How to collect meaningful workshop feedback?

“Be sure you ask for feedback and not for people to tell you how great you and your workshop is because that praise won’t help you improve and learn and people don’t like to tell you that you are an idiot!”

When moderators ask for feedback after a workshop, I have often observed a practice where the moderator asks each participant to give feedback after the workshop one by one.Then the moderator selects one of the people and asks them personally:

“How did you like the workshop?”

This of course already is a leading question. Also in many cases, the moderator picks the most prominent person first hoping he will be kind and all others will join in praising the work being careful not to offend the boss buy disagreeing.

The moderator being in charge might even skip those who he suspects of not being very happy and might short cut lengthy critics under the pretext we have not time and need to complete.

For me, this kind of feedback collection is always embarrassing!

The first person asked will probably say something like “Thanks for the very nice and interesting workshop…….”. The second person will have a similar comment. And if you are, the third person in line you don’t know what you shall say and from that point on everybody in the room is getting bored and wishes they could finally leave the room wondering what they will say when they are forced to speak out.

This method is not only embarrassing but also a useless custom where the moderator is not asking for honest feedback but confirmation and praise how good his workshop and moderation skills are.

People are generally polity and don’t want to embarrass the moderator and tell him in public this workshop was boring and a wast of time, even if this is what they actually would want to say.

If you use the wrong method to ask for feedback, you will annoy your audience and leave the workshop on a low note killing much of the enthusiasm and credibility you work so hard to establish in the workshop.

The problem with this kind of feedback is threefold.

First of all the participants will be highly reluctant to voice direct criticism in front of the group after all you are asking them to expose them self and they never know what their superiors and colleagues thoughts on the even are.

Second, in this scenario, I never saw the moderator making notes, and I wonder how he could remember all feedback and capture it for later improvements.

Third, you are wasting time because instead of having each person spend a view minutes writing down feedback everybody only make one or two statements.

It seems like everybody in the room understands this exercise is a waste of time, but at least the workshop will be over soon, and there is no way to escape so let’s get it done as fast as possible and leave the room as quickly as possible.

If you want real feedback that will allow you to improve your next workshop

You must use a simple, safe and trustworthy method that promotes emotional and honest feedback and give people an option to lean back and reflect before they make a statement.

The simplest way to get qualitative good and honest feedback is, to hand out a short anonymous questionnaire with maximum four or five questions.

If this is done in the right way asking for feedback will be the last fun exercise of your workshop and attendees will enjoy it.

In many cases, this will be the first time where you can hear a needle drop on the floor and the only sounds noticeable are scratching pens writing comments on your feedback form.

After a full day of work and total exhaustion, a relaxed, calm atmosphere kicks in similar to a cool-down phase after a marathon where attendees have no time and performance pressure and everybody calmed down.

This is a nice an quiet way to close your workshop and say good by.

An additional benefit in asking participants to re-image and relive the workshop because this forces attendees to retrieve and search memories and reflections from the day and this, in turn, ensures they won’t forget the event immediately.

Here is the simple feedback template I use for all my workshops

At first glance, this feedback form does not look very spectacular, but it has proven extremely helpful and successful in the past because;

1. The feedback is anonymous and people will potentially be honest.
2. Participants have time to think, judge and formulate their feelings.
3. You appreciate the participant’s work by thanking them for their effort and participation.
4. You give them an opportunity for emotional feedback by check marking one of the smileys.
5. You ask them what they like first because many people are reluctant to say what needs to be improved but are comfortable to criticize if they have first made some conciliatory statements.
6. There is almost always something you can improve, and you are asking for suggestions which implies you want honest feedback and can accept critique.
7. The last question asked is if they would recommend such a workshop to other people and if you get a yes they can even add the person’s E-Mail or name.

I would claim this is the most efficient way to get feedback in less than five minutes.

I also observed participants enjoy sharing positive and negative feedback and it’s an excellent way to conclude your workshop and say thank you at the same time.

Make collecting and processing feedback a regular habit for each workshop and take time to review the notes and think about improvements.

And remember, no matter how good you think your workshop is

There is always something you can improve to make your next Design Thinking workshop better, more productive and more pleasing for the participants, clients and workshop owners who are paying for the workshop!