THE PANEL. An international retreat

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1 76 Rodolfo Musco A nobleman house of late XVI Century, a quite village on the hills, only a few kilometres from an international airport, a territory to explore during the spare time, all forming an ideal set for international retreats An international retreat steeped in history Rodolfo Musco CMP, CMM, has been organizing conferences and incentive programs for 35 years. He is president of Motivation & Events, a journalist and teacher. musco@motivationandevents.com It started as many challenges start: a colleague was looking for a venue to run a marketing and product management seminar for 15 junior managers coming from several European and Middle Eastern countries. For several years this seminar took place on a Texan ranch not far from the main office of the client company, but the decision was taken to hold it in a European destination in order to avoid intercontinental travel. The programme was quite long: nine days. The budget was not specified, but it was easy to find out that the ranch s rates were not very high, specially if compared to the increasing value of the Euro and the new cost of good hotels in Europe. Also, ranches have a lot of space on their properties and not many guest rooms. Finally, the proximity to an international airport could be considered a must, due to the internationality of the participants. The research of the appropriate venue brought a discovery. Savignone is a township only a fifteen-minute drive from the airport of Genoa and five kilometres from the highway that links the two airports of Milan to the capital of the Italian Riviera. There are only a few houses around a little square with secular trees and only one street that crosses the whole township. At the two sides of the square like almost all medieval towns stood the two major buildings representing the two powers of those days: the church and the palace of the ruler of the area, Palazzo Fieschi, transformed in a four-star property. Palazzo Fieschi was built late in

2 77 the sixteenth century by one of the most powerful families of that time, actively engaged in defending the Republic of Genoa from the hills dominating the Mediterranean Sea. In the nineteenth century, the palace was restructured as a hotel to host visitors interested in the thermal springs that formed a spa. During the last world war, the spa was closed, and the palace then served as the meeting point for wealthy people on vacation in the area, until it was acquired by the Caprile family some twenty years ago. The actual owners restored the property piece by piece, refurbishing the 23 guest rooms and the public space with furniture perfectly matching the quiet and yet comfortable atmosphere of the palace. In spite of the meagre number of guest rooms, Palazzo Fieschi is a member of the Genoa Convention A site must evocate something and must involve people Bureau. This confirms how much the Caprile family understands the importance of meetings and their participants. Meeting facilities into history The palace as the Texan ranch - was not built to host meetings as they are considered nowadays. However, it has several plus for retreats that use the property for a long meeting. The ceiling of the ball room is over six meters high, with precious paintings and a warm atmosphere. It is connected with the fireplace room and also features precious decorations and crystals. A third small room is connected to the other two, and may be used as the event office. What is special of Palazzo Fieschi is that the whole venue may be used for the purposes of the meeting. When breakout sessions are called for, participants may decide to work in: the patio the TV room the quite and relaxing private park with trees, a spring in the middle and a fountain on one side. There is plenty of space, and the hotel staff continuously takes care of the permanent refreshments to anticipate the guests needs. Palazzo Fieschi has an excellent gourmet restaurant, with precious paintings and decorations, and a large fireplace. When a meeting is hosted in the palace, the restaurant is totally reserved for participants, who enjoy the fragrance of the freshly baked croissants for breakfast or the delicatessen items cooked for their pleasure and served in the garden or in the monumental restaurant. A possible programme Many hotel managers try to keep as much business in the house as they can. The members of Caprile family, on the contrary, assist conference organizers to

3 78 best design their events. Their insightful advice and suggestions were critical for the success of the retreat, to the point that Savignone is now synonymous with the product and marketing management seminar that an American company runs yearly at Palazzo Fieschi. Here are some key points of the off property programme. a) An Italian specialty for a psychological de-conditioning Fifteen people coming from fifteen different countries do not form a group in the psychological optic. Consider also the impact with a three member faculty and a totally unexpected venue. It is necessary to ice-break and let participants network among themselves before starting the seminar. For this purpose, a welcome cocktail is organized in the lovely hotel s park. During this short function, the senior trainer introduces the participants and the programme. Then groups of three participants are formed to compete in a pizza making contest that takes place in the pizzeria on the opposite side of the street. Participants wear aprons and chef s hats, and are requested at their turns a) to paste the flour, b) to flatten it, and c) to dress the pizza. The dinner that follows the contest gives participants the chance to taste several types of pizzas (excluding, of course, those made by participants). Diplomas are presented to the members of the winning team. b) Fashion outlet Twenty kilometres from Savignone there is one of the largest fashion outlets in North Italy. This is also the area where Gavi, one of the best Italian white wines, is produced. A short visit of a winery is a must on the way to the outlet. Participants love to spend a couple of hours visiting the shops of world known griffes, from Valentino to Versace, from Fendi to Armani, from Ferré to Cavalli, to name just a few. Of course they can buy what they like, before dining in a nice, friendly restaurant at Serravalle Scrivia. c) A Sunday in action Believe it or not, in Savignone there is an organization that deals with quads. This provides the ideal means to discover the beauty

4 80 of the hills. By combining quads and mountain bikes, it is easy to set up a competition among the same teams formed for the pizza making contest. The rules are simple: two members per team are requested to drive towards the top of the hill and place small flags with the team s colour every 300 to 400 meters, and signal their location to their team mate by using vegetal material. The task is not easy, as the competitors may steal the flags if they can decode the signal. There is plenty of material to use during the debriefing in order to find out the key factors of success in communication. After a while, the roles are exchanged, to give to all three members of the team the chance to drive the quads, to place the flags and to drive the bikes. On the top of the hill, teams are requested to snap a picture of the landscape and give instructions to their team mates so that they can take the same picture in the same frame. This works again as an occasion to highlight a simple principle of communication: an image (a drawing, in this case) is more eloquent than hundreds of words,

5 81 especially in a multicultural environment. d) Lunch in the farm On the top of the hill there is a small farm where participants may have a lunch based on genuine products cooked by the farm s owners and blessed with local wine. The view of the hills, the peacefulness of the environment, the simplicity of the food and the smile of the hosts form a real experience, and participants plan to go again at least once to Serrato to eat at Agriturismo Il Pero. e) Orienteering There are several solutions to organize intriguing orienteering contests on the hills around Savignone: to find and map a ghost town, to draw the hidden walkway to a chapel, to find the easiest way to the river, and so on. Camp knives and pieces of nylon threads may be sufficient to organize an archery contest before driving back to Palazzo Fieschi. f) By the sea Savignone is a short drive from Genoa. After seven days on the hills, participants may be happy to reach the old port of Columbus city and be served with a full Mediterranean menu while smelling the fragrance of the sea at night. This cannot happen the last night, because it must be devoted to the ceremony of graduation. A retreat is a full immersion seminar, and participants really work intensively. The environment helps them stay concentrated. What they learn is beneficial to their career, and Palazzo Fieschi seems to be the ideal setting for it. As a matter of fact, participants recommend the retreat year after year to their junior colleagues.