sessions from £400, refunded in full if they don't land.
See the sessionsTwo more pieces are coming on the same subject.
Not written yet. They go up on Insights as they land.
The difference between blocking and disagreeing
Teams get told to say yes, and. Most of them need permission to disagree properly instead.
The conversation your first-line managers are avoiding
They know what to say. They've just never said it out loud.
Get a price and a date.
Tell me the group size and roughly when. You'll have a written quote back within one working day, and the fee is refunded in full if the session doesn't land.
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