Leadership Outbreaks – The New Corporate Retreat

It was 2002 I was on a plane from Ho Chi Minh City to Kuala Lumpur where the then President of Unilever Asia, Tex Gunning had invited 225 senior leaders from across Asia for a Leadership Outbreak. I didn’t know it then, but I was about to take part in a corporate retreat that would change my life forever.

I didn’t have a clue what to expect since the only thing we were told was the time we should arrive to the recently opened Kuala Lumpur airport and a list of stuff to bring. I was puzzled. What was this so-called Leadership Outbreak all about? All we were told was to be ready in the morning for our next flight. The next day 225 business leaders were confused and complaining. What is this? What are we going to do? What is this all about? We boarded a plane to Sarawak, and then get on a much smaller plane to Mulu in the heart of the Serawak jungle.

I remember complaining to my colleague sitting next to me – I kept thinking we could have invested the money for this journey into growing our businesses. However, what unfolded over the next few days had a profound effect on me. 225 business leaders from more than 15 different countries were hiking, canoeing, visiting the famous Mulu caves, discussing, conversing, participating in village life and partying together.

What You Can Achieve With A Leadership Outbreak

Even a group as large as 225 people came closer together. The smaller groups in which we shared lifelines, talked about our aspirations, built bridges and had powerful conversations immediately become stronger teams with a strong emotional and intellectual commitment to each other and our collective goals.

One of the pioneers in designing Leadership Outbreak’s Erik Jan de Rooij, from Amaseu (he partnered with Tex on many of his journey’s) says:

A leadership outbreak [is] a journey that promotes peak performance designed to provide an unforgettable, lasting and profound learning experience.

I have participated in Outbreak Leadership journey’s in Vietnam and Pakistan with Unilever. And here’s the thing about Outbreaks – they’re far more intense than the standard corporate retreat. Through these experiences I have been able to design and facilitate Leadership Outbreaks in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Thailand, Oman and Bangladesh. Based on Tex and Erik’s pioneering work I have used Leadership Outbreaks to help new teams coming together in a much shorter time then would normally be expected to:

• Resolve dysfunctional behavior in leadership teams


• Align teams around their joint aspirations


• Help leaders to accelerate team performance

The Key Components of a Leadership Outbreak

I find that the most effective Leadership Outbreaks weave together 6 different strands to create a leadership team learning event that has profound impact on a personal level and a transformational impact on a group level.

Photo Credit: SYU*2 via Compfight cc

Leadership Outbreaks – The New Corporate Retreat