Each year, the national Worklogic team comes together for our annual workplace retreat. The retreat is an opportunity for the team to share ideas, wisdom and hopefully, some good food!
The annual Worklogic retreat gives us the rare chance to all be together in the one place. With offices in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, and some of the team living regionally or in the outer metro area, we often don’t find ourselves in the same room, so we relish the opportunity to have some valuable face-to-face time.
Day 1
With beautiful Hobart as the setting, we checked into The Old Woolstore Apartment Hotel, which provided huge rooms, right in the heart of Hobart, a stone’s throw away from the harbour and most importantly, decent coffee!
After we checked in, some of the team went out in search of op shops and picked up some excellent bargains, while others enjoyed a stroll around Hobart’s Botanic Gardens.
Now, it must be said that the Sydney team proved to be a bunch of troopers- despite flight delays exceeding 10 hours and missing luggage, they arrived to dinner, all smiles! We had cause to celebrate, not only the start of the retreat but it was also our director. Jason Clark’s 10th anniversary with the company. A fantastic achievement! Suffice to say, after the walk back from the restaurant, we hit the hay.
Day 2
After a sufficient amount of coffee, and some early morning walks for the eager, the team gathered in The Old Woolstore’s conference room for the morning session.
Lead by Directors Jodie Fox and Jason Clark, we were given an overview of how the company is tracking. Transparency is a key value of our company and the team is regularly updated at our monthly meetings about upcoming work and trends.
The exciting thing about working at a place like Worklogic is that the team is made up of people with different backgrounds and experience. The team includes people who have had careers in HR, journalism, law and psychology.
Our task for the morning session was to get an understanding of the skills and knowledge base of our team with an interview exercise. In pairs, we were asked to find out the basic history, skills and interests of a fellow Worklogican. I was vey happy to be paired with Rosemary Hay, who works in Practice Support in the Sydney office.
Rosemary has had a varied and long career, moving as a ’10 Pound Pom’ from England to Australia as a child. She was a trailblazer and, in her decades-long career, she was among the first women to learn and embrace technology is an array of industries. With a passion for people, Rosemary loves learning and focuses on gratitude in her everyday life- and her ideal dinner companion would be Anthony Hopkins!
I learnt so much about Rosemary and the rest of the Worklogic team. What a talented bunch! 
After a short break, we launched into the second session of the day- an interactive workshop on client persona, run by myself and project officer, Ruth Weinekoetter. I was sweating bullets in the lead up- having never run a session at the retreat before, I was hoping for a smooth and fun session and although we had some hilarious and surprising technical difficulties, I didn’t need to worry! The team were engaged and ready for a constructive session.
Client persona is a composite or fictional representation of an ideal or typical client. During the session, we broke the group up into teams and asked them to design an ideal client including their background, interests and hobbies. The results were fascinating and hilarious- there was definitely some common trends amongst the people that the group created.
The team presented their ‘people’ and we voted on the personas that most accurately depicted our typical client/s. Of course, in real life, not all clients are the same but I can feel confident that the Worklogic consultants are very in tune with the needs of our clients.
After the client persona session and quick lunch, we walked to the ferry for a cultural excursion to MONA- The Museum of and New Art. A must see, for anyone visiting Hobart, it’s a beautiful trip across the harbour and even the biggest art sceptic would agree, it’s a fantastic space and an incredible feather in Tasmania’s cap.
After a jam-packed day, we were happy to be well-looked after by the team at the Stockman’s Restaurant and the Old Woodstores for a delicious dinner and excellent chocolate cake, to celebrate Ruth’s birthday. Happy Birthday Ruth!
Day 3
On the final day, the directors opened the floor with an ‘Ask Us Anything’ session which led to a lively discussion about how current world events and shifts in workplace policy may have an effect on the work that we do.
And just like that, another retreat done and dusted. I feel grateful to work with such a fabulous team of smart and passionate individuals. It’s an epic few days and although I didn’t feel that rested and did feel very inspired.
