Running a Departmental / Directorate / Team Awayday
Considerations
1. What do you hope to achieve?
2. What proportion of the time should be allocated for
· team building / getting to know each other
· reflection on past successes and problems
· strategic planning
· organisational issues e.g. problem solving; clarification of responsibilities; changes to procedures
3. Who presents what – which topics can be prepared in advance by individuals / team?
4. Who to include other than academic staff in academic departments? How to include PT staff?
5. How to record discussions/decisions?
6. Which topics are you ‘telling’ and which are genuinely ‘for discussion’? It’s very frustrating to have discussions where the HoD/awayday organiser has already decided what to do!
7. Where to hold the event? Timing? External facilitator for part of the day? Other guests?
8. Evaluate the day (best, worst, use of time as well as more obvious things like catering, venue, facilitator). Use evaluations to inform future planning.
9. When will there be a follow up meeting?
Content
You should probably include the following on the programme:
· Praise and thanks for work to date
· An examination of the achievements of the department/team over the last year
· A consideration of areas which need to be improved and/or changed
· External factors affecting the department/team
a) Faculty/section plans
b) Institutional plans / strategy / financial issues
c) External influences
· Some thought about longer term directions for the department/team – 5, 10, 20 years?
Hints and Tips
· Plenty of notice to delegates
· Clear themes
· Variety of working & presentation methods
· Active learning where possible
· Involve the delegates in presenting / leading discussions
· Plenty of time for informal networking
The most common problems
1. Head of Department/awayday organiser fails to follow through;
2. Good ideas get lost. It's a meeting like any other and someone needs to record decisions/ideas/actions;
3. Trying to cover too much or in too much detail – or conversely not leaving enough time for discussions to reach fruitful conclusions;
4. Not being clear up front about who will make the decisions – are staff being asked for ideas or to take decisions?
Staff Development Office
School of Oriental and African Studies, Room 472
E-mail –