5 Strategies for Engaging Virtual Workshops & Meetings
You were scheduled to offer an in-person workshop or meeting, but now need to revise it to be virtual. Sound familiar? While you may be prepared to adapt your slide deck and discussion questions for an online environment, how do you ensure that your participants stay engaged during your live web-based session? This post offers five strategies to keep your participants engaged.
A virtual session I facilitated awhile back for Maine Mathematics and Science Alliance’s ACRES project.
Set super-clear expectations. In online workshops and meetings, it’s important to be very, super, ultra-clear and specific on the intended outcome of the session.
For instance, instead of a workshop objective like: “In this session, we will explore our understanding of emotional intelligence and how it relates to our work…”, set objectives like: “In this session, you will develop a three step plan to improve your emotional intelligence and become a better leader.” Why? Virtual participants want to know exactly how their time investment is going to benefit them. They will sign up for a session that has clear outcomes they desire. And, because they care about achieving the outcome, they will be more invested in participating in the session to get the knowledge or skills you’ve promised.
In your session planning, remember that it’s better to have one or two attainable, clear outcomes than several, abstract or not-so-attainable outcomes. One way to think about it is: If you were offering a money-back guarantee, what skill or knowledge could you 100% guarantee your participants would get from participating in your session? Keep it simple, focused and attainable.
Promote video. Many online platforms offer the ability to show yourself (and your participants) on video or not. Some still feel awkward on camera, but it’s time to take the leap! To build community and rapport, you really need to use video.
In a virtual meeting, all participants should use video. It’s important to be able to see facial expressions and body language, allowing participants and facilitators to “read the room” and react accordingly. If attendees are new to video, encourage and praise them for trying it. In a virtual workshop, the facilitators should be on camera. If there are multiple facilitators, we’ve found success keeping the cameras on for all facilitators on during the full session as it simulates a discussion or interview kind of feeling and adds to participant engagement. And when you use video, make sure you use it well! A few tips:
Set up your meeting environment. Consider what’s behind you and what your participants will see during the session. It’s totally fine to have stuff behind you, but try to minimize visual distractions. You want to keep people focused on the session, not on the stack of dishes or pile of toys behind you.
Test your video and audio before your session. If you know you won’t be at your desk for the meeting, test your tech away from your desk to make sure all systems work.
Adjust your lighting or move your computer so the light source is behind your camera and your face is well-lit.
Tinker with your camera angle. It’s better to have the camera a little above you than below you—no one wants to look up your nose. So that may require you to boost your laptop up on books or tilt your camera down toward your face.
If your camera is set up in a conference room, consider switching to your laptop or webcam instead. You’ll maintain a more in-person feeling by having your face on your participants’ screens instead of them seeing a long conference table with you sitting way at the end of it.
Be you. There is no need to go out of your way to change your appearance for web-based meetings or workshops. Consider the tone you want to set with your participants and dress accordingly.
Intentionally build community. While this may not be your thing when in person, community builders are a must in virtual environments. As a facilitator, strive to keep it light. Things will go awry. Your dog will bark, your kids will run through, the fire alarm will ring. Acknowledge that aloud to everyone. One of our favorite icebreakers from our friends at the Maine Mathematics and Science Alliance (MMSA) is “What or who is most likely to interrupt you during our session?” You know it’s going to happen, so own it. MMSA has a lot of great advice including ice breakers and facilitation strategies that support community-building online.
We also encourage sharing or setting Community Agreements with the group at the beginning of the session. Community Agreements are agreements on how we will interact with each other, how we can be in community. For example, you might share agreements like:
Be present.
Step up if you don’t hear yourself participating. Step back if you hear yourself talking a lot.
Accept that some things are outside your control.
Be willing to try technology that may be unfamiliar.
Use inclusive facilitation practices. Sometimes it’s difficult for participants to know when and how to participate virtually. It’s up to you to establish and model practices that bring people in and help them be collaborators in the session. A few of our favorites practices are:
Be transparent about the process. Share with participants how this meeting or workshop came to be and why it’s so important to you. Let them know how the agenda is structured, how and when they’ll have opportunities to participate (like via the chat box, unmuting yourself and talking, taking a survey, small breakout groups, etc.)
Set a speaking order. In a meeting or for a small group share out, you can post a speaking order in the chat box or on a slide. Put everyone’s name on the list. Set the expectation that each person will have a turn to speak and can pass if they don’t have anything to say.
Use interactive tools. It’s fine to use slides, but also use web-based tools to include participants. For example, use a shared Google document where people can be working together in real time. Or use features on your video conferencing platform like the whiteboard, chat area, polling. You can even do think-pair-share or small group discussions using breakout rooms.
Highlight successes. Sometimes virtual sessions end abruptly and participants are left feeling suddenly isolated. After you’ve spent the time together in community, engaging in discussion and forming connections, you want to carry that momentum through the very last minute. Be sure to leave enough time at the end of your session (like 10 minutes) to reflect on how well it went. As a facilitator, you can recap the session, reflect back productive conversations or note ideas that surfaced. You can also invite participants to share via chat a take-away, action step or highlight from the session. Take the time to wrap up the session and illuminate how you all collaborated to achieve the outcome.
Take a look back at the strategies in this post—are there any you have already tried? Any you haven't? If you’re ready to learn a little bit more, take our free course, Leading Virtual Meetings That Used to be In Person.
