Offsites

We're a remote-first company, which means in-person time is rare and valuable. We don't want to waste it on slide decks that could have been a document or brainstorms that could have been a Slack thread.

Offsites are for the things that actually benefit from being in the same room.

Why we do them

Remote work is excellent for execution. It's less good for building trust, having hard conversations, and making strategic shifts as a team. Those things are much easier face-to-face, and they matter.

We've learned more about how to work together and where we're going in one good offsite than in months of async work.

Types of offsites

Company offsites (twice a year)

The whole team. Typically 3–4 days. We do these in Istanbul, but we've also done them elsewhere when it made sense.

What we try to cover:

• Review of what we've shipped and what the numbers say
• Strategic priorities for the next 6 months
• 360-degree feedback sessions (see Feedback)
• At least one day that's genuinely fun and not about work

Informal team gatherings

As the team has grown, we've started doing smaller gatherings when people are in the same city for events or just for the sake of it. These are less structured. Dinner, a walk, showing someone around your city if you're the local. These matter too - especially for people who joined recently.

What makes a good offsite

Plan the agenda in advance, but leave room. Fully scheduled offsites feel like a conference. Fully unstructured ones drift. A few well-designed sessions per day, with real time in between for conversations that emerge organically, is the sweet spot.

Don't fill every hour. The conversations that happen over dinner or on a walk are often more useful than the ones on the agenda.

Do the hard sessions early. If there's a strategic disagreement or a performance conversation that needs to happen, do it at the start of the trip - not the last evening when everyone is tired and wants to avoid conflict.

Include feedback. Every offsite should have a structured feedback session. We don't always love doing it, but we've never regretted it.

Capture what you decide. Decisions made in person have a way of dissolving when everyone goes home. Write them down - a short doc, a Notion page, anything - before you leave.

Costs and logistics

We try to keep offsite costs sensible. Good locations don't need to be expensive. The value comes from the time together, not the hotel.

Flights, accommodation, and meals are covered. Bring your Deel card or submit receipts. If something feels extravagant, ask first.

Sponsors and events

Some of our offsites happen around events we're sponsoring or attending (MeasureCamp, privacy summits, etc.). When that happens, we plan the team time around the event schedule - not the other way around. The event is the context; the team time is the priority.

What we've learned

Our best offsites have been the ones where we came in with real agenda items - things we'd been circling in Slack for weeks without landing. Getting in the same room and committing to a decision is worth the cost of the trip.

Our worst ones have been the ones where we filled the schedule with presentations that could have been documents.