Wilder Retreats goes all-out(side) to strengthen companies by breaking down walls.

 “We bring people together, often remote workforces. We bring them together in nature, nature-based settings, and we let nature do the magic,” says Kirk Reynolds, explaining he started Wilder Retreats to focus specifically on businesses and giving people that sense of empowerment, of possibility or clarity on what they want.

Having been in adventure travel for a couple of decades, Kirk had seen “nature do the magic” over and over again. As he shared in his exclusive interview with the Center for Social Capital, he regularly heard from people coming off the mountain or the trail saying “I’m changed. That was amazing. I feel so good. I’m going to dump that crappy boyfriend or I’m going to start that business.” And that became the catalyst for his own inspiration. “Everything becomes crystal clear in their life when they come off the trail or the mountain and just completed something that they didn’t think that was even possible.” So, he sold that business in 2018 and started Wilder Retreats to create those epiphanies for companies. “That’s essentially what we do for companies. And so, it’s company retreats, team building, executive off-sites — things like that.”

Magicians never give away the secret behind their magic tricks, but there’s no “trick” to the magic Kirk employs. It’s a fascinating look at how we all are wired, as he explains, “There’s science behind what happens to our physiology, to our spirit, to our mental health when we’re just looking at a tree for 10 minutes.” He has amassed a trove of examples that prove the efficacy of this approach, which he shares along with some insights into the “why” and “how,” but admits that in the beginning, “it was intuitive at first, knowing this would be good for people — and what’s good for people is good for business, and it is working.”

As he also talks about more hard-edged ROI, he notes, “One stat is, you bring people together in nature, especially remote teams, productivity increases.” More importantly, companies forge relationships among their employees. “It’s very, very well-known fact that people are living in isolation. It’s easy just to ghost your employer and even get another full-time job and remain the payroll. If there’s not a connection, an emotional connection, at least to their colleagues, if not the business and the brand, then it’s easy to drift and just quit.” And the cost of attrition, he notes, is a hefty 150% of the person’s salary.

Forced togetherness is the opposite of what Kirk is trying to achieve. He personalizes the retreat for each company to create organic moments and experiences that people want to be a part of. For instance, he says, “Whether you like nature or not, … you stand on the edge of the Yosemite Valley and look out at the valley for the first time. I mean, we’ve had clients just weep. You can’t help yourself but feel awe. And that feeling of awe connects you with your colleagues instantly. … And then the conversations start to happen and whatever conflict that may exist coming into the retreat, you start finding a way to pick apart that difficulty you have with your colleague and you start to connect and talk about real things.”

While “transformation” might be an appropriate description, Kirk is reluctant to use the word. “I wish there were a different word than ‘transformation’ because I think it’s overused,” he says, observing, “A lot of travel companies sell transformational experiences and trips of a lifetime, and it’s overselling.” But that does encompass his goal as he describes it, going beyond the single event: “transformation, regeneration of wellness, of your own health, of practical ideas of how I keep this thing going between retreats, how I keep relationships strong between retreats.”

And he emphasizes that as he shares how he builds the same experience at his own company: “We do have those actual retreats that we participate in as our own client, but I think what is often overlooked with our clients is what happens in-between retreats — it’s the day-to-day, week to week. And that’s culture.” Getting people aligned with the company vision and excited and energetic has to happen throughout the year.

Kirk makes the point that we’re incredibly disconnected in real life. “We’ve built homes that we don’t have to leave; we work from home; we work out in home. We have these massive kitchens and we can cook and everything [but] we have food delivered.”

Wilder Retreats offers a counter to that. As his many examples express, “What we do is provide that in-person connection, try as best to drop the technology during the retreats and get people just to stop looking at their phones and have real conversations.”

Click on the link below to hear Kirk share why it’s more important than ever to have these moments where people can connect. “And yeah,” he says, “it’s great for business.”