Take A Walk

Photo by Ryoji Iwata on Unsplash

I went for a walk with a client today. 

We were supposed to meet in a conference room at his office building and talk through our plans for 2022. But as I waited at reception with my colleague, our client came down and asked if we wanted to sit in the office or perhaps go for a walk. 

We opted for the walk which, as it turned out, was fantastic. 

The weather was perfect and we did about 3 miles walking along the river and the old town area of the town we were in (it didn’t hurt that we were in Switzerland). 

Our conversation ranged from the personal to the professional. We talked about dealing with covid to dealing with change at our organizations. We discussed the evolving nature of our profession as well as the core challenges that needed to dealing with. And yes we discussed the path forward for 2022. 

But the main point wasn’t just what we discussed - we could have done all of those things in the conference room back at his office. 

It was the openness of our communication and more personal connect it established. There was an air of informality to the conversation that allowed us all to let our guard down a little. And the fact that we broke a (mild) sweat helped - it brought us more towards being a partner than otherwise might have happened. 

Now, of course, there’s nothing groundbreaking in taking a walk. Plenty of us do it every now and then. 

But it’s worth noting that we do have a tendency to fall into our habits and norms and conventional patterns. Because, you know, meetings take place in offices, at normal hours with the normal formalities. 

Today was a reminder that we don’t need to do those things. 

Sometimes it helps to break the pattern and just head out for a chat. No whiteboards needed. No hiding behind our desks. 

Sometimes, it is groundbreaking to just break with formality and conventional and just walk and talk. 

Try it yourself next week.