Leadership Retreat
on a Mountain Farm
Phone away. Hands dirty. Mind clear.
Three days of real work on a mountain farm: wood, forest, animals. No flip charts, no role play. You lead better when you remember what real work feels like.
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Leadership is not learned in a seminar room
On the farm there are no meetings you can sit out. The barn has to be mucked out, the firewood has to be dry before winter, and a tree falls where you steer it, or it falls wrong. Here it shows within minutes how you decide, how you delegate and how you handle pressure and responsibility.
I don’t guide you as a trainer with slides, but as someone who does this work every day and who tells you honestly what I see.
- Phone away: At the start your phone goes into the box. Three days without email, without pings, without excuses.
- Forest work: Fell a tree by hand, with an axe or an old two-man saw like in the old days, plus clearing the forest and replanting. Responsibility, safety and team coordination when it really counts.
- Splitting wood: Physical work with a clear result. What you split today will keep someone warm later.
- Farm work: Digging over the garden, planting vegetables, putting up fences, preparing the alpine pasture, mowing, pruning trees. The season decides what is on.
- Working with animals: Daily life with our beef cattle, mucking out, pasture and field work, later also with horses. You can’t lie to animals, and they are not impressed.
What we do: work through the year
There is always something to do on the farm, but never the same thing. These are examples of what awaits you, depending on the season.
Spring
- Reforesting: planting young trees and protecting them from browsing game
- Clearing the forest after winter: removing snow breakage and branches
- Digging over the garden and growing vegetables: preparing beds, sowing, planting
- Preparing fences and pastures for the animals
- Splitting and stacking the firewood that lay over the winter
Summer
- Making hay: mowing with the scythe, raking, stacking, bringing it in with the mule
- Keeping pastures free of brush
- Fence building and path maintenance
- Tending the garden, weeding and harvesting
- Working with the cattle: pasture, water, checking fences
Autumn
- Clearing the forest: processing logging debris and windfall
- Felling trees and making firewood for the winter
- Reforesting: autumn planting of young trees
- Harvesting the garden and putting the beds to rest for winter
- Last hay, getting the barn and pasture ready for winter
Winter
- Timber harvest: felling trees and moving the wood
- Splitting, stacking and drying firewood
- Mucking out the barn and caring for the animals
- Keeping paths and access roads clear of snow
What exactly is on depends on weather, snow conditions and what the farm needs. We agree on it with you shortly before the retreat.
Hands first, then head.
Every retreat follows the same structure and three rituals that make it unmistakable:
At the start you hand in your phone, into a wooden box I built myself. On Sunday before you leave you get it back, and until then you will miss it less than you think.
On the second day you make something with your hands that you take home: a carved spoon, a tool handle or another wooden item from wood from the farm. I show you how. In spring and autumn it can also be a sapling to plant at home. It stays as a reminder of what you set out to do.
On Sunday you write a letter to yourself: what will I change? I mail it to you after 90 days. Handwritten, no email.
Three days at a glance
Arriving. I show you the farm, the animals and the forest. You put your phone in the box, we go through the coming days and have dinner together. Our cook prepares regional food with ingredients from the area.
Forest. 7:00 breakfast. 8:00 we head into the forest. Depending on the weather, on one of the days we fell a tree entirely by hand, with an axe or with the old two-man saw, a beautiful and very strenuous job you have probably never done. We also clear the forest and process wood, and in spring and autumn we plant young trees. I provide helmet, gloves and a thorough safety briefing. 12:00 lunch break in the forest, then work until 15:00. Then an hour of rest to shower and catch your breath. Afterwards we talk about how the day felt and what you take with you. Dinner at 19:00, again from the cook.
Wood and farm. 7:00 breakfast. In the morning we work with the wood from the day before: splitting, stacking, piling. That is half a day, no more, because a full day of splitting wood wears you out instead of clearing your head. After lunch at 12:00 the work changes with the season. In summer the hay comes in, in spring and autumn maybe digging over the garden and growing vegetables, in winter barn and forest. Then a break, and from 17:00 to 18:00 a walk together. At 18:30 we eat together by the fire, with goulash from the cauldron. In the evening we sit together and carve, each on their own piece: a spoon or a tool handle you take home at the end. We talk about what you take with you, also about blisters on your hands and a sore back from the work. There is a lot of talking, or long silences.
Farm and farewell. In the morning we get stuck in on the farm, in summer with scythe, rake and hay, otherwise with pasture, barn or wood work (see above). At 12:00 we eat together. Then we take time for the round: what has stayed with you? You write the Farm Letter to yourself, and you get your phone back. Around 16:00 you leave.
The exact programme depends on the season, the weather and what is happening on the farm. Real work can’t be run to a timetable.
Who guides you
I’m Tobias, a farmer in East Tyrol. Every day I work with animals, in the forest and in the fields, with everything that comes with it: responsibility for animals, guests and employees, and decisions you can’t push to tomorrow.
I believe people think more clearly when they do something tangible. That is exactly why I built this retreat: honest, down to earth and without show.
Details
18–21 March 2027
8–11 April 2027
20–23 May 2027
More dates to follow
For your team, too. You can come alone or with your leadership team. A company can also book all five places on a date, as a retreat for a team or a department. We are happy to invoice the company. Write us a few lines and we will sort out the date and programme.
Please bring sturdy shoes and work clothes that can get dirty. A basic level of physical fitness is an advantage.
Ready to hand in your phone?
Write me a few lines about who you are and what you expect from the three days. I will get back to you personally.
Enquire nowor by email to hofprinzip@proton.me