Retreats
Running a residential programme: what changes when people stay over
Team Selgars · · 1 min read
The evening is not downtime
On a day course people leave and the learning stops. On a residential it continues in the kitchen, on the walk, at eleven at night. Most of the peer learning happens outside the sessions, which means the sessions should leave room for it rather than exhaust it.
Programme less than you would for a day course
The instinct is to fill the extra hours you have bought. Resist it. Four good hours of taught content a day, on a residential, produces more than seven, because the other hours are doing work you cannot see.
Cohorts form fast and fix fast
By the second evening a residential group has a culture, and it is very hard to change afterwards. Whatever you want to be true — that questions are welcome, that seniority does not decide who speaks — has to be established in the first few hours.
The practical differences
Accommodation quality varies and people compare. Someone will need a quiet room. Alcohol changes the dynamic and you should decide your position rather than let it emerge. And somebody has to be reachable at night.