Okay, picture this.
You are attending a corporate retreat at a beautiful resort. You have traveled all day, possibly crossed a few time zones. Your inbox is still gathering emails, and your first scheduled activity begins at 7 a.m.
That’s right, 7 a.m.
It is a beachfront yoga activity. Attendance is not mandatory, technically, but your boss is going, the head of whatever committee is going, and it is kind of implied that you probably should be there.
Someone has already created a group chat titled “Sunrise Squad.”
So, naturally, you are going, because nothing says wellness quite like waking up anxious that declining that yoga invitation might impact your professional reputation.
[Smart Start Radio theme music]
Welcome back, Smart Start Radio family.
Grab your coffee, tea, matcha, water or whatever is getting you through your planning season, because today we are talking about another aspect of wellness.
More specifically, we are talking about what happens when wellness becomes another thing attendees are expected to perform.
Smart Meetings editor Avery Matteo recently spoke with Robin Ruiz, CEO of the Wellness Tourism Association, about the organization’s Six Principles for Responsible Retreats.
The framework was created to help retreat leaders, venues, destinations and planners evaluate experiences through six areas: qualified leadership and facilitation; safety and risk management; transparency and integrity; thoughtful design and inclusion; respect and care; and responsibility toward the surrounding community, culture and environment.
There is a lot planners can take away from Avery’s story, particularly when it comes to sourcing retreats and vetting facilitators.
But one part stopped me.
Participants should feel comfortable engaging at their own pace. Activities should be voluntary. Expectations and boundaries should be clear. Individual needs, abilities and comfort levels should be respected.
My takeaway from that is pretty simple:
You cannot mandate wellness.
Wellness has become a major part of the meetings and events conversation.
We talk about mindfulness breaks, yoga classes, sound baths, which I love, by the way, nature walks, meditation sessions, healthier menus and agenda designs that give attendees room to breathe.
And I love that.
I love when planners think about ways to infuse moments into an event where attendees can recoup some of their time, take a breath or relax. We work so much all the time, and if we are able to design an event that incorporates time when we can just unclench, that is a win.
On a personal note, I have practiced Reiki for several years. I am a Reiki master. Not that you need to care about that, but I have worked a lot on my own personal wellness and finding ways to calm myself during times when I might be extremely stressed.
I have spent a lot of time in wellness spaces, and I really believe these experiences can be of great value to attendees when they are available.
They can help people reconnect with themselves. They can give attendees a moment of quiet in an otherwise demanding agenda. They can create space for reflection, restoration and even deeper connection with the people around them.
But those benefits depend heavily on how the experience is introduced, facilitated and held, because wellness is not neutral for everyone.
One attendee may love the idea of a guided meditation. Another may find closing their eyes in a room full of colleagues deeply uncomfortable.
One person may be excited about a group hike. Another may have a mobility concern they do not want to explain publicly.
Someone may find a facilitated sharing circle meaningful. Someone else may not want to discuss their emotions with the person who approves their expense reports.
Neither response is wrong.
A wellness experience can stop feeling supportive when it assumes everyone has the same body, boundaries, beliefs, comfort level or relationship with vulnerability.
It becomes especially complicated in a corporate environment, where the line between invitation and expectation can become very blurry.
I have mentioned this before, I think, in a previous podcast. I once signed up for a 7 a.m. yoga session. I was going to go. I was excited about it.
Then I realized the evening’s planned activities ended late. The minute I was on the shuttle ride back to my room, I thought, “There is no way I am getting up at 7 o’clock in the morning.”
The sun was not even up at 7 o’clock in the morning. I was like, “No, I am not doing this to myself.”
I know my boundaries. I know my body. If I force myself to do this, I am going to be unhappy for the rest of the day.
It just was not going to happen.
Now, let’s talk about the word “optional,” because corporate optional and actually optional are not always the same thing.
An activity can be labeled optional on the agenda, but if senior leadership attends, the entire team is encouraged to participate and the photos are later circulated as evidence of company culture, attendees may still feel pressured to join.
They may worry that opting out will make them appear antisocial, disengaged or unwilling to be part of the team.
This is not really a choice.
Let’s be clear: This is mandatory participation wearing a softer outfit.
This is where psychological safety becomes part of event design.
Avery’s story explains that psychological safety begins before participants ever arrive. Clear pre-event communication, intentional program design, appropriate safety practices and an understanding of attendee needs all help create a responsible experience.
This means planners cannot simply put “optional wellness activity” on the agenda and assume the work is finished.
How is the activity being described? Are attendees told what it involves? Do they know whether physical touch, emotional disclosure or strenuous movement may be involved?
Can they leave during the experience without being singled out? Is there an equally appealing alternative? Are company leaders making it clear that participation has no connection to professional commitment or team loyalty?
Perhaps most importantly, does the person leading the experience understand the difference between facilitating a public wellness activity and working with a private group of employees?
It is very important to distinguish that people have a choice. They have the ability to say, “No, thank you,” or excuse themselves.
When people do not have a say in how they engage with a moment, there is no longer a clear sense of “optional” in the equation. You are removing a person’s ability to control their own choices.
That immediately brings into question how leadership views team boundaries.
Does leadership respect those boundaries?
If people feel uncomfortable, unheard or disrespected, that goes beyond the wellness activity. It becomes a deeper conversation about whether the team is respected outside of that moment and in the workplace.
If employees are not able to say, “No, thank you,” that is a bigger conversation.
It is a huge conversation to be had.
Planners know how to evaluate meeting space. You look at capacity, accessibility, food and beverage, audiovisual capabilities, emergency procedures and how people will move through the property.
But wellness programming requires another level of sourcing.
You also have to evaluate the human being delivering the experience.
The Wellness Tourism Association’s full framework goes even deeper, asking retreat providers to consider areas such as professional liability insurance, emergency protocols, participant health screenings, informed consent, confidentiality and healthy professional boundaries.
Avery’s story translates these principles into practical sourcing questions for planners.
Does the facilitator have the right qualifications, experience and approach for this particular audience? How are safety, accessibility and inclusion being considered? How do the venue, destination and facilitator work together to support the experience?
That matters because a beautiful resort does not automatically make every activity offered there appropriate for your group.
The venue alone does not create a meaningful retreat. The quality of the leadership, facilitation, program design and alignment between partners shapes the participant experience.
You would vet the person handling your production. You would vet the company providing transportation. You would vet the kitchen handling a serious dietary requirement.
The person guiding attendees through a potentially physical, emotional or psychologically vulnerable experience deserves the same level of scrutiny.
What are they qualified to do? What are they not qualified to do? How do they respond when someone becomes uncomfortable? How do they protect confidentiality? How do they adapt an experience for different bodies, backgrounds and abilities?
Are they making promises the activity cannot responsibly fulfill?
There is a difference between saying an experience may help attendees relax and promising that it will heal trauma, eliminate burnout or transform someone’s life.
This is very important.
When I practice Reiki on people, I tell them directly that it is not some magical healing experience. It does not fix you overnight. It is not a one-time experience where I perform Reiki on you and suddenly you are done and everything is good.
That is not how it works.
I would be a horrible practitioner if I said that. You cannot say that kind of thing to people.
Responsible wellness practitioners, in any capacity, cannot make promises they cannot provide.
Another point from Avery’s story that I really appreciate is the idea that wellness should not simply be an activity added to an event.
Well-being can influence the location, pace, environment, food, facilitation and structure of the entire program.
You cannot schedule a 20-minute meditation between nine hours of back-to-back sessions and declare the agenda restorative.
You cannot give attendees a green juice while denying them enough time to sit down and drink it.
You cannot hold a session about burnout and then send six follow-up emails before everyone has left the ballroom.
Sometimes the most meaningful wellness decision is not adding another activation.
It is ending the day early. It is providing a real lunch break. It is building transition time between sessions. It is giving attendees a quiet place where they do not have to network.
It is providing food people can actually eat. It is letting people sleep. It is recognizing that rest does not always need to become another scheduled group experience.
A sound bath might be wonderful.
So might an unscheduled hour alone in the hotel room.
The goal should not be to create the most visible wellness agenda. The goal should be to create conditions in which people can care for themselves.
Here are three things Avery’s story has me thinking about.
First, audit your agenda for pressure.
Look beyond whether an activity is officially required. Ask whether your language, leadership participation or company culture could make attendees feel obligated to join.
Make opting out easy, private and genuinely consequence-free.
Second, vet the facilitator as carefully as the venue.
Ask about qualifications, experience, insurance, safety procedures, professional boundaries and how the facilitator adapts the program for a corporate audience.
Do not assume a consumer wellness experience can simply be copied and pasted into a company retreat.
Third, design for well-being instead of decorating with wellness.
Consider the pace of the agenda, the food, the physical environment, accessibility, communication and the amount of unstructured time attendees are given.
Wellness should not be one session.
It should be reflected in how the entire experience feels.
In closing, a retreat is not restorative simply because yoga appears on the agenda.
It becomes restorative when attendees feel safe, informed, respected and free to listen to what they actually need.
Sometimes that might be yoga. Sometimes it might be meditation, movement or time spent connecting with colleagues.
Sometimes it might be signing up for a 7 a.m. yoga class, hearing the alarm go off and deciding that your personal wellness journey begins with turning it off, like me.
That is not disengagement.
That is an attendee exercising the very self-awareness the wellness program is supposed to encourage.
You can read Avery Matteo’s full story, “Wellness Tourism Association Releases Responsible Retreats Framework,” at smartmeetings.com.
Once again, I am Eming Piansay, and this has been another edition of Smart Start Radio Coffee Chat.
Thank you for joining me, and I will see you next time.
Bye.
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You’ve been listening to Smart Start Radio, a Smart Meetings production. Interested in being our next guest? Connect with us at editor@smartmeetings.com.
