Join us at The Advance Retreat

How can we foster an effective, open, enduring culture of design in our organizations?

One of the coolest things about my job is that I get to engage in constant conversations with design people about what’s interesting and important. Whether it’s books, events, or consulting services, people love to tell us what topics they want us to cover.

From those many conversations, I’ve concluded that one of the things UX people need most is… well, more conversations. Acquiring and refining nuts-and-bolts skills are important too, but how-to information is increasingly easy to come by. Productive conversation with peers isn’t.

So we’re trying something new: we’re launching the very first Advance Retreat. It’ll focus on answering a single question—one that more and more design leaders are struggling with: How can we foster an effective, open, enduring culture of design in our organizations?

That conversation oughta fill two days easy.

We’re producing the Advance Retreat with Marc Rettig and Hannah du Plessis of Fit Associates; they’re hugely experienced with this particular challenge. AND they are really, really good at facilitating conversations that lead to co-learning and co-creation. In other words, real outcomes. (I speak from experience; Fit’s help has moved Rosenfeld Media forward.)

The Advance Retreat is limited to 50 mid-late career design leaders, and you can apply to participate here. The Retreat may not be for you, but if your organization is larger than a startup, I’ll bet dollars to donuts that someone you work with could benefit greatly from participating. (Feel free to forward this PDF brochure their way.)

We’ll be meeting February 11-12 in Palm Springs. The very cool Ace Hotel is the ideal setting—both inside and out—for the kind of conversations we all need.

Questions or comments? Post them below. Or just go ahead and apply to be part of the conversation in the desert this February.