Making (remote) workshops work
Some practical tips on how to take the humble workshop into a virtual world …
A sudden virtual world has suddenly become our new normal — thrust into this unusual work routine it’s left lots of people trying to figure out how to make it work for them.
At Fluxx, we’re used to working with uncertainty and we’re embracing this disruption as a challenge to continue working with our clients on projects and helping them explore and embed new ways of working. We’re having lots of conversations with our valued clients, prospects and contacts about how we might help them continue to keep projects and programmes moving.
The humble workshop is a great way to collaborate, chat through and accelerate ideas. It has a myriad of uses; whether you are looking for intense team building, sense-making, problem solving, ideation or experiment design (or all of the above), the workshop is one of our go-to tools. This doesn’t have to stop just because you’re not in the same room.
Over the past few weeks we’ve already run 10 virtual workshops for a leading financial services company and as this article is being written, we’re running a 5 day virtual Design Sprint for a well known consumer website. So we thought we’d share some of our top tips from what we’ve learnt in this new virtual world, for making workshops, work.
Planning the right format. Planning and testing is the key to success — particularly in a virtual space where various technical issues can jump out from nowhere. You probably have some of the most obvious considerations covered like — setting a clear agenda, planning lots of activities and breaks and encouraging people to use their laptops and the use of video — for better collaboration and engagement.
Our other top tips for planning are; share ‘house rules’ at the start, like stay on mute when you’re not speaking, and make use of pre-work or homework to get people in the right frame of mind. If everyone is able to come prepared with something to share — a bit of stimulus, or some research — it gets the session off and running.
The best tool for the job. There are plenty of tips and tricks out there about the pros and cons of how technology can help and which platforms to use. The best tool for the job is the one you, and more importantly, your participants, are most comfortable with. Microsoft Teams works well for basic video calls and is great for keeping everything in one place, while Zoom is fantastic for video conferencing and breakout rooms.
Miro and Mural are white-board based collaboration tools which are amazing but do come with a bit of a learning curve. Keep it simple and get fluent with the features before you start. Try to take any tech overheard away from your participants — we want them contributing to the workshop not stressing about technology. But do think about how tech can help keep things interactive — polls and surveys work well and keep your audience engaged. Be clear on the apps you will use ahead of the session so they can be installed ahead of time.
Keep it fun and interesting and make it stick. Our clients tell us that the success of a Fluxx workshop is down to the simple fact that we take them away from BAU; we make things fun, creative and collaborative. Usually we use lots of sharpies and post-it notes and whiteboard huddles.
You can still do this virtually — use activities that involve paper and pen, help people work on their own then share with the team, use games, ask people to take pictures of their work and upload them to the platform you’re using or use other tools like WhatsApp to share stuff. Engaging and fun equals impact and outcomes — don’t lose that impact just because you aren’t face to face.
Keep it short (er). Attention spans are shorter in a virtual world. If you planned a two-day face to face workshop, break it up into shorter, more frequent sessions — you might want to consider 4 smaller sessions of 3–4 hours each. Make sure each session has a clear outcome and design the flow with a mix of alone and together activities.
Facilitate the s**t out of it. As a facilitator, you will have to work harder. Make no bones about it, even for an experienced facilitator, it will be a challenge to get your participants to engage on the right level. Think in advance how you will get the quieter members of the team to contribute and how you might temper the enthusiasm of some of the more vocal participants.
Help people to ‘pick up the pen’, as a facilitator it’s not your job to do the work. Instead you might want to lead by doing so you’re showing people what’s expected, before setting them loose. We’ve also found it useful to have clear roles defined for you and your co-facilitators — one to lead, one to take notes, one to collect outputs from your participants.
We’re really passionate about helping stuff continue to happen. We’ve been working as a team to collect as many practical tips and tricks as possible. If you want to know more about how we’re keeping our clients keep their projects moving, or just want to chat workshops, get in touch. brett.bircham@fluxx.uk.com
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Thanks to Ariel Lerner, Jack Metcalfe, Murray Sim, Ophelia Spowers, Dean Wilson and especially Gemma Slater for contributing to the article. Go team.
