Workshops that Work
What makes for a great interactive workshop, where participants come away with something of real value?
While many workshops focus mainly on the dissemination of information, the truly impactful ones find ways to engage participants on a deeper level, creating an environment in which they:
- Get hooked by the “What’s in it for me?” (WIIFM) factor
- Gain actionable insights of significant value
- Feel safe to practice new techniques repeatedly to build skill and confidence, with expert guidance on hand
And finally, get sufficient support *after* the workshop to apply the learnings in the greater complexity that they experience in day-to-day work.
Here’s how we do it and Everest Academy.
1. Start with Stories
Everyone loves a good story.
In terms of kicking off a workshop, we’ve found it enormously helpful for the workshop facilitator(s) to share a personal story that establishes their connection to the material, ideally illustrating some of their struggles (showing some vulnerability!) as well as successes.
Everest’s Director of Product, Design and Collaboration, Pilar Esteban Gómez is ace at this, and her workshop stories play like a condensed hero’s journey with this sort of sub-text: “First I tried and failed. [We’ve all been there!] Then I tried again (many times) and experimented and learned … and eventually I succeeded and learned the key lessons and techniques. Now I am going to share what really works with you.”
Lessons for workshop facilitators:
- open with authentic personal stories that show both vulnerability and illustrate that you have something of value to share
- use stories that also help frame the big picture of what will be covered in the rest of the workshop
- encourage participants to share their experiences — tell their stories!—as the workshop unfolds
Benefits:
- Creates safety and connection
- Builds excitement
- Sets the scene for the rest of the workshop
2. Building Skills and Providing Guided Practice
In an era of easy access to information it can be tempting to just present really excellent techniques and tools, but that’s not learning!
The experience was expertly crafted to allow for interaction and incremental learning through practice and the ability to draw upon the wisdom of the group. — Daniel Hill, Agile Coach
Learning by doing: For most people, real learning involves trying out the techniques for themselves, making mistakes, trying again, and so on. What can be invaluable is having expert guidance on hand to offer encouragement, timely feedback, and helping participants get unstuck.
It’s also very valuable to practice with a variety of partners of varying levels of expertise, helping others and being helped.
One idealised model of this kind of learning is the martial arts dojo, in which an instructor demonstrates a technique (e.g. this judo throw from the John Wick films) to the whole class, and then the class breaks off into pairs to practice the technique, with the instructors circulating and helping pairs refine and troubleshoot.
Similarly, when Everest Academy runs training workshops we take the “coding dojo” model seriously: A technique or challenge is introduced — it could be a coding challenge, a slicing technique, or any number of things (and not only coding) — and participants break into pairs or small groups to work on it. After each activity we reconvene as a group to share insights.
Lessons for workshop facilitators
- Build in time for structured practice, with expert help available
- Include reflection and sharing time
- Swapping partners helps peer-to-peer learning
Benefits
- Opportunity for expertly supervised learning-by-doing
- Develops participant collaboration skills
- Skilled participants learn about how to use this model approach in their home organisations
3. Connecting the Dots
“Your ideal form of influence is first to help people see their world more clearly, then let them decide what to do next.”
— Jerry Weinberg, The Secrets of Consulting
Especially with experienced participants, a “connect the dots” activity uses a collaborative exercise to help structure sense-making. This helps participants to better understand their current challenges and opportunities.
A well-chosen structure plus skilled facilitation radically increases the changes of “aha” moments: the insights that help participants to “connect the dots”.
Often these kinds of activities will feature some sort of visualisation. For example:
- user journey or story mapping
- assumption mapping
- a futurespective
The difference between using a made up scenario and participants bringing their actual context and content is that the latter may well deliver actionable value as well as skill building. This is gold!
Lessons for workshop facilitators
- Include at least one activity in which participants can supply their own real-life scenarios
- Well-chosen structures plus skilled facilitation add value
- Understand that in public workshops participants will be less willing to share sensitive information compared to in-house workshops
Benefits
- Immediate relevance to participants’ current challenges
- Opportunity for participants to exercise agency in what they want to work on
- Participants who are skilled facilitators can take the meta-format into their home organisations
4. Real Life Pay-offs
Finally, we have the transition to practice.
How much do you really get to apply from the workshops that you attend?
Too often, what sounds like a great technique can’t be applied immediately, or there is a substantial gap from the toy problems practiced in the workshop to the daunting complexity of real life.
- In a connect-the-dots workshop the next steps may be clear
- For a guided practice workshop, it may be the case that further practice and deeper learning is required
In either case, it is extremely valuable to have access to follow-up options:
- In-house workshops that focus on the particular needs of your organisation
- Access to a skilled consultant who will help you and your team(s) apply the techniques “for real”
- Coaching and/or mentoring to give additional support to teams and leaders as they figure out the application for themselves
- Further workshops that address related topics
Lessons for workshop facilitators
- Help participants prepare for the next steps
- Share options for follow-up support
Benefits
- Reduce the friction between learning and improvement
- More impact in the real world
Conclusion
Full scale workshops are a major investment in time and effort for facilitators and participants.
- Start with stories
- Guided practice
- Connect-the-dots activities
- Follow-up options
At Everest Academy we have found that skilfully combining these elements leads to highly engaging experiences, and valuable outcomes for most participants.
