The good news is that corporate incentive travel and luxury business travel are recovering.
- Incentive Travel Comeback: The Shape of Things to Come
- Incentive Travel Operator Reports Incentive Trips Recovery
- Incentive Travel Recovering from Belly Flop [PDF]
With the economic recovery on simmer rather than at a full boil, some companies are still proceeeding with caution. They have not released the hold that they placed on their incentive travel programmes in 2008.
For these companies, local incentive travel is an option worth pursuing to:
- reward your team
- express appreciation to top tier clients
- stretch your budget
- boost the local economy
If you keep travel time to no more than 2 hours by ground transportation, your team can enjoy a longer stay at your chosen destination.
What does a local incentive travel initiative look like? It could involve a short excursion and an overnight stay at a local hotel. It could take the shape of a 3 or 4 day stay at a local resort. Small teams should consider boutique hotels, inn and lodges to stretch their budgests.
You can kill 2 birds with one stone by including some facilitated team building and a short business meeting on the itinerary. (The operative word is short or it will feel too much like work. An initiative that gives back to the community should also be a key component of foreign and local incentive programmes.
Here is a sample itinerary that builds in enough downtime and still incorporates enough meaningful business activity for companies that are gun-shy about media criticism (i.e. think AIG effect):
- Travel to a local destination.
- Opening remarks by CEO
- Orientation and group check-in
- Opening reception
- AM: Relaxation
- PM: Facilitated Team Building Exercises and Team Briefing for Outdoor Challenges
- Full day of team building including outdoor team activities and challenges
- AM Relaxation – Choice of free time and leisure activities
- AM Short business meeting before lunch
- PM Philanthropic Activity
- AM: Relaxation
- Departure for home mid-afternoon
If you need to shorten the itinerary, then philanthropic team building is an option to consider. Since your destination is local, employees could have the option of paying to extend their stay and have spouses and children to the resort for the weekend.
You’ll find many options for local team building at our corporate team building blog. Here are just a few options to consider based on your location:
- Toronto: Winter Team Building, Wilderness Survival
- USA: Desert Survival, Wilderness Survival
- Jamaica: Island Survival
- Dubai: Desert Team Building, Oil Rig Simulation
- Oman: Mountain Team Building
- Malaysia: Jungle Survival
- Japan: Team Building Japanese Style
With local incentive travel, you can create a blockbuster event within the scope of your budget. It’s an option worth considering for companies that are not ready to dive and re-activate their foreign incentive travel programmes.