Seth Godin has a great post
on planning a retreat.
Writers have writers retreats
ALL the time.
The reason for that
is because writing can be very isolating
and because it is a creative process,
benefiting from brainstorming.
‘Cause really… that’s what a retreat is.
It is a great place to brainstorm.
If I want to learn a skill,
I’ll hook up with a mentor.
If I want to learn assorted information about a topic,
I’ll take a seminar.
But if I want a whole lot of different ideas,
I’ll go to a retreat and brainstorm.
The best retreats I’ve been to
have been small,
less than ten people.
Those ten people are similar
in where they are in their careers and abilities
but they are different people
doing/writing different things.
We usually send out our problem areas
(i.e. the plot issues we’d like to brainstorm)
before we arrive at the retreat.
We also go somewhere cut off
from the rest of our normal world.
And we work
HARD.
We have set goals for the retreat
and we accomplish them
because accomplishing these goals
justifies the next retreat.
If you need to brainstorm a problem or product,
consider a retreat.