By Jerry McNellis My daughter Lisa was a college freshman when our company was asked to lead a Compression Planning retreat for the International Board of Habitat for Humanity. She went along to handle logistics. Habitat for Humanity had a tradition where they started each session with a prayer led by a different board member. [...]
7 Steps To Stronger Designs
The 7 Steps I Followed To Design The 2-Day Retreat For Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing Retired Navy Captain Ed Nicholson’s stay at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in 2005 presented him with a close look at the returning wounded from the conflict in Iraq (and later Afghanistan). His desire to offer fly fishing to [...]
Honoring My Mentor and Friend, Dr. Kendall Cowing
The Reverend Doctor Kendall Cowing Charlotte, North Carolina Passed away on February 4, 2013 Married to high school sweetheart Della Father of 5 children, 16 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren I’d like to share four items about Ken and his impact on Compression Planning and leading groups: How he mentored me His advice about groups with [...]
How Church Board Meetings Had A Role In Building Compression Planning®
Dear Compression Planning Friend, Have you ever been to a church board meeting? After graduating from St. Thomas College in Minnesota I worked for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. My job was calling on church boards to sell them religious education programs. One program was for parents to prepare their children for First [...]
An Evening Of Lobster And The Pope
Client: Bernard LaMontagne, Former President IWK Health Centre Halifax, Nova Scotia Dear Compression Planning Friend, After leading a two-day Compression Planning retreat for 25 members of the board of directors and senior staff of a hospital I was exhausted. Drained. Spent. You know the feeling. My client, Bernard Lamontagne, invited a group of people from [...]
Laying the Foundation for a Successful Strategy Session
It was a “mountain top” session As a Compression Planner, you know every session is different. We frequently get asked “How do you evaluate a session?” Evaluating how a session goes is sometimes tricky. At some point in the future, you have to ask “Did that time we spent together make a difference?” There are [...]
How Switching Perspectives Helped 15 Doctors and 14 Nurses Save Their Fragile Merger
I’ve designed, organized and led Compression Planning retreats continuously since I was 26 years old. Periodically I’ll share the essence of some of those Retreats. For many I’ll disguise the clients so their confidentiality is protected. Even change the industry in some cases. What I’m really after is the story and what I learned. Hopefully [...]
Do you do this with your prospective cients?
How to use Compression Planning with your prospective clients Are you looking to differentiate yourself with your prospective clients? Garett Trumpower has been a power user of Compression Planning for over five years. He uses CP in his sales efforts and in the delivery of his company’s consulting services. Using CP is a key part [...]
Hold that NO…for now
“The Art and Discipline of Pure-Form Thinking” by Pat McNellis Shooting down ideas seems to have replaced Baseball as “America’s favorite pastime.” Let’s face it…we’re good at it. It’s something we’ve learned to do since we were kids. Well, as kids, we were often told “don’t do that” or “that’s a dumb idea.” Maybe not [...]
Rip-off and Duplicate…you don’t have to “create uniqueness”…you can steal it!
My wife Stephanie shared with me an idea she recently had. I’m embarrassed to say my initial reaction wasn’t an enthusiast yes. You see, Stephanie is pregnant with our third child. She found out the gender on Monday morning but she had the ultrasound tech jot it down on a piece of paper she then [...]
