Remote workshops for (a) change.
Our advice on how to organise an online remote-first workshop.
At Vizzuality, we regularly have workshops with our partners at different project stages to meet, align, share ideas, and design work plans. However, travel restrictions have made us adapt to the new normality and make all of our workshops fully remote.
As we cancelled our flights and revised our agendas for two in-person workshops originally planned for March, we realised that all the activities we had planned did not translate well into a virtual world. So when we re-designed the workshops, we didn’t seek normality. We simply adapted to the new situation with the tools and knowledge available to make the most of our remote collaborative work.
In the end, the workshops were a success, and we learnt about adaptation by designing a workshop plan so that all the people participating in it could engage, play, and share their vision to advance in our goals. Many of the lessons we learnt from running online workshops are applicable to offline sessions, but they are also markedly distinct in a number of ways.
- PLAN. Make the most of the dynamics by involving the participants in the preparation of activities prior to the workshop and receiving feedback as you conduct them. Being adaptive is key!
- PEOPLE. Engage with all participants. When you are physically distant, it becomes even more important to make sure everyone feels comfortable and encouraged to share their point of view.
- PLAY. Less talk, more action. Combine activities aimed at sharing information with others to co-create knowledge in an interactive and structured manner.
Running an online workshop.
Plan.
There are very effective alternatives to pens, paper, and flip chart. For example, while in a workshop we used whiteboard platforms (like Miro or Whimsical) to facilitate collaborative activities (and even used them to substitute sketch boards), we also used a Google Slides deck as a whiteboard in another workshop. When activities benefited from working in smaller groups, we used automatic Zoom breakout rooms in one workshop, and prepared links for Google Hangouts rooms that we shared with instructions and group participants in another workshop. In the end, both approaches lead to comparable outcomes as all participants responded to the dynamics we planned with clear objectives in mind. While some tools might be more familiar to many and are more than adequate for shorter workshops, more sophisticated tools with a small learning curve can be more appropriate in instances when there is more time to prepare.
What we learnt from these experiences is that preparing and sharing instruction worksheets beforehand was essential to making sure things run smoothly. We even prepared a training session to get everyone familiar with the tools we were going to use before one of the workshops. These training sessions can be as simple as giving the participants early access to the tools and sample activities to practice specific and less-intuitive functionalities. In addition, these sessions will help all participants feel more comfortable about the expectations and requirements of the workshop, and encourage them to start thinking about their goals.
The lower costs of remote workshops (no travelling and accommodation needed) allows for more participants to attend the sessions. If the number of attendees is relatively high, you can assign active and listen-only participant roles to ensure the discussions are fluid. In our case, to make sure that everyone’s voice was heard, listen-only participants had the chance to share their opinions through assigned active representatives and in open feedback documents that we reviewed at the end of each day. In other instances, participants were encouraged to ask questions or share comments in the chat box, where a designated moderator could answer the questions on the spot without distracting the main speakers.
Feedback is essential during the whole process. We adapted our activities to the feedback comments and the general feeling after each session, which we shared when summarising outcomes and highlighting take-home messages at the end of each session. When starting a new day, and in order to ensure continuity, we provided a quick recap of all discussions and learning outcomes from the previous day.
People.
Every workshop is different, and so is every person. For this reason, each workshop should be designed for the specific group of people who will be attending. Make sure you understand the roles of all participants and that the activities are designed for everyone to make the most of them. In order to make sure everyone is on the same page, summaries from previous sessions are particularly important if participants are jumping in and out, or aren’t joining from the very first session of the workshop.
A successful workshop is one in which each person can be heard and oftentimes, engagement can be strongly influenced by the first impression. While in some cases everyone knows each other by the time the workshop takes place, in other cases introductions are necessary. Starting the workshop very cold might make for an uncomfortable and unproductive session. From a short introduction activity or icebreakers in breakout rooms, to simply asking how people are doing, how they are feeling, or who is with them (pets included) can facilitate the workshop development.
A workshop will be successful if all participants feel satisfied and accomplished by the end of it. Although all sessions should be collaborative and fun throughout the entire workshop week, it is key to start and end on a high note. Particularly since we are missing all those specific interactions that are part of face-to-face workshops: the morning coffee on the first day, asking everyone about their travel and first impressions of the city, going out for meals or drinks on the last days… Agreements will need to be made and it is easier to get there when everyone has a positive attitude towards all activities and discussions throughout the sessions. Designing the sessions for everyone to have fun will help to keep the spirits high as well as start and end the workshop on a high note.
Play.
Keeping all participants engaged takes more than just having fun introductions. Throughout the sessions, make sure activities are short, interactive, and have clear goals. Make sure that all sessions have a good balance between presentations and interactive dynamics. Although presentations are needed, people might get bored if they are only listening. Less talk, more action. In either case (presentations or activities), make sure all parts of a session are concise and that there are breaks between them, this will help everyone stay focused. Breaks are particularly important when working remotely, as shorter attention spans online, including the usual distractions and notifications from working in a computer.
In in-person workshops, participants get together for a few days, and we try to make the most out of our limited amount of time together: long sessions, long days, socialising in the evening and working hard for the rest of the time. In remote workshops, we have observed and we believe that shorter sessions (2–3 hours max) spread out over a number of days in a given week seem to lead to good results and good engagement.
It is easier to stay engaged from a remote environment if all materials are visual and intuitive, especially for interactive exercises. For example, we added short instructions to activity boards to remind participants what were the steps to complete the exercises. Rather than asking participants to build text boxes to write their opinions, we prepared blank sticky notes that could be dragged and written on. We prepared shapes that could be used as stickers to vote for different designs, and always gave them a pre-made example of how to use the materials. It’s fine if the templates for the activities are slightly rough, they invite participants to feel comfortable playing with them, moving things around, and engage fully in the activity.
Keeping the activities intuitive and engaging will make them adapted for all participants. It’s even better to provide tutorials and examples of the dynamics and exercises that will be part of the workshop beforehand. Give hints of what the following sessions will involve so that all attendees are ready. Everyone will appreciate it, especially if sessions are organised by topic and keeping the right pace.
Taking things offline keeps everyone focused and engaged. We often ask the participants in our workshops to prepare pens and paper for sketching activities. Sketching individually, each in their own house, with a bit of music in the background is a nice creative break. After the activity all sketches are uploaded to the virtual boards or slides in order to have group discussions.
Don’t hesitate to give homework to the participants. On one hand, homework makes the sessions shorter, as part of the work gets done asynchronously, giving participants some time to reflect at their own pace. On the other hand, homework helps everyone stay engaged between sessions and there are plenty of resources available to make it accessible to everyone (online polls and questionnaires, file-sharing platforms…).
Applying learnt lessons.
Months have passed since the March workshops that we had to adapt with short notice. We have planned and conducted more workshops since then and have continued experimenting with different session structures and tools to refine our dynamics. Our main learnt lesson is that there is no one-size fits-all in the workshop-planning universe. To create a memorable, productive workshop, you need to think about your goals, build a solid plan that can adapt to people’s needs, and use play to help your participants reach the desired objectives.
This post is result of collaborative effort between myself and Camellia Williams (Vizzuality’s Lead Writer), Martin Dubuisson (User Researcher), and Ariadna Martínez (Designer).
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