Why Virtual Workshops Can Be Better Than Face to Face - lessons learnt in a pandemic

This article is part #1 of a series on Creativity For Better Innovation.

Does the thought of attending a virtual workshop make you feel like this?

It shouldn't have to.

Done right, I firmly believe that virtual workshops can even be better than Face to Face (F2F) workshops.

Here's the thing, virtual workshops require more preparation and creative execution than most people expect.?

Often folk try and transfer what they remember from F2F workshops directly into the virtual environment with limited success.?

Actually, there is no problem with virtual. The problem is when we try and use it as a tool but don't respect what it is good for and how best to use it.

I'm on a journey to study and dissect creativity.?I want to help the people I work with be at their creative best in the service of doing a better job of meeting their consumer's needs.?

This had led me to study creativity theory and refine my own innovation practice running workshops.

I've run over 100 live virtual sessions during the pandemic.?

I have worked with a range of clients and smart agencies (many thanks especially to the team at Paraffin) where I have refined these approaches.

What follows comes from my learnings at the "workshop coalface".?

This article summarises a presentation I gave at the Creative Experts Exchange?in late January 2021 (held virtual from Buffalo, New York).

9 Enablers for Virtual Workshop Success

1. Frame?virtual collaboration as a positive and powerful tool right from the start

I suspect many of you may have had experiences where you come to a workshop, and immediately people say;

"it's a really exciting challenge but such a shame we have to do it virtually..."

The moment you start saying that, you instantly take energy and impact out of the event.

You start people questioning whether the event will be any good.

The seeds of doubt have been sewn.

When you frame virtual collaboration as a positive thing, suddenly, anything becomes possible.

Getting this right at the beginning and maintaining it throughout the workshop is vitally important.

2. Dial up the virtual positives to maximise creativity

Apart from reduced travel costs and no jet lag, there are some real positives from virtual.?

It is important to challenge ourselves every time we lead a virtual workshop to make the best use of these positives.

Specifically:

• We are now not constrained by people flying in for a finite period, so we've now got the flexibility to chunk up our interactions over time. That's exciting because it opens up opportunities to incubate ideas (more on this later).?
• Virtual makes it far easier logistically to access the very best participants (including external provocateurs) without geographic constraint. Is that expert speaker you want traveling in the Arctic? With virtual, that may not be a problem.
• The collaboration technology available provides real-time visibility and transparency of outputs, creating a sense of achievement and momentum.
• Virtual also does a really good job of reducing the social and emotional bias that can be present in physical settings meaning that more egalitarian and diverse inputs can often result.

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3. Acknowledge and mitigate virtual barriers

This is about facing into barriers, not trying to sweep them under the carpet, but acknowledging them and positively moving on.

My belief and experience are that across every possible touchpoint in the project that participants come into contact with, we need to signal that this workshop is different.

It will be inspiring. It will be exciting.?It will be a good use of their time and energy.?

This means creating beautifully designed teaser invites, engaging creative stimulus, thoughtful workshop navigation, and engagingly designed collaboration platforms that cut-through and set the expectation that this is a creative endeavour worthy of their time and creative energy.

Because some folk are still finding their way in virtual, setting clear expectations to make it a seamless experience is also essential.?

Having cameras on, and using platforms where you can view everyone's faces, makes for a more engaging and collaborative human experience.?

Ensure clear guidelines for things like conversational turn-taking and when to be on mute are also important.

Wifi isn't perfect. When lags and other problems pop up, acknowledge them and move on. Pragmatism and good humour are essential skills in virtual sessions.?

Yes, the verbal and body language lag that occurs in virtual can make sessions seem more intense, which is another excellent reason why sessions need to be shorter and sharper and ideally not exceed 3 hours.

Because everyone is working from home right now, we've got dogs, cats, children, significant others, deliveries, popping up in the middle of workshops. Again, cheerfully acknowledge it and move on.

Don't allow it to derail the session.

So having established a positive narrative around virtual and maintaining that throughout the live sessions, that's when I think we're in a position to unlock the power of incubation.

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4. Design for idea incubation

The concept and use of idea incubation to enhance innovation is an area that I am excited about.

Faced with a difficult decision, many of us benefit from mulling it over overnight. And who doesn't find that some of their best ideas come at unexpected times? In the shower? On a walk?

Alex Osborn, credited as the father of modern brainstorming, advocated circulating a two-page brief, including the project objectives, several days in advance of the workshop, so people can start mulling over the program. I'd build on what Osborn said and take this even further.

I've also been inspired by an English academic, Wallas, who in 1926, put out a book called The Art of Thought. Wallas talks about the importance of preparation and looking at an issue from "all available angles".

He also talks about the power of idea incubation which gives people space and time to create new connections and come up with ideas that are more original.

Incorporating time for idea incubation can be more challenging within a face-to-face workshop when people have flown in from around the world and time pressures are intense.?

However, within a virtual workshop, idea incubation can and should be actively exploited.

Best practice virtual workshops design idea incubation into the project journey.?Sessions can be chunked up several days or weeks with immersion time built-in for digesting creative stimulus designed to stretch thinking.?

An adapted sprint structure works well here.?Then incubation opportunities also occur between ideation, idea prioritisation, share and build sessions, consumer 'test and learn', and idea iteration.

I've had lots of workshop participants, particularly self-confessed introverts, say that they have appreciated having more time for reflective thought using this process.

5. Incorporate incubation brain breaks

The second exciting thing about incubation is that opportunities to incubate can also be incorporated within sessions.?

This is often referred to as 'delayed incubation'.?For instance, if you're in the middle of a divergent thinking task, taking a break between rounds of ideation can help escape a phenomenon called 'functional fixedness'. 'Functional fixedness' refers to getting fixated on one solution/approach to the detriment of fresh thinking.

?It's important to note this is not just any break; these are deliberate activities proven to aid idea incubation.?

Some of the practical things I've been doing that have worked well include: using meditation apps, stretching/desk yoga, mental rotation games (an excellent offset for verbal ideation tasks), watching nature videos, and even silent discos.?

In all cases, research shows that these techniques result in better idea fluency (quantity and originality of ideas) when comparing samples of people who did and didn't use these incubation techniques.

6.?Design for deep work and engagement

I am a big fan of Cal Newport's thoughts on deep work.?At best, any of us can only engage in three or four hours of deep work a day.

For workshops, I am conscious that we are asking people to think differently from their day job, which is tiring.?In virtual workshops, we also have to overlay the intensity of the virtual environment.?

For me, this means a maximum session length of around 2-3 hours works well.

And let's consider the role of the facilitator as the workshop leader.?

Virtual workshops call for even more skilful project design and facilitation than in the F2F world. It's important to note that if the structure and design aren't well crafted in the first place, then no amount of engaging brain breaks or quizzes will make a fundamental difference.?

As with physical F2F workshops, having a variety of exercises that play to different preferences, individual, pair, and small group activities, and larger plenary share and build sessions are necessary, probably even more so.?

In addition, building in novelty, and just as significantly the anticipation of novelty, is critical in creating a sense of excitement and cut through the sense of sameness that we are all feeling in lockdown.

We also need to consider making the workshop visually engaging.?The importance of visual and multi-sensorial stimulation in the creative process is highlighted by Torrance and Safter in their 18 creative leap skills.?This ties into the point I raised earlier about making the workshop enticing and exciting across all touch points.?

Beyond visual stimulus, we can also consider multi-sensorial stimulus to immerse people in the smells, sounds, and textures of stimulus to spark fresh thinking.

7. Deploy positive strategies for avoiding distractions

I'd be remiss if we didn't acknowledge that our laptops are a Pandora's box of distractions.

I deliberately signal to teams at the kick-off sessions for innovation Sprints and workshops that we want to be at our creative best for focused chunks of time.

To be at our creative best, I invite everyone to engage in deep work.?

We have permission to remind our managers and our colleagues, we're not going to be available for the duration of each session. Turn on out of office.?That takes some of the pressure off us.

Then I give people a positive substitute for checking their email in breaks. I earlier mentioned creating incubation brain breaks, which are actually going to help people be more creative.?And hopefully, they will also leave the session with brains that feel a bit less frazzled by the many tasks they are probably juggling.

That's a good thing.

8. Create a "human" experience

Having a human experience was always important F2F. However, I think there is a need in virtual workshops to further dial this up to offset the physical distance.

Creating a 'human' environment for collaboration is critical:

• Making sure people feel welcomed and acknowledged from the moment they land in the session sets the tone.?
• Giving people opportunities to contribute early on and sharing how the 'why' for the workshop resonates.
• Keeping the environment positive, making sure people's voices are heard and valued.?Help people feel part of something bigger, as well as having a sense of social connectedness.
• And create an environment where it's okay to experiment and be a bit playful.

This point has been driven home after having several clients tell me, "not only did we get to disruptive ideas, we also really appreciated was that this was a rewarding human experience."

I see that part of my role as a workshop leader is to create enriching and rewarding human experiences.

I will share more thinking on the importance of the right creative climate to help people be at their creative best in the future.

9. Make technology an enabler, not the star attraction

Too often, I see the technology being the star at the expense of having a seamless human experience.

Technology is an enabler.

I believe that if we spend anything more than a couple of minutes over the course of a project talking about the technology, we've not done it right.

?Cover off collaboration platform up-skilling in advance and give people guidance to know which apps they need on laptops or as a backup on their phones.?

By the time we get to the live sessions, a hundred percent of our energy is focused on the task at hand.

Have a dedicated person responsible for the tech.?Someone who is experienced with the video conferencing and collaboration platforms.

Set up separate chat groups for tech issues so these can be efficiently dealt with in the background. I've tried managing tech several ways and found for me, this works best.?This way, the facilitator/s can focus on what they are good at, facilitating.

Plan B.?Have one.?

For example, if my wifi drops, I'll rejoin using a 4G/5G connection. If that fails, I'll use 4G on my mobile phone (through another provider), and the technology manager will have a copy of any of the documents/links I'll need and will share these on my behalf.

Closing thoughts...

I firmly believe that deploying the 9 enablers in combination results in successful virtual workshops every time.

The feedback I have been getting from clients across industries is that the virtual workshops we have run together are not only the best virtual workshops they have been to, but some of the best innovation workshops (virtual or F2F) that they have ever been to.?

Of course, in the future, when we have more choice over whether we deploy a virtual or a physical F2F workshop, F2F will undoubtedly be a better fit for some opportunities and teams.?

However, I think we'll see a high number of virtual workshops continuing to run out of preference because of the real tangible benefits.

Your thoughts?

Have I missed anything that has proven successful for you???

Which of these enablers did you find most useful??

Please add your comments below!

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A bit about me

I lead front-end innovation projects for clients, designing the project, creating and sourcing creative stimulus, and leading workshops.?I bring best practice learning on creative collaboration and co-creation immersive experiences, rapid innovation, and virtual workshops to all of my work with global, commercially savvy clients.

For more info please reach out on LinkedIn or visit 8innovation.com