Organizations Don't Experience Change.
Human Nervous Systems Do.
Introducing a new kind of change management retreat.
The Cost of Fear
We spend enormous time and money planning the strategy, processes and communications surrounding change.
But transformation must happen through human beings.
Human beings who are hopeful and scared.
Optimistic and wary.
Passionate and protective.
Human beings whose survival instincts are designed to generate fear of change ...
Who experience that fear physiologically ...
And whose nervous system disregulation can freeze creativity, stymie productivity, and burn them out fast and hard.
A nervous system regulation approach to transformation
Your organization already has the roadmap, communications plan, stakeholder analysis and implementation strategy for your next OCM initiative.
Now it's time to focus on the human beings being asked to make that strategy real.
Our change management retreats take leaders out of the conference room and into an immersive six-hour experience designed around some of the most simple and ancient ways humans regulate, reconnect and restore their nervous systems.
Nervous system regulation is critical to building the new neuropathways necessary to create new habits, systems and even belief systems. That's why our retreats start with a unique nervous system regulation process before delving into change management strategy.
Leaders get to experience for themselves the profound benefits of having a calm nervous system when doing high-level strategic and creative work. This is what the day looks like.
1. Current State Check-In
We start by slowing down, getting honest about where we are, and setting the intention for the day.
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Gather and lay out the problems we're trying to solve as part of the current change
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Individual nervous system check-in to establish a baseline for the experience
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Identify hopes, concerns, and what success would look like
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Hydrating and fortifying pre-sauna snack to prepare physically for the day
2. Sauna Retreat Experience
We move through an immersive, guided sequence to restore, regulate and reconnect.
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Woods walk to arrive and reset
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Movement to awaken the body
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Meditation and reflection to calm the mind and create space
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Sauna and cold plunge cycles to experience stress, recovery and regulation
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Nourishing meal shared around the table
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Time for connection and perspective
3. Strategy in a State of Calm
From a regulated nervous system and shared experience, we return to the strategy table.
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Use your change management framework (e.g., Prosci)
to guide the work -
Stay tightly focused on the employee and human experience of change
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Generate creative, culture-aligned strategies and solutions
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Clarify next steps, commitments and accountability
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Leave with actionable ways to lead through change that are integrated with your organization's culture and change initiative
Your Retreat Guide
Jenny Niemela,
Finn Hollow Founder
Jenny Niemela brings decades of experience leading, communicating about and facilitating organizational change.
As a Prosci-certified change leader, Jenny has seen firsthand that even the best-designed change strategy ultimately succeeds or fails through people.
Her work led her to become increasingly interested in something traditional change-management approaches can overlook: the experience of change in the body.
Her retreats combine her professional perspective with experiential practices with nature, movement, meditation, sauna, cold exposure, food and connection. Her approach invites leaders to experience regulation themselves before exploring what those insights might mean for the people they lead.
Jenny, who holds an MBA from the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management, lived in Finland for several years and learned sauna culture from the real experts. She observed that the experiences before and after the sauna are as important to the experience as the sauna itself, and she's passionate about bringing that experience to others.