Exploring Trust Building and Organizational Empathy Through the Wilderness Experience Program in Startup Companies

Abstract

Startup companies operate under adaptive pressures, uncertainty, and cross-functional coordination demands that may shape interpersonal trust and employees’ capacity to understand their colleagues’ perspectives. Wilderness experience programs provide learning opportunities beyond organizational routines through shared challenges, mutual dependence, and structured reflection. This study aims to explore how organizational trust and empathy may develop through outdoor wilderness experiences among startup team members in Indonesia. It is designed as an exploratory qualitative investigation using a multiple-case study strategy. Data are intended to be collected through in-depth interviews, limited participant observation, reflective journals, and program documents, with purposively selected participants, facilitators, and team leaders as key informants. Reflexive thematic analysis will examine shared vulnerability, coordination, perspective-taking, and the transfer of learning into everyday work. Previous scholarship indicates that outdoor adventure training may support team cohesion and teamwork-related confidence, although effects on formal workplace performance are not consistently observed. Accordingly, the study does not presume that trust and empathy necessarily improve after participation; instead, it investigates the conditions that facilitate or constrain these processes. Its anticipated contribution is a process-oriented account of social learning in wilderness settings and practical guidance for designing safe, reflective, and context-sensitive development programs for startup teams.