During the 30-years that I have been at Goble Properties we have never had a staff retreat. Ridiculous, right?
Well that has been corrected. Last week D’Aun and I spent three days in Napa at the Silverado Resort with some of the nicest people on the planet. Our staff are scattered from Cathedral City to San Jose to Pleasanton, so it was good to pull everybody together.
Some of our meeting notes
We built our meetings around the book ReWork by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson. What I love about this book is that it understands the mindset of a small business owner. As the authors say, they don’t cater to the Fortune 500 but instead focus on the Fortune Five Million. That is to say they focus on all the small businesses who usually fall under the radar. It was a perfect book for a real estate company that caters to this clientele.
A core part of our conversation stemmed from Simon Sinek’s ideas about the why of a company. We had a great conversation as I reflected on why my father started Goble Properties and why we continue to pursue success through the company.
The simplistic answer to the why of Goble Properties is that my father, a child of the Great Depression, was hungry. Literally hungry — as in going without food for days.
The motivation to never again be hungry naturally expanded to never wanting his family to be hungry. And then it grew to never wanting his employees to be hungry, or his friends, or his neighbors, etc. Today we look at how Goble Properties can fund work through groups like The SOLD Project or PathLight International so that children around the world can be equipped to break the cycle of poverty. It’s a powerful core motivation of Goble Properties, so it was naturally a great conversation to have with staff.
Aimee at Tofanelli vineyard. Wendy and Gerry in the background.
Of course a good staff retreat is not complete without some fun activities. In addition to lunch at the Oxbow Public Market in Napa (get the buffalo taco at C CASA) and a fine dinner at the Royal Oak, we had a great tour of the Tofanelli family vineyard.
Vince Tofanelli creates wines that are delicious (I came home with two cases) and his vineyard is one of a kind. With vines that his grandparents planted in the 1920’s and a specific goal of staying small, the wine business is more significant than just bottling some fermented grape juice. Vince was a great example of somebody who understood the why of his business.
Phyllis at the vineyard.
D’Aun and I also took some personal time to do a bit of tasting at Caymus (discovering their incredible Zinfandel you can only buy at the winery). Plus we joined Nick and Drew Parisi for a tasting at Regusci. We would have visited many more wineries but time constraints (and diet constraints!) kept our tastings limited.
The staff retreat was truly a fun few days that touched many of the things I love. We had good food, great wine, warm friendships, joyful laughter and deep thoughts as we discussed real estate, business, and purpose. For me it doesn’t get much better than that.
I can’t wait to do this again. And certainly before another thirty years pass.