Every August, the Knight Eady office closes for an entire week as our staff heads to a fun destination for our annual Staff Retreat. This retreat is used to unplug, reset, foster our culture, and set goals for the year ahead. While most staff retreats are within a six hour drive from KE HQ, this one was a bit different because the Knight Eady office was saddling up to head to the Lone Star State.
After the cowboy hats were packed and the boots were shined, our team was ready to make our way west, but it seemed the west was not quite ready for us. Between the several canceled flights, a historical flood, plane doors not closing and the idea of renting vans and driving, we finally arrived!
Once we were settled in, it didn’t take long for the competition to get started. As a company rooted in a belief in sport (and competition), our staff was immediately split into two teams, Team Queso (real Texas queso) and Team Blanco (“cheese dip”). We kicked the retreat off with pickleball tournaments, bocce ball games, miniature golf, cooking competitions and a chipping contest. Each employee had the opportunity to take part in activities that suited them and played to their strengths. All of these events culminated into our final three, and most challenging competitions: trivia, a full-office volleyball match, and… a waterslide relay.
If you know Knight Eady, then you can understand how competitive these last three events turned out to be. Between the colorful pep talks from our fearless leader, Michael Eady, and the fact that the last three events held enough points to tip the scale back toward Team Queso, it’s safe to say things were intense! It all came down to the waterslide relay, which required each employee to zip down a 200 ft water slide, climb out, run 50 yards and then flip a cover over in order to tag the next employee. After an astonishingly quick performance, it was determined that Team Queso was the 2022 Staff Retreat winner! Each Team Queso member got to don the infamous “Teal Jacket'' that evening during dinner to celebrate.
Although our week is packed with fun games and competitions, the real reason for our trip is first and foremost about bonding and resetting. We discuss our successes (and failures) from the year before and set goals for the year ahead. This special week is so important to us and we all look forward to it each year.
Stay tuned to find out where we’re headed in August of ‘23!
