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Lanzarote '22: parcelLab Company Offsite

parcelLab

Published on: Aug 17, 2022

Lanzarote '22:  parcelLab Company Offsite I Cover Image

Here at parcelLab we are all about creating magical experiences for our customers, to help bring brands and people closer together. However, to offer these first-class experiences to our customers, we also need to ensure that we are offering our employees a first-class employee experience.

parcelLab is a digital first company and we cherish the value and flexibility this provides to our employees. Nevertheless, we understand the importance of coming together when we can, to enjoy in-person quality time – something that cannot be underestimated. With this in mind, every year we encourage each parcelLab team to come together with the people they work with every day and have some time away, make some powerful memories. For their latest offsites the People team and the Marketing team jetted off to Munich to collaborate and grow, while earlier this year the Engineering and Product teams combined for an incredible two team offsite in Portugal for ten days.

At the beginning of the year, we set out an ambitious growth plan for 2022, and had to grow the parcelCrew to help achieve them. In light of this, it we thought what better time to bring the whole Crew together for a full company offsite. The time away together would provide us with the opportunity to, celebrate how much parcelLab has grown, evaluate where we are with our current targets, and more importantly, inspire us to continue striving for parcelLab’s goals.

The initial offsite was scheduled for earlier in 2022, but with creation of a memorable and safe offsite being a top priority, the continued presence of Covid saw us push the trip back to June. However, thanks to the dedication of our incredible planning committee, planning restarted in March to deliver an unforgettable and powerful experience.

And so in June, 178 employees from 12 different countries all jetted off to the beautiful sunny island of Lanzarote in the Canary Islands.

People, Purpose & Passion

The theme of the offsite was people, purpose & passion. The Crew were there to come together and bond, get excited about what the future holds, and finally meet the people behind the computer screens. The goal of the trip was to also ensure clear alignment in the strategies across the whole organisation and reenergise everyone to continue accomplishing parcelLab’s impressive mission moving forward.

The people team hoped to drive company-wide collaboration through tackling some real parcelLab pain points suffered by the company, as well as more specifically by the distinct teams. This provided the opportunity for individuals from all the parcelLab teams to offer their insights and suggestions for resolutions to team-specific problems. This allowed the parcelCrew to gain an understanding of the current issues currently faced the various teams in their day-to-day roles, while offering the chance for inter-team collaboration and the dissolvement of any potential silos.

Inclusivity

We are extremely proud of the culture created at parcelLab, and therefore ensuring we maintain a warm, welcoming and friendly atmosphere is a top priority. All workshops and talks were held in one meeting room, with a set seating plan. The idea behind this was to minimise the risk of employees solely mixing with the other Crew members they already knew. With everyone coming together in the Canary Islands, we wanted parcelLab employees to make the most of the opportunity and collaborate and socialise with as many new people as possible.

Following on from the workshops and seminars, the activities provided were chosen such that there was something offered that everyone would enjoy. The activities ranged from, exploration of the island and biking tours, to wine tasting. To ensure as much intermingling within these activities, the parcelCrew were asked to sign up before the trip to avoid big groups of specific teams taking up whole activities on the day. It was important that the parcelCrew were making impactful memories outside of a work setting that would enable lasting relationships.

At parcelLab we realise that employees have different commitments, and that time away can be limited. Therefore, we packed all the seminars, activities, and workshops into three core days. Employees were also offered the option of arriving a few days before and to stay on afterwards if they wanted to maximise the opportunity to socialise and connect with their colleagues offered by the offsite.

The impacts

The engaging, collaborative and friendly characteristics fostered at the offsite have continued to carry through to everyday work. The Crew rated the whole experience as 5.69/6, with 83% of employees noting it had a clear and direct positive impact on their perception of the company.

The Learn & Grow sessions offered throughout the trip had a great reception from employees and clearly indicated the joy and reward that comes from learning from your colleagues. On the back of this, the wonderful People team have since developed and implemented a new initiative called parcelGrow to allow this peer-to-peer learning to continue. Thanks to our parcelGrow series, every quarter new parcelLab employees take to the stage to teach and educate on a topic of their choosing.

A huge thank you is due to the incredible mastermind organisers for putting such an incredible offsite together. Not only did it allow us to become closer as a team and spend valuable time connecting with one another, the parcelCrew returned home revitalized about the company mission and what we are here to achieve. It was truly a trip that the whole parcelCrew will reflect on for a very long time

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parcelLab