A summit meeting brings different perspectives within a system together for strategic conversation. It is best convened when high-stakes issues or perceived major change require a mountaintop experience that disrupts old ways of thinking. Ideally, the event is led by key leaders of your profession or industry and includes internal and external stakeholders who offer diverse multidisciplinary perspectives.
Getting the most value from a summit requires an open and receptive mindset. Participants must be prepared to absorb a significant amount of information and knowledge throughout the entire event. They should minimize work commitments that week to ensure they can fully participate and attend each presentation. Then, upon return to the office, they must take the time to work through all of their notes and newfound wisdom, turning them into smart strategy and executable next steps.
When a summit director first meets with the CEO and executive team, he may use his allotted 15 minutes to describe locations and three to five potential guest speakers with a preliminary agenda seemingly related to a theme like “one company, one vision.” The executive team spends a few minutes reacting to the locations and suggesting additional speakers. Then they promptly forget about the summit until a few weeks before the event, when the planner starts reminding them that they need to pull their presentations together.
Summits are valuable, but if attendees aren’t given the tools to channel volunteer enthusiasm into actionable next steps they’ll quickly lose momentum and the envisioned change will not occur. At the outset, the top executive convening the summit should designate a summit director who is empowered to shape the agenda and to say no to people requesting things that don’t fit its focus. Working with a design team, the summit director should create all pre-meeting, in-meeting and post-meeting content.
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