Reading time: 3 minutes to support better company culture decisions

Corporate company culture strongly influences revenue growth, productivity, and retention. Corporate events give global teams a rare chance to meet in person, share experiences, and live the culture together. When these moments are designed with intention, events act as real culture catalysts rather than isolated yearly gatherings.​

Why in‑person Moments Matter for Culture

Strong, performance‑focused cultures consistently outperform their peers on growth and profitability. Independent analysis of high-performing organizations shows that companies with intentionally managed cultures achieve higher revenue growth and better retention than those that leave culture to chance. When teams gather in person, the culture that usually lives in documents and slide decks becomes visible in how people behave with each other.​

In these settings, employees go beyond listening to leadership messages. They share experiences, test ideas, and see how colleagues from other markets interpret the same values. Research on workplace events shows that well‑designed, meaningful gatherings can increase engagement and proactive behavior even weeks after the event. This effect is strongest when events create space for recognition, dialogue and shared achievement alongside clear business content.​

Designing Networking as a Culture Tool

If culture is “how we behave together,” networking is where that behavior appears clearly. Start with three guiding questions:

1. Which behaviors should this event encourage (collaboration, openness, innovation)?
2. Which groups benefit most from connecting (regions, functions, seniority levels)?
3. Which stories or values should people experience during the program?​

From there, select formats that express those goals. Mixed‑level roundtables invite honest conversation between leadership and front‑line teams. Peer‑to‑peer sessions around shared challenges help participants learn from each other and feel heard. Social and cultural activities that reflect the destination give teams a shared story and sense of belonging.​

Physical design reinforces these choices. Open layouts, visible leaders who move through the space, and small hosted discussion areas all send a clear message: “This is a place to connect and contribute.” When room setup, timing, and facilitation work together, people experience the culture you want to build while they are at the event.

Connecting Culture to Metrics Your CFO Cares About

Culture initiatives gain strength when they connect to metrics. A practical starting point is to focus on indicators you already measure, for example:

1. Engagement survey scores
2. Voluntary turnover
3. Internal mobility
4. Cross-functional project participation

You can illustrate the impact with simple, realistic scenarios. For example, in a hypothetical regional summit with 200 employees from several countries, a modest reduction in voluntary turnover over the following year can represent hundreds of thousands of dollars in avoiding recruiting and training costs. When you present this together with engagement or collaboration scores that improve after the event, culture appears clearly as a strategic lever.​

Practical culture tools also help. Short pulse surveys conducted during and after events, as well as feedback on networking formats and quick questions about new relationships or cross-team projects, provide tangible data that you can bring back to leadership. Over time, patterns in this data highlight which types of events and experiences deliver the strongest cultural benefits.​

For a deeper dive into building business cases for strategic events and measuring their cultural impact, explore Ovation’s guide to purpose-driven events and ROI.

Your next step

Culture evolves every day within the business, and events provide that culture a visible platform. Ovation Global DMC partners with companies worldwide to design meetings and incentives that support culture, engagement, and measurable outcomes, combining strategic thinking with strong destination expertise.

If you want your next program to strengthen connections and performance across your teams, contact Ovation Global DMC to explore what is possible.