“Camp? Training? Retreat? 合宿?”
In this article, our colleague Eric Frey shares his experience participating in a「合宿」(gasshuku) organized early this year by his team, and explains how this intensive retreat helped to strengthen their team’s bonds and foster a sense of shared purpose. From outdoor activities to team-building exercises, read on to learn more about the benefits of this unique approach to corporate team building. The original article was posted in our LinkedIn page.
In Japan, the concept of a corporate retreat or company offsite would likely be called “合宿,” or when translated to English, “camp.”
In practice, the phrase “合宿” actually covers a wider variety of meanings, from an offsite for corporate strategy, or a middle school basketball team rooming together for a week of intensive practice, to a driving school condensing months of curriculum into a week for people with busy schedules.
With such a flexible application, it’s no wonder that it’s a popular phrase which can be applied towards anything where people go off somewhere to be in the same physical space for the purpose of creating a shared perspective.
(There’s also often the element of sharing as many mealtimes together as possible, along with a group night out for food & drinks.)
Over the years at mct, we’ve also held the occasional camp where everyone from our Osaka and Tokyo offices can get together, as well as smaller ones with our work units of 4–9 colleagues. Often the aim has been to revise strategic direction and highlight core principles and skills.
Having adopted a remote-first work style, giving members more flexibility in balancing work and life, and more opportunities for various kinds of collaboration, we are finding that lighter and more frequent 合宿 are a welcome chance to reconnect with each other in a refreshing way. These more recent camps can integrate individual work time and activities together in a seamless way that makes sense for established members and new members alike.
Organizational Design Team 2023 Camp — FEEL
Last month, the nine of us in mct’s Organizational Design team convened in Kyoto for a three day camp for some team building, discussion of this year’s strategic direction, and to meet with one of our partners for a training workshop. But mainly, we went in with the goal to create a web of shared meanings & references by sharing experiences together.
For last year’s camp the theme was HUDDLE, since we were still separated by necessity by the pandemic. When considering the theme for this year, we came to an agreement around FEEL. There was a sense that with remote work, while we were finding an efficient routine for work, there was maybe an imbalance towards too much individual cognitive thinking.
As such, one of the mantras we adopted became Bruce Lee’s iconic line “Don’t think. Feel.”
Our goal was to not only have a number of shared experiences in person, but to use the in-person aspect to FEEL in a variety of ways during those experiences, and through that to also have a sense of the place (Kyoto) where we had gathered. By doing so, we could develop a richer shared understanding from which to refer to in our work.
Playful Workshop Training with Nobuyuki Ueda
On the first day, we met with Doshisha Women’s University Professor Nobuyuki Ueda & his zemi students for a ‘Playful Workshop’ training session. mct has partnered with Professor Ueda in the development of mct’s Playful Network, a participatory community launched in 2019 with “the vision of making playful part of the standard of work style.. for realizing a better employee experience, and to create an environment that facilitates innovation within the organization.
During the half-day session he walked us through various kinds of ‘playful’ exercises for team-building, with a purposeful build up from easy to more involved, while moving between activity to reflection along the way.
A key phrase was “low floor, high ceiling, and wide walls” from Lifelong Kindergarten by Mitch Resnic.
In this way, we found another facet of the FEEL theme. That is, to not only FEEL for the purpose of the output being developed, but also to sense the process along the way. To feel the dialectic process, the positive sense of creative “clashing”, that occurs between people when creating shared meaning and new things.
After wrapping up the session with some learning presentations from his zemi students, in the true spirit of 合宿, we all headed out for dinner & drinks to wrap-up the first day.
Out & About In Kyoto
On the second day, we handled individual work tasks in the morning before splitting into smaller groups for a series of various experiences around Kyoto within the theme of FEEL.
One of the places we stopped by was a facility called ‘Question’ operated by the Kyoto Shinkin Bank. The concept of the facility seems to be that it is a place where various local players gather to solve local questions. The facilities are excellent, of course, but the fact that a local financial institution plays a central role seems to have made it possible to realize activities with great centripetal force. With this concept, you can feel the clash of different parts of the community coming together and the creation of a place where different perspectives can be felt and new meanings and ideas can emerge.
Another place we visited was a traditional incense shop for scent training and incense making experience. In the class, we were introduced to the individual components often used in the making of the incense pouches, and then allowed to create our own custom mix. As each person crafted their mix based on personal preference, we found another metaphor to consider teamwork and team formation. Not only how the combination of individuals can lead to an unexpected new result, but also in the need for awareness and understanding with each other when forming teams.
Aside from these, there were interviews with people in the community, ideation sessions on empty trains & crowded buses, plum blossom viewing at a local temle, checking out innovative store design using the five senses, and of course, meals together.
In the evening we attended a talk at Kyoto Design Week between German architects and a Japanese monk, about “あいだ” or “dazwischen”, and the intentional use of the “in-between” for creating new things. Again, we came across the idea of “clash” and drawing upon a wider palette of sensations from which we can pick up pieces to clash or to find the in-between of.
Reflecting & Strategizing for the Year Ahead
On the third day and final day of the camp, we held our monthly Organizational Design unit’s “Morning Live” webcast, before conducting a team meeting & wrap-up session at a traditional Kyoto family house (古民家) (which had been converted into a remote working space).
During the meeting we had an exercise to consider different learning styles as part of experiential learning,and how to be conscious of how we blend people, styles, and work tasks — for our own when approaching our own teamwork within mct, as well as the organizational design projects we do with clients.
After this and some debriefing of the entire 3 day camp, we took care of some individual tasks, cleaned up, and went for another meal together — this time an okonomiyaki lunch near the station before heading back home.
Reflecting on This Year’s Camp
There’s no doubt that the get together produced a nice healthy team glow. Even now that a few weeks have passed, we are still pulling out new and interesting aspects from the various experiences that are applicable in how we approach our work. Not only having a richer set of experiences that we “felt”, but doing so together in the context of a 合宿 has proven beneficial. As a unit we have more robust set of shared meanings and sensations that we can refer to and use as ingredients in our day to day thinking.
In talking about our camp experience, we hope that other teams will be interested in setting up their own 合宿 — whether it is a corporate offsite, playful team-building, an intensive training session, or a literal camp! Whatever you choose, keep in mind the objective to create shared meanings with each other through the shared experiences.
