Board Retreat Facilitation
Facilitated board retreats for directors, chairs and executive directors, designed around governance rather than borrowed from an executive offsite.
We create sessions that are greater than the sum of their parts, guided by award-winning facilitators.
- 110,000+people facilitated globally
- Award-winningfacilitators
- Boards and committeesin person, virtual or hybrid
We design sessions that leave teams with shared clarity, specific commitments, and the momentum to follow through.
Trusted by teams across the public, private and non-profit sectors
Board retreats
A board retreat is not an executive offsite with different people in the chairs
Positive Impact facilitates board retreats for charities, associations, co-operatives, public bodies and private companies. Your directors are mostly volunteers. They meet a handful of times a year, they govern rather than operate, and several of them will have read the board package on the way in. Nearly every design choice in the day follows from those three facts, which is why a retreat built from an executive offsite template lands the way it usually does.
We won’t tell your board what to decide. You know your organization, your sector and your obligations far better than a facilitator arriving for a weekend possibly could. What we bring is a process that lets your chair take part instead of running the room, gets the quieter directors into the conversation before the confident ones have settled it, and ends with decisions written down while everyone is still sitting there.
What we facilitate
What boards bring us in for
Every retreat starts with a conversation with your chair and executive director. If what you’re facing isn’t listed here, ask us anyway.
Annual strategic direction
Setting the board’s priorities for the year and being clear about what you’re asking of management. We facilitate so the board arrives at direction rather than receiving a plan and finding no reason to object to it.
Learn moreBoard self-assessment
A structured look at how the board works rather than how the organization performs. Anonymous pre-work first, because directors will write down things about meeting length or information quality that they won’t say across a table from the chair who set them up.
The board and executive director relationship
Expectations in both directions, where decision rights actually sit, and what good reporting looks like. Often the most useful conversation a board can have, and the one most reliably left implicit until something goes wrong.
Generative and horizon work
The questions that never carry a deadline. What problem is this organization really here to solve, would we start it this way today, and what have we been quietly avoiding for three years.
Governance transitions
Founder succession, an executive director leaving, an amalgamation, or a board that has turned over faster than its institutional memory. Sequencing matters considerably more than enthusiasm in these.
Communication styles for a refreshed board
Our own communication styles framework, run when a board has turned over and the working shorthand has to be rebuilt rather than assumed.
Learn more
Every retreat we run is built around your board, your bylaws and the year you’re actually having. Tell us where things stand and we’ll design from there.
Start a conversationHow we facilitate
Your chair gets to be a director for a day
There’s no prepared script. We guide the process, your board brings the expertise, and together we build toward decisions your directors helped shape and will stand behind at the next meeting.
The practical gain is that your chair stops running the room. Nobody can hold the process and take part in it at the same time without one of the two suffering, and on a board the cost is higher than usual, because when the chair steers, their view carries weight they never asked for. Facilitator-guided, participant-led, with everyone in the room free to be a director.
Get in Touch
Ways to engage
Three ways boards engage us
Every engagement is customizable, but most start in one of these shapes.
Half-day to two days
Single retreat
One facilitated retreat designed around the decisions this board needs to make this year, with anonymous pre-work beforehand and a written record afterwards.
Best for: boards with a clear purpose and a full calendar.
Ask about a retreatRetreat, then check-ins
Retreat plus follow-through
The retreat, then two or three short sessions across the year to keep the commitments alive between quarterly meetings. Boards forget faster than staff do, for the simple reason that they aren’t in the building.
Best for: boards whose retreats have historically produced good intentions and little else.
Ask about follow-throughAnnual, with a thread
Multi-year board development
A retreat each year with the same lead facilitator, each built on what the last one committed to. Useful where turnover is steady and institutional memory keeps resetting to zero.
Best for: boards rebuilding continuity through a period of turnover.
Talk about a longer arc
The process
A clear path from first call to follow-through
Every retreat follows a similar path, from the first call with your chair to the work that carries on between meetings.
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Discovery
A call with your chair and executive director to understand the year you’re actually having.
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Pre-work
Anonymous input from directors, so the real agenda arrives before the day does.
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Design
A retreat built around your board’s decisions, not a governance template.
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Facilitation
One lead facilitator holding the process so your chair can take part in it.
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The record
Decisions, owners and dates written up and circulated within a few days.
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Follow-through
Optional check-ins to keep commitments alive between quarterly meetings.
Why facilitation?
How a team works together shapes everything it creates.
$100 Million
is the yearly cost for big companies for staff being in pointless meetings.
65%
of senior managers say that meetings keep them from completing their own work.
58%
of Americans would rather go to a doctor’s appointment than attend a work meeting.
75%
of decision-makers feel that collaboration needs to be improved in their companies.
Forrester Research, 2021
Outcomes
What your board leaves with
Decisions, not a longer agenda
A retreat that closes with things settled, rather than a list of topics to bring back to the next meeting, where there won’t be time for them either.
A chair who participated
Your chair spends the day as a director with a view, which for many boards is the first time in a long while they hear it as one opinion among several.
The quiet directors heard
Structured input, so the most experienced voices don’t set the direction in the first fifteen minutes and the newest director’s question still lands.
Clarity between board and management
A written understanding of where the board’s work ends and the executive director’s begins. Almost no organization has this written down, and it’s the source of most friction that isn’t about money.
Commitments with names on them
Who owns what, by when, in a document that survives to the next meeting rather than living in one person’s notebook.
Something a new director can read
Working agreements and decisions recorded in a form that onboards your next director, instead of depending on somebody remembering how it went.
Client stories
Real teams, real outcomes
Every board is different and we won’t pretend one case study maps neatly onto yours. These are the kinds of sessions we run and what groups point to afterward.
What our clients say
It was a pleasure to work with Will and Positive Impact. I was both inspired and empowered to co-deliver a meaningful offsite. Their positive incite into leadership performance and emotional resilience gave me clear direction and tactical tools I could apply to my workplace right away. I thoroughly look forward to working with Will again.
– Haley Daniels
Olympian and Motivational Speaker
Thanks for your incredible support, kindness, professionalism, and realness.
It was my sincere pleasure and privilege to work with you on our event.
You are a unique and special human, and I’m grateful that our paths crossed on this project, and look forward to the next time.
– Shauna Grinke, MBA, CPHR
Vice President – People and CultureThe workshop was an incredibly valuable experience for our team — the facilitator created an open, engaging environment that encouraged honest discussion and collaboration. The content was thoughtfully tailored to our team’s specific goals, making the session both relevant and actionable. We’re excited to continue partnering with Positive Impact to build on the great momentum sparked in this session.
– Shannon Charbonneau
Account Director
Treetop Marketing and Promotion Inc.
I’m leaving our session with a sense of optimism that I haven’t had in a while. It was time extremely well spent! I am sure that we all feel much closer and more connected.
– Participant
MDA Geointelligence Engineering Leadership SummitThe environment that was created made me feel comfortable to participate and collaborate with my colleagues. It was very well organized. I liked the outcome of the brainstorm sessions and warmup activities.
– ParticipantThe level of engagement and pace of the training was excellent. Like the fact that this workshop was trainer-guided, but participants lead!
– ParticipantFantastic facilitating most importantly Will understood when to let us talk and when to corral us back on track. Excellent value this afternoon.
– Engagement Workshop Participant
100% Satisfaction Guarantee.
We stand behind the quality of our work with complete confidence. If you’re not fully satisfied with the results, we’ll make it right.
Your trust matters more to us, and our guarantee acknowledges our belief that you deserve to feel confident in every investment you make with us. That’s a standard we hold ourselves to, every time.
Ready to talk about your board?
Get in TouchChoosing the day
What a retreat can cover, and what you actually leave with
Most boards can do one of these properly in a day, or two of them across two. Attempting four is the commonest reason a retreat ends with a list rather than a decision.
| Purpose | What the session covers | What the board leaves with |
|---|---|---|
| Annual strategic direction | Environmental scan, the priorities the board is setting, and what the board is asking of management for the year | A short priority set in the board’s own words, and a clear handoff to the executive director |
| Board self-assessment | Anonymous pre-work, then structured discussion of how the board works rather than how the organization performs | Agreed changes to meeting practice, committee structure or information flow, each with an owner. Not a score |
| The board and ED relationship | Expectations in both directions, decision rights, and what good reporting actually looks like | A short written statement of where the line sits, which is usually the document nobody realised was missing |
| Generative and horizon work | The questions with no deadline: relevance, risk, and what you would start if you were founded today | Framing rather than resolution, plus a shortlist of what comes back to the next two meetings |
| Governance transition | Founder succession, an executive director leaving, amalgamation, or a board refresh | A sequenced plan with named owners, and honest naming of what is still unresolved |
| A new or refreshed board | Roles, norms, communication styles, and how this particular board makes a decision | Written working agreements that a director joining next year can actually read |
A point worth knowing
The fiduciary work has deadlines. The generative work doesn’t, so it’s always what gets cut.
Board work sorts into three modes. Fiduciary is oversight and stewardship: the audit, the financials, the filings. Strategic is setting direction alongside management. Generative is the harder one, the question of what problem this organization is really here to solve and whether it is still the right problem. The framing comes from Chait, Ryan and Taylor’s Governance as Leadership, and it has lasted because boards recognize themselves in it inside a minute.
Only one of the three arrives with a deadline. Audit dates are real, filings are real, and a finance report has to be received. Generative work has nothing forcing it, so it gets scheduled for after lunch on the retreat day, the morning runs long, and it is the thing that gets dropped. Boards do this year after year and then describe the problem as not having time for strategy. The time was there. It went to the work that shouted.
We design against that rather than hope. The generative conversation goes in the morning, while the room is fresh and nobody is watching the clock for the drive home. Fiduciary material that genuinely needs the full board gets a hard-stopped block, and the rest moves to a pre-read the week before, which directors will read when the alternative is sitting through it out loud. We also say at the open which mode each part of the day is in, because a board that isn’t told will default to oversight every time. It’s the mode they get the most practice in.
One more piece of design worth naming. An in-camera session at the end of the day changes what gets said during it. When directors know there’s a slot without staff in the room, the difficult question tends to arrive at the right moment rather than in the car park afterwards. We build one in, and we say at the start that it’s there.
Featured Workshops
Each of these runs in person, virtually, or as a hybrid, and each is designed around your board rather than delivered off a shelf.
COMS Communication Styles
COMS is our own communication styles assessment, grounded in research and facilitated by our team. It gives your people a shared way to talk about how they each work, so different styles become an advantage instead of a source of friction.
On a board it earns its keep fastest after a refresh. A group that has replaced half its directors in two years has no shared shorthand left, and without a common vocabulary those differences get read as difficult personalities rather than different defaults.
Eight questions, one simple grid, and a reference the whole board can point at a year later.
Learn more
Strategic Planning
This is where your board gets a real say in shaping and carrying out the organization’s direction, landing on priorities that actually move forward.
For a board the facilitator’s job is to stop a capable group approving a plan it didn’t build. There is a real difference between a board that set direction and a board that received one and had no objection to it, and the difference shows up about eleven months later.
A strategic plan is a living, breathing document. We stay involved as it plays out over the following months and years.
Learn more
5 Dysfunctions of a Team
This session takes a good board and helps make it excellent. We draw on Patrick Lencioni’s well-known framework, approached through an appreciative inquiry lens that starts with what’s already working.
Boards are a particular case. Directors are volunteers who like each other and meet four times a year, which reliably produces warmth and not necessarily trust. The difference shows the first time something genuinely contested has to be settled. The five behaviours, trust, conflict, commitment, accountability and results, are all on the table.
Your directors walk away with shared language for how they work together, and a plan for moving forward that they built themselves.
Learn more
Our Core Team
Great content is only made better by great facilitators
Will Chambers
Founder & Facilitator
Award-winning facilitator and Founder of Positive Impact, with sessions delivered to tens of thousands of people. Will focuses on strategy, leadership, team dynamics and communication, turning concepts into clear, committed action.
More about Will
Lindsay Davis
Coach & Strategist
Award-winning coach and entrepreneurial guide, with experience spanning rural entrepreneurs in Africa to multimillion-dollar companies. Helps leaders focus on what matters most and build the resilience to anticipate challenges and move through them.
More about LindsayMichael Lorsch
Facilitator & Learning Consultant
Brings facilitation and learning design from theatre stages to executive boardrooms, including in-house work with lululemon. Blends mindfulness, relationship systems and human-centred design to keep people at the centre of every session.
More about Michael
Jason Maraschiello
Coach & Facilitator
Certified life and corporate coach, mindfulness and meditation teacher. Uses mindfulness and effective communication to help people set manageable goals, find work-life balance and build the support to follow through.
More about Jason
For a board retreat we assign one lead facilitator who speaks with your chair and executive director beforehand, designs the day, runs it, and stays with you through the follow-up. You will not be sold by one person and facilitated by another. Beyond the core team, we draw on a wider network of facilitators and subject-matter experts, matched to the sector and governance context of each engagement.
Before you book
Worth reading first
Six pieces that answer the questions most boards have before a first retreat.
- Strategic planning Why organize a strategic planning session Read the guide
- Honest advice When not to hire a facilitator, and what to do instead Read the guide
- Facilitation craft The art of asking the right questions Read the guide
- Measurement How to measure the success of a facilitation session Read the guide
- Getting ready How to prepare your group for a facilitated session Read the guide
- Afterwards Keeping momentum after the session ends Read the guide
Frequently Asked Questions
Board retreat facilitation FAQs
What is a board retreat?
A board retreat is a longer, less formal session where directors work on the organization’s direction and on how the board itself functions, away from the agenda of a regular meeting. The practical difference from a long board meeting is that a retreat has no motions to pass and no minutes to approve, so a conversation can stay open instead of moving to a vote before it’s finished. Most run from half a day to two days. The ones that work have one or two purposes rather than six.
How is a board retreat different from an executive offsite?
The people and the job are different, so the design has to be too. Directors are usually volunteers who govern rather than operate, meet a handful of times a year, and carry a fiduciary duty a management team doesn’t. That means less shared context in the room, a greater need for pre-work, and a different relationship to the material. An executive team lives the detail daily. A board sees it quarterly, which changes what you can assume everyone knows by ten in the morning.
Should our executive director be in the room?
For most of it, yes. For some of it, no. Your ED holds context nobody else has, and excluding them from the strategic conversation produces a plan that management then has to be persuaded of. But there are conversations a board needs to have without staff present, including the ED’s own review and any discussion of the board’s relationship with management. We build an in-camera block in deliberately and say at the open that it exists, which tends to stop the subject leaking through the rest of the day.
Our board gets on well. Is a retreat still worth it?
Often more so. Warmth and trust are not the same thing, and a board that has never had a hard conversation doesn’t yet know how it will handle one. The valuable work with a board like yours isn’t repair, it’s the generative material that gets crowded out by oversight in a normal meeting year. Boards in genuine conflict are a different engagement with a different design, and we would say so on the first call rather than sell you a retreat.
How do you stop two or three voices dominating the day?
Structure, mostly, rather than moderation in the moment. Anonymous pre-work means the agenda is shaped by everyone before the most confident directors have framed it. Written-first rounds mean people commit to a view before hearing the most senior person’s. Small groups get composed deliberately rather than by who sat where. None of this silences experienced directors, and it shouldn’t. It stops the first fifteen minutes deciding the whole day.
Can you facilitate a board self-assessment?
Yes, and we would run it from anonymous pre-work rather than starting a discussion cold. Directors will write down concerns about meeting length, information quality or committee structure that they won’t raise across a table from the chair who set those things up. The session then works from what came back, which shifts the conversation from who has a complaint to what the pattern is. The output is agreed changes with owners attached, not a score out of ten.
What do we have in writing afterwards?
A written record with the decisions made, the commitments directors made out loud, and who owns each one by when. Where the retreat covered the board and management relationship, it usually also produces a short written statement of where decision rights sit, which is the document most boards discover they never had. It lands within a few days, while people still remember why they agreed to things, and it should be readable by a director who joins next year.
How far ahead should we book?
Six to eight weeks is comfortable. That covers a call with your chair and executive director, anonymous pre-work with directors and time to read what comes back, and a design built around your board rather than a template. Board calendars are usually set a long way out, so the date tends to be the constraint rather than our availability. If your timeline is tighter than that, say so and we’ll be honest about whether the preparation can still be done properly.
Let’s talk about your board
Tell us what your board is facing this year and we’ll tell you honestly whether a retreat is the right tool, what it would need to cover, and what a day designed around it would look like.
Get in Touch
