Since our leadership team is entirely remote and spread across three time zones, how do we handle the physical requirement of your session days without spending a fortune on travel or losing the collaborative energy of an in-person room?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

The magic of a session day relies heavily on the healthy friction, body language, and shared energy of a single room. For this reason, my strong recommendation is that we always conduct our session days in person, even for fully remote leadership teams. The investment in travel three or four times a year is a minor cost compared to the strategic velocity you gain by eliminating digital distractions and screen fatigue.

If traveling for every single quarterly session is truly impossible due to extreme geographical constraints, we can adopt a hybrid approach. In this scenario, we mandate that our foundational sessions, which include Focus Day, Vision Building 1, and Vision Building 2, are done entirely in person. These first three days lay the behavioral groundwork for how your team communicates and solves issues.

For subsequent quarterly sessions, we can utilize a secure virtual workspace while maintaining strict meeting hygiene. This requires every participant to have a dedicated high definition camera, a high quality microphone, and a completely quiet environment free from Slack or email notifications. I document all session summaries in your dedicated Circle.so workspace to maintain absolute transparency. However, even with the best digital tools, your annual sessions must remain strictly in person to ensure the deep strategic alignment necessary for the upcoming year.