When working in a network comprised of technical folks, it is easy stay in the familiar territory of presenting knowledge when the network gathers. Sometimes make assumptions about scientists, or policy makers, or engineers about how they prefer to interact at a face to face meeting. Watch that “fluffy” stuff!
Visual notes from the day
My sense is a lot of this push-back originates in bad experiences where “interactive methods” were used for interactivity and perhaps less focused on the purpose at hand. With this in mind, I had a blast developing an agenda and coaching the facilitators for the Floodplains by Design Network gathering. I wanted to reflect and pull out some of the highlights of the process, both to acknowledge the fabulous team and the network participants, and to give some clarity on designing for networks, especially technically oriented networks.
Ditch the tables: People walked into the room to find a chair set of concentric circles – and were surprised. Coached to put their coats and backpacks to the side, there was a sense of “what is happening?” The folks kicking off the meeting had to adopt a new position to speak to and within a circle, but they quickly got the beat. Without tables, it was as simple as turning to someone to engage in conversation, look across the room to notice faces. The conversational sound level never wavered!
Nurture network relationships: Networks balance on the three legs we often use to define communities of practice: community (relationship), domain (what we care about – in this case integrated floodplain design), and practice (what we actually DO!) It is easy in a technical field to skip the community element so we started the day with a round of Impromptu Networking facilitating three rounds of short conversations about what we are grateful for in this work. Three new or deepened relationships along with domain knowledge! No fluffy “icebreaker.” The team crafted the invitation so it would resonate with the people in the room – something, by the way, I would have gotten wrong had I designed by myself. TEAMS, people, TEAMS!
The knowledge is in the room: use it! We used a modified version of Shift and Share to highlight as many stories of integrated floodplain work as we could to spotlight both the small and big steps being taken, and surfacing useful lessons for spreading. Along the way, people connect and relationships are nurtured in these rotating, purposeful conversations. We divided the short 5 minute talks, each followed by 10 minutes of conversational Q&A into five thematic “pods,” each with a “poderator” to help track time and capture highlights. We fully encouraged everyone to vote with their feet and move between talks, stay in a pod, visit all the pods, or just hover and bumblebee around. I was surprised that quite a few people stuck to a single pod and suspect there was growing identification and affinity around the pod topics.
Networks that rely primarily on voluntary participation need to focus on what matters, not on EVERYTHING. To help identify what to STOP doing, we did TRIZ, a reverse engineering process to identify the stuff we are doing that is not adding value. This one baffled some people in the room, leading us to consider how we might deepen the structure if we had a “do-over.” But we discovered later in debriefings that some people really got it and came to some tough conclusions about how the work might need to shift. So it may have also been a little bit of “elephant in the room” going on. I found it fascinating to watch the dynamics of acknowledging that sometimes the stuff we are doing doesn’t matter. A tough one.
Always find the next step. From the TRIZ we invited people to think about their 15% solution of what they could stop doing, and recommendations to the wider network of the more gnarly things that require a bigger lift to stop at a larger level. There were a few very concrete network recommendations, and some people began to crack open that they DID have some agency to stop things — or start them. That is always the temptation, to add before we clear the decks a bit.
Use the knowledge in the room. As we started the day by noticing the knowledge in each other, so we wrapped things up with Troika Consulting to get specific feedback on the 15% solutions. In knee-to-knee trios, people dug in to help each other. When we asked for a show of hands of who gained valuable “consulting” from their peers, almost every hand in the room went up. In after-event conversations people noted that this activity and the Shift and Share had high value for them.
Don’t forget the reflection with space for every voice. We finished in a circle, just like we started, with a “Just Three Words” debrief with everyone having a chance to say something or pass. Many of the words were captured on the right side of the visual above… you may notice a pattern.
Troika Consulting
There were a lot of smiles at the end of the day. The facilitation team did a fabulous job – mama mia, were they talented. The feedback was both positive and criticisms were super constructive, instead of generally grumpy. There was, from where I observed, a tangible pulse of energy.
Heather leaned in!
All kinds of people find value in engagement. Some need it a bit slower, some a bit faster, some need more space for reflection. But in a learning network, we need each other, so we need to design our meetings to truly BE with and ENGAGE with each other. Hats off to the Floodplains By Design team who had the courage to step outside of the “way things are done” and create that dynamic design. You KEEP GOING Heather, Carol, Courtney, Leah and all the shift and share speakers/poderators!
My lovely Liberating Structures (LS) community of practice has a monthly newsletter. December’s will be around LS online and as I started marking up their draft, I realized it would be a good idea to get my thinking/practices more clearly outlined rather than trying to “think out loud” and potentially make a mess of their draft!
What I’m laying out here could be extrapolated to other group processes, not just Liberating Structures. My goal is to describe how I think, talk and practice in online facilitation. I’m going to use the LS “Purpose to Practice” as the scaffold. The beauty of a scaffold is that it holds up an ever-evolving understanding of the practice, versus a static set of “best practices” or the like. This first version will stay at a pretty high level, and then it might be interesting to do some future posts digging deeper into each area.
Purpose
Why is this work important to me and the wider community? Purpose exists on a couple of different levels here. At the highest, the purpose of this post is to share learnings about how we transfer facilitation of offline group processes into an online space. In this particular instance, I’m focusing on LS and primarily synchronous online interactions using group meeting tools. My ultimate purpose is to use LS online so that people are easily and delightfully engaged and liberated to achieve their own purpose(s).
Purpose from an LS perspective – the integrity of an LS used online or offline – should be consistent with the structure and theoretically is not informed by the environment.
Purpose informs what structures people use, regardless of environment. In practice, people use each LS in different ways. For example, the stated purpose on the LS site guides us, but our ability to riff and improvise may surface other, unique purposes.
When thinking about the online environment, there may be more than one LS to choose in terms of what that structure enables (its purpose), but one of those options may be more suited to the online environment. For example, when the harvest of a process is important, an online environment makes it easy for everyone to type in and capture their input, faster and easier than a wall of sticky notes. The harvest is done by all, not by the facilitator. The data can be quickly organized, parsed and we can bring forth the best of what was produced.
People’s individual experience and practices using LS also vary. Some of us have favorites that we go to over and over. This may bias towards or away from using LS online because of our comfort of using a particular LS and how easy it is to transfer its use online.
Principles and Minimum Specifications
What rules must we obey to achieve our purpose? What are the minimum specifications, things we must absolutely do/not do? Again, principles exists on different levels. There are my personal principles as a facilitator/participant which drive my practices. There are the principles that sit beneath Liberating Structures . (Or whatever processes you use.) There are the principles of the individuals and group involved. I am excluding my personal principles/generic facilitator principles and will mostly focus on principles that arise from the online environment and which inform minimum specifications and practices. The other levels are very rich areas for future exploration!
Here are my general principles for using LS online:
Practice with others. The online environment can be unkind to multitasking… (Min Spec: Find a co-facilitating friend)
Use the power of alternating individual, small and large group interaction. Don’t fall trap to top-down online meetings, especially since most technologies favor top-down. (Min spec: unless the group is very small, don’t stay in a large group the whole time – a.k.a “goat rodeo”)
When in doubt, keep things simple. From technology, to process – simplicity gives room for experimentation and emergence. For example, while we might rapidly restring our structures F2F, we may not always be as prepared to do that as quickly online without a deeper practice. From a tech perspective, we might keep our technology set simple. (Min spec: never introduce more than two new tools to a group. One is ever better!)
Be prepared to be surprised (and innovate, use plan b, etc!) Technology (and the supporting infrastructure like bandwidth and even electricity) are rarely under your control. (Min spec: stay cool! Have a backup plan. Set reasonable expectations.)
Position everything as an experiment and a chance to learn, even while focused on real and urgent purposes. Let go of thinking everything can and should be perfect. (Min spec: let go of the identity of an expert.)
People/Participants
Who must be included to achieve our purpose? This one is much easier because there is little distinction between online and offline. The main benefit may be that online we might possibly include MORE people than we could if we were limited to a face to face interaction. In general, my overall facilitation principles drive me to include everyone who is engaged/impacted by the purpose to participate. Even if they are spread all across the globe. That is one of the driving strengths of doing things online, despite the challenges.
Structure
How will we organize to distribute control? Traditional design and use of online meeting tools have centralized control to the person who has administrative control of the meeting software. Sometimes additional people can be given these “host” or “admin” roles, partially or fully. But the central design of these tools has prioritized control over emergence, theoretically to offer a more consistent experience. Liberating Structures, on the other hand, is designed to engage and unleash everyone. So it is super important to figure out how to hack these tools to distribute control. Here are three potential vectors for distributing control. I’m sure there are more. Ideas?
Control can be distributed by handing off control of the software. I start by sharing my screen, now you can share yours. Here, why don’t you work on setting up the breakout groups while I review the process?
Control can be explicitly shared by identifying and distributing /switching roles. I’ll facilitate the process, you work on the technology support. Everyone can take notes in the chat. Invite people into those roles early and often.
Control can be distributed byfacilitators being quiet for a while. Some of us facilitators have this urge to fill every second of air time. Silence can give others a chance to breathe, think, and then participate in a way that is easier for them. Facilitators, IT IS NOT ABOUT US!! This is also a practice.
Practices
What are we going to do? This is where it gets practical. It is also where it may be more useful to describe practices through examples of how to use specific LS online. So I’ll start general, then we can dive into specifics in future posts.
For me there are two intersecting sets of practices: the process facilitation and the technology stewardship. I (along with John D. Smith and Etienne Wenger) have written extensively about technology stewardship. You can get the book (free!) on the Digital Habitats book site, and I will focus only on LS related facilitation and tech stewardship issues. You will also note how these are related to principles stated above!
Don’t do this alone. Have one person focus on the technology stewardship issues while the other facilitates process. It can be devilishly hard to do both at one time. For example, individuals with tech problems need one on one private “back channel” assistance that doesn’t suck up the time and attention of the whole group. Setting up breakout rooms is best done with attention, not while multitasking with process instructions.
Select and use technology to facilitate the large group/small group/individual levels of participation that are found in LS. For me the profound difference of using LS online and more traditional “web meetings” or “webinars” is that they enable peer to peer, multi-directional interaction versus being the object of a stream of content from one or few people.
Use multiple modalities beyond voice. We humans pay less attention to verbal interactions when we aren’t facing each other. Video can help – a bit – but not resolve our lackadaisical listening skills. So important instructions (how to do a LS, the invitation, etc.) should also appear visually on a slide, whiteboard or chat room. Don’t underestimate adult’s ability to quickly forget the instructions as well, so make sure they are visible in breakouts. Use images, drawing tools – whatever it takes to create a closer cycle of information exchange and UNDERSTANDING.
Keep technology choices as simple as possible. For example, if you pair the web meeting tool Zoom with Google Docs, it may seem really easy if you already have a Google Doc practice. For someone totally new to both, it may be enough to learn one tool at a time. For experts, pile it on! Just because we can use a ton of tools doesn’t mean we always SHOULD. A subset of this is “always keep an eye out for new tech” – the landscape is constantly evolving.
Beware of the heaven/hell of harvesting online. Online tools make it easy for everyone to write/draw/contribute. When it comes to sensemaking and harvesting, be careful of creating too much useless/never used content. Ask people to ruthlessly evaluate and harvest the best of what is created.
Don’t restrict yourself. Think through how you will use an LS online based on your purpose instead of slavishly following the instructions in a literal manner. Use your imagination and the strengths of the technology you are using rather than fighting the limitations. This is a great place to expand your LS repertoire. (Again, there should be a whole post on using the LS Matchmaker with an online perspective. Some of us have been trying to capture our current state of understanding of this.)
Give most LS a bit more time online, especially when learning how to do them online. Don’t over-pack your sequence or “string” of structures. While I might do 3-5 in 90 minutes F2F, I’d say 3 online! To date, almost all the LS I’ve used online take more time the first time (sometimes a LOT more time). We get better over time, but if you are always working with new people, build in learning time. And in a perfect world, get the chance to do these together more than once. It gets richer and richer. Another perspective is spreading out a string over multiple, shorter online meetings. Most of us burn out after 90 minutes of full on attention online.
Reflect on the similarities and differences of a structure/string online and offline. Chances are this will deepen your overall understanding and facilitation practice, and expand possibilities each time you reflect, learn, apply, and repeat! Better yet, reflect with your peers. Use What, So What, Now What? to debrief at every chance. Share your learnings with the Liberating Structures community of practice on Slack.
I received a request to grant usage rights to a VERY old piece I wrote years ago – a general set of heuristics for online facilitation called “Facilitips,” first published in 1999. Way back in the old days!
It was basically my distillation of everything I learned from people like Howard Rheingold, Sue Boettcher, and many others (see the bottom of this post). I realized it was full of typos and could use a brush up, so here it is.
Note: these are not unique to online but have been found IMPORTANT in online facilitation!
General Tips
Assume good intent. Approach every contribution with
curiosity, expecting surprise and wonder. Remind others of this simple
trick.
Role model the behavior you wish others to use.
Practice and encourage active listening/reading.
Be as explicit as possible in your communication.
Remember not everyone thinks or perceives the way you
do. Seek to understand participants’ styles and needs.
Don’t automatically assume understanding — ask for
clarification as needed.
Trust is slow to be granted, easily taken away.
Encourage an environment that values trust.
Build trust by doing what you say you will do.
Encourage others to do the same.
Use irony and humor with care as it does not always
come across online as you might have intended. This is particularly
relevant in intercultural contexts. You can always use emoticons to
clarify! 😉
Think before you hit the button and a post goes up.
Process Facilitation Tips
Make the bare minimum of rules, expectations or norms
consistent, explicit and clear. No one remembers long lists of rules!
Provide orientation materials and paths for new
members.
Respond to all first-time participants. Welcome people
by name.
Use recognizable names or pseudonyms.
Use small group activities to build relationships and
“get acquainted.”
Encourage the use of personal profiles to build
relationships.
Consider cultural differences of participants.
Help members take ownership of the interaction space.
Nurture others to help host and facilitate the group.
Encourage people to mentor and assist each other.
Recognize mentors.
Acknowledge and reciprocate participation.
Reply to messages that get no other recognition. Even
if it is a “treading water reply.”
Use (open-ended) questions to encourage participation.
(move beyond yes/no)
Stimulate input with positive private emails to
individuals.
Notice if someone is “missing” for long
periods of time. Email them and invite them back.
Let others know when you will be offline for extended
periods of time.
Draw out the quiet members.
Help focus the chatters.
Don’t fan the flames (or the flamers!) (see
difficult situations below).
Ask members for feedback. What is working for them?
What is not? What is missing?
Monitor member activity with available tools to gauge
participation and alter your facilitation strategy accordingly.
Look for participation patterns and changes in
conversations.
Consider participation from different time zones. The
more your time zones are spread, the more time needed for a group to be in
sync.
Consider time-delimited events or topics to foster
activity.
Facilitation Tips for Task-Oriented Groups
Make purpose and task VERY clear/visible/explicit.
Post timelines and reminders.
Agree on process issues up front. Address as needed on
an on-going basis.
Make roles and responsibilities clear and visible.
Use email as appropriate for notification.
When activity levels drop, evaluate to ensure you have
compelling reasons for participation: real work, learning, shared tasks,
personal or professional development.
Let divergent processes flow free. Channel convergent
processes.
Tips for Dealing with Difficult Situations
Don’t be intimidated by challenges. They are learning
opportunities for everyone when handled with grace.
Help bring learning out of friction or “creative
abrasion.”
Help people understand how they come across if others
are having difficulty with them. Consider doing this offline or privately.
Avoid “one-upmanship” and point-by-point
defenses which usually only escalate problems.
Use back channel (private) email to resolve problems
unless the issue involves a larger group.
Use your administration tools (i.e., deleting posts)
lightly and carefully.
Don’t assume a lack of response means dissent or
assent. Seek explicit responses.
Structural & Content Tips
Frame topic openers clearly and demonstrate the goal or
purpose of the topic or thread.
Label topic/threads and conference items clearly.
Provide ongoing (and often repeated) guidance on
“what goes where” in any interaction space.
Don’t pile too much into one post. Break it up into
small paragraphs or multiple posts, especially if you are dealing with
more than one point or topic.
Keep “conversations” in their most logical
place — social chat in social spaces, content or action specific
interaction in their own spaces or topics.
Open new topics to support new discussions emerge as
needed.
Observe the rhythm of topics and close old topics as
they grow dormant.
Summarize and/or index conversations of value to make
them accessible to the group.
Provide great links, resources and relevant,
stimulating content to foster interaction.
Tag materials if your platform allows.
Explore the use of color and images as communication
and facilitation tools.
Respect copyright and confidentiality. Do not repost
other’s postings, photos, references or emails without explicit
permission.
Keep the online space free from “garbage”
such as duplicate posts, or disallowed content (i.e.. pornography,
advertising or whatever your group norms dictate.)
Don’t obsess about typos. Life is too short.
One for the Road…
Facilitation is the combination of knowledge and practice.
So practice, practice, practice.
Read between the lines.
Seek to be fair.
Have fun.
Use common sense.
When all else fails, ask and listen. Again. Again.
Sources:
Notes from Uri Merry, Mihaela Moussou, Peter and Trudy Johnson-Lenz, Margaret McIntyre, Denham Grey, TJ Elliott and others from the Knowledge Ecology Work Group at http://www.co-i-l.com
Online
Facilitation Classes from Wise
Circle Training, including Kimberly A. Adler of the National
Mentoring Partnership
Last November I participated in a webinar on designing and facilitating webinars hosted by GFAR. I had intended to do a deeper dive and reflection, but as I clean up old blog post drafts, some things must be let go! 🙂 That said, some very pragmatic things emerged and were captured, so I’m circling back to share them. Peter Casier, our host, was super well organized and did a great job on follow up. Peter asked for input on outstanding questions from the chat, collected responses and shared them out. This was fricken FANTASTIC! They comprise the bulk of this very long post!
I was not one of the panel as they had plenty of people, so I decided to focus on the back channel. I started by sharing related resources, taking notes on key ideas but quickly a bunch of us started interacting with each other. As I’ve noted before, I love the chat “backchannel” – it really helps me pay attention.
FollowUp From Peter Casier/GFAR
Hi all,
Here is our final wrap-up email for our “webinar on webinars”. — With apologies for the delay, but the depth of the feedback the speakers on your unanswered questions (see below), should compensate for this. 🙂 — In the answers, we are joined by Nancy White who was also providing quite some feedback in the online chat channel.
Answers to questions which we were not able to tackle during the webinar itself (or questions which needed further elaboration)
A: (Peter) Yes, we have tried Zoom, and it looks like a good webinar platform.
A: (Nancy White) Yes. Besides the fact that it requires a small download, it is now my favorite tool because it facilitates many different kinds of engagement, including video and breakout groups. Warning, the free version is limited to 45 minute meetings!
Q: Which webinar platforms has the possibility of recording
A: (Kelly) WebEx and Adobe Connect both do (not sure of others).
A: (Peter) Most webinar tools allow recording the sessions – which for us, is one of the basic requirements. We used webinars-on-air, Google Hangout, Bluejeans, Zoom, GoToWebinar which all allow recording the session
A: (Pier Andrea) I believe most have – for sure Adobe and WebEx that I’ve used
A: (Leandra) I have used Adobe Connect, Vidyo and Skype for Business, which all allow for recording
A: (April: I haven’t encountered a platform that doesn’t record. We convert our recordings and upload to YouTube, where we can more easily track recording views and ensure the recordings will live on if we ever transfer platforms.
A: (Nancy White) Most, but check, sometimes the free versions have no or limited recording capabilities.
Q: Using Skype for business, can participants call in? Or do all participants need to be in your contact list?
A: (Pier Andrea) I’ve never organized webinars/online meetings with Skype for business but I’ve joined several as participants. And my personal experience is rather negative. I never managed to get connected via the web but always had just to dial in – with all limitations that this has. Maybe things are better now but I remain skeptical of the tool.
A: (Peter) I’ve never used Skype for business, sorry.
A: (Leandra) You create an invitation for the webinar which creates a URL link. This link is then sent to the participants. The link allows you to contact via the Web app. There is also the ability to phone and participate that way.
Q: for Leandra: what tool did you guys at the Uni use before Skpe for Business?
A: (Leandra) Webinars are relatively new at the University, so I am trying out a new concept. I tried Vidyo for the first Webinar, but the software has limitations, and therefore we now use SFB. The University does have Adobe Connect but it is only for University staff and students and cannot be used for people outside.
Q: To access Skype for Business, does your organization have to have a membership?
A: (Leandra) Yes, you have to purchase a Microsoft License.
Q: In more of a meeting format, what platform would you recommend to combine an in-person group with remote participants? Does anyone have experience using complementary equipment (microphones, etc.)?
A: (Kelly) We’ve used Adobe Connect before for this purpose. Instead of using headphones for the presenter or speaker, we had remote microphones. Harder to hear with them and it was somewhat of a hassle to keep moving the microphones to whichever participant wanted to speak.
A: (Peter) Webinar tools can easily be used for online meetings or teleconferences. Any of the webinar tools we used for actual webinars, we also used for teleconferences with larger participation than what you would normally be able to use with “standard” Skype e.g. “Audio quality” is the most crucial part. If the remote participants are linked into a large onsite meeting, we just hook up the audio equipment (microphones) from the onsite meeting. If it is for a smaller onsite group, we used a Polycom Communicator device (speaker and microphone) https://www.amazon.com/Polycom-Communicator-C100S-Speakerphone-Skype-Grey/dp/B000GG0EFY — much better than using the mike/speaker from a laptop for this purpose.
A: (Pier Andrea) We did this in several occasions using Adobe Connect. You can see some process overview and quick lessons are in this blog post and after action review (not for circulation). Bottom line: it ain’t easy, besides the technical setup & equipment you need more people to manage the process, and people who understand how both online and f2f facilitation work. Key role is for the persons bridging the two.
A: (Leandra) Skype for Business or Adobe Connect
A: (April: We occasionally do blended events on our Adobe Connect platform. The webinar experience and setup is virtually identical to our webinar only setup, and the in person portion is no different than a live presentation, with a miced speaker at the podium, slides projected behind him or her (which are in turn also projected online). Where the two audiences blend is in the Q&A portion, as we’ll alternate between questions from the room (audience asking directly via a passed mic), and questions online read aloud by the facilitator. It requires additional AV setup to capture the audio properly for the online audience.
A: (Nancy White) The key thing is to have someone in the F2F setting looking out for and including the remote participants. Sometimes I even go so far as to put a paper \cut out of a person in a chair to help those in the room remember that there are others participating. If you do breakouts, consider if you should have a fully remote break out group (plus a connector person in the room), or mix. If mixed, make sure there is a laptop/device for every breakout. For a fabulous case study, seehttps://wenger-trayner.com/resources/practice/what-equipment-do-we-use-at-betreat/
Q: How can we create webinars, which allow for deep interaction? What tools both technical and facilitation wise are available? Any experiences / examples?
A: (Pier Andrea) For me it’s a matter of facilitation more than tool. Sure the tool may limit your options – or present you with opportunities. In my experience more interaction happens when the group is smaller. So what I would do (using Adobe) is the following:
– start with an icebreaker to get people engaged from the beginning
– have short presentations (8/10 mins) followed by Q&A in chat
– throw in some polls every now and there
– have a second round of interactions with the audience allowing them to use voice (so not just chatting) OR
– break folks in breakout rooms – in here, all participants have mic rights by default. There should be a room facilitator, and one participants that volunteer to take note
– notes are then displayed back in the plenary room for debrefing/harvesting with the all participants
A: (Peter) I agree with Pier Andrea, it is a matter of facilitation.. For me, the interactions/questions are key to the success of a webinar: how much the online audience engages, and feels comfortable to engage with the panel. For me, just a chat channel to get questions and feedback is already enough, but make the audience feel comfortable to ask questions!
A: (Leandra) With Skype for Business, I integrate polls into the webinar to make it more interactive
A: (April) Blackboard Collaborate is designed for a more interactive, classroom style experience, where you can do breakout rooms, where smaller groups of participants can be led through an exercise or question together. I think this style works best when you have an audience that shares a base of knowledge or experiences, and/or when the material is something everyone has something to share (as opposed to a highly technical topic, where it may be more geared toward one way delivery of information, and Q&A is interactivity enough.) For example, I presented on a webinar on learning from failure for a knowledge management group, and then we moved into breakout rooms and shared experiences. Each of the main presenters led a breakout room discussion, and then we all came back together to share what came out of it.
Q: Are there any platforms that work better or worse for participants in China?
A: (Peter) I am unfortunately not aware of which webinar tools breaking through the Great Internet Wall of China.
Q: How many different languages do you need to work with at any one online event? Are they written languages?
A: (April) I have never done an online event involving with more than one language. It’s hard to get around the need for a common language for this kind of event.
A: (Peter) There are some tools that allow for simultaneous translation of the speakers’ input, but it is not common.. Most of the webinar tools are confined to the language of the speakers, which is a real pity, and in my view, one of the big potentials for future expansion of features!
Q: What connectivity you use? What about not having wifi? How to overcome this problems?
A: (Kelly) We made it a standard practice to always connect via Ethernet cable since our wifi can be spotty in our company’s building.
A: (Peter) This is a technical IT question. For speakers, their connectivity (and quality of connection) is crucial. The potential bottleneck can be either the wifi, or the actual internet connection from the office to the ISP (service provider). We encourage speakers to connect via an Ethernet cable (as Kelly mentioned) to the LAN, to avoid the bottleneck of wifi used by many other office users. If speakers connect from their homes, we ask them to ensure there are no other family members using the internet/wifi at the moment of the webinar. For our webinars, we always do a test-run with all speakers, prior to the actual webinar, to ensure their connectivity works well (with Bluejeans, we can monitor the quality of their connection remotely). In 50% of the cases, we detect problems during the test run, and debug it before the actual webinar. For us, it is crucial that all technical issues, with the speakers, are debugged BEFORE the webinar, to avoid a speaker dropping off during his/her actual live presentation/webinar. It takes time to test and debug, though. The IT people in your office, are your best friends to give you, as a speaker good connectivity.
For the online audience: there is not much support we can give. When we send the audience the link to the webinar, a few days before the webinar, we send them a link to self-test their connectivity and browser setup, so they can prepare. But it is impossible to provide technical assistance all online subscribers, though..
A: (Leandra) In Mthatha, the University has worked with Vodacom to install towers in the more remote areas. They have also placed routers in the hospitals and residences for the students to be able to connect to the internet.
A: (April) Hard line internet connection is typically most stable. Where a presenter lacks stable wifi, we will ask him or her to dial in on a phone line and we can advance slides for them. Many platforms allow participants to dial in rather than connect via internet for the audio portion, and will have a list of toll-free numbers for various countries of operation (though not all).
Q: How many can join webinar at a time – size of audience effectively handled via webinars?
A: (Kelly) With our Adobe Connect license, we have up to 500 participants able to join. When we first started, it was only 100 but now we regularly have over 100. I know Adobe Connect can be pricey, and I think with the 500 limit it might be more.
A: (Peter) This depends on the webinar tool you use, and the subscription you have to their service. e.g. the default Bluejeans subscription allows for 100 real time participants. If we want more, we need to take another subscription (with a steep price!). The prices go up, by the amount of simultaneous participants you want, for each webinar tool. I have yet to find a webinar tool that allows me to dynamically increase the maximum amount of simultaneous participants, based on individual webinars.. Most services want you to subscribe to a fixed scheme with a fixed amount of online participant.
A: (Pier Andrea) I guess it depends a bit on the scope/purpose of the webinar. Also, there’s a limitation in terms of number of attendees you can have with the various webinar platforms (i.e. you may need to pay more if you want to accommodate a larger audience). In general, if I have an audience of 100+, I’d like to have a larger facilitation team, and a more skilled host/MC – to ensure we stay on track while trying to engage the audience
A: (Leandra) Each of the different webinar tools can accommodate various different sizes of audiences.
A: (April) It depends on the platform and your subscription, but in terms of an optimal number, it depends a bit on the webinar format and audience, and the size of the team putting it on. You need to be able to effectively manage their tech issues, keep on top of the chat, incoming questions etc. We regularly have webinars of 100 people or more for Agrilinks with a team of 3-4 working the webinar – an AV tech, online
A: (Nancy White) This always goes to PURPOSE. If it is more information dissemination, you can scale larger. If you have an effective breakout and harvest strategy, you can go larger. If you need deep interaction, listening and “talking time,” keep it smaller. The knowledge and practices we have about group size OFFLINE are pretty similar online.http://www.fullcirc.com/2012/09/24/chris-corrigan-on-group-size-in-innovation-and-open-design/
Q: What’s the etiquette for subscribing webinar attendees from your general listserver ?
A: (April: We do not subscribe webinar attendees to our mailing list without their explicit permission. We recently have started adding a registration question to get mailing list signups for those who aren’t already on the mailing list.
A: (Peter) We keep a database of people who attended past webinars. We send them an email when a new webinar is coming up, but it is up to them to subscribe or not.
Q: How do you handle different time zones, taking into account internet limitations outside of the office (after work hours)?
A: (Kelly) We typically aim for 8 or 9 AM EST so that it’s not too late for others in different time zones. This, of course, does not really account for people in the US that are in later time zones.
A: (Peter) It is difficult to schedule a webinar to “hit” ALL timezones. We typically schedule our webinar around 13:00 or 14:00 CET (Rome time), which is rather late for Asia and early for the Americas, but a good compromise. Often the timing of webinars is also dictated by the availability of the speakers. So, it depends really on your target public (and their time zones).
A: (Pier Andrea) Well, if you are organizing a webinar for a global audience, there will always be someone that will have to wake up early or work late in the day. Normally, I’d arrange the schedule based on the speakers’ availability/location first, then on the location of the majority of the potential audience.
A: (April) It’s good to be cognizant of your core audience and where they are located, if you have a larger base in one area or another. It’s impossible to find a time that fits working hours everywhere in the world. You can consider switching time zones to accommodate different audiences or if it’s something mission critical like a webinar on internal policy changes, you could hold it a few times in different time zones. Of course, with recordings, people can always listen after the fact at a convenient time.
Q: Are there any of the platforms which is “technically” better in using less bandwidth?
A: (Leandra) Skype for Business is bandwidth friendly
A: (Peter) Each webinar tool is a compromise (does it record, does it allow you to show video or presentations, how many online participants does it allow for, what are the bandwidth requirements…). Before committing to a single webinar tool, you need to try it out. For sure, for speakers, there is a persistent need for excellent connectivity, but different tools require different bandwidth for participants to view the webinar. Some are very demanding on bandwidth, even for participants…
Q: Do you advice to rework/edit the recording of the webinar before putting it online?
A: (Kelly) Before putting it online, I usually watch it and cut out any silences or awkward breaks (i.e. if our internet went down for a minute or two). Not sure if it makes that much of a difference but I think it provides a nicer viewing experience.
A: (Peter) We always “publish” the recording “as is”, within 24 hours after the actual webinar. This is the raw recording. In the 30 webinars we did in the past 3 years, we only had one occasion where a speaker had problems with his connectivity. In that case, we re-recorded his presentation, and inserted that into the recording before we published it. So, in general, we publish the raw recording. For GLF, we are now also editing the recording afterwards (and it takes a while before that is done), with a condensed (10-15 minutes) video and audio (podcast) summary of the webinar.
A: (Pier Andrea) With Adobe, I normally just use the Adobe recording if the audience is just internal. This recording gives you a timeline on the side bar, so you can skip to different moments of the recording (e.g. a question in the chat, a change of presentation, etc). When I need to make a recording completely public, I export the Adobe recording in flash, then do some light editing (top&tail, fade in/fade out). When possible, I also find it useful breaking down the recording is smaller videos (for example, one for each presentation) to make it more digestible. But never underestimate how time consuming it could be to edit videos!
A: (Leandra) I always edit the webinar before adding it to the website. I do this to remove any white noise. Also to tidy up the presentation.
A: (April): See below. Not recommended unless there are egregious issues. It’s good also to look at how many people look at the recordings and other post-event products, and decide accordingly much effort to put into polishing them.
Q: With the recording of the webinar, or even with the live webinar, is it possible to turn off (or edit out) the audio alert when a member of audience joins or leaves? What tool is good for editing white spaces and lenghty pauses in webinar?
A: (Kelly) Yes, you can do both of these things in Adobe Connect. You can also turn off sound notifications in WebEx.
A: (Peter) Most webinar tools allow you to configure the webinar to disable audio alerts when people leave or join. I saw that in our “webinar on webinars”, this was mis-configured (my apologies), where we had continuous audio alerts. Normally, this should not happen.
A: (Leandra) I use Articulate replay
A: (April) Our AV technician will occasionally edit big gaps in a recording using standard video editing software, but I would say it’s not worth the effort to try to smooth out the usual occasional pauses or momentary technical difficulties. People come to expect these momentary issues as part of a webinar. It can be useful to hold off on starting the recording until the moderator is done with the “can you hear me now” type banter and ready to introduce the speakers/topic, however.
Q: What webinar tool have you used and what did you find as the pro/cons of it?
A: (Pier Andrea): As many of the other speakers, I use Adobe Connect. And I love it! Below some pros and cons:
Pros
Link opens in browser
No need to install anything – often if you use a company laptop you’re not allowed to download and run new programs, need to ask IT to fix it, it can be a hurdle that discourages/prevents participation in the webinar
Performs well in different bandwidth settings
Break out rooms
Allow for multiple conversations, eg. group work
More options to participate
More intimate environment – less fear to talk into the black box
Competitive pricing
Easy to use – upload & share content
Export content, meeting recording
Different room layouts – more importance to video, presentation or chat
Solid and simple phone app (OS and Android)
Cons
Mic issues, at time users don’t find it easily to activate. Or flash is disabled by accident and need to be fixed in browser settings.
No shared accounts allowed – one person per account – I always need to be in the room, or share my login details
You need to append some standard text to the event link to force it to open in the browser – otherwise in some instances, the ‘native’ link to join may trigger the download of the Adobe addin, which may not always be possible
No dial in options (or not that I know of)
A (Peter): We tried and tested many webinar tools over the years. Each webinar tool has advantages and limitations, and it is up to you to define which features are more important. It goes from bandwidth requirement, technical features, easy of registration, etc… In the tests we did about 2-3 years ago, Bluejeans came out as a winner. Meanwhile the market evolved, and for GLF, we are now trying Crowdcast (but even that tool has advantages and disadvantages).
A- (Leandra): We used Vidyo for the first webinar and now we are using Skype for Business, I did investigate other webinar tools, but the University wanted me to rather make use the software available at the institution.
Pros: It is easy to use, especially if the presenters are not very computer literate. – If you do not have SFB, the Webb app is easy to install. – As the organizer of the webinar, I am able to control a lot of the backend operations (such as muting microphones, videos etc).
Cons:Polls are not visible when participants use a tablet to view the webinar
A: (Nancy White) See http://www.fullcirc.com/2013/01/07/quick-revisit-of-web-meeting-tools-what-is-your-favorite/ – Old, but helpful on the picking criteria. Tools change quickly. My main preferences are tools that a) allow the organizers to give as much (or little) control to the participants, which includes peer to peer chat (vs “question” tools or chat that only goes to the moderators – see http://www.fullcirc.com/2011/11/16/why-chat-streams-are-critical-to-live-events/ ), tools that allow some visual (especially shared white boards for smaller gatherings and co-creation), IF you use video, display is useful vs distracting (i.e. not fixed and dominating always over everything), and of course, bandwidth suitable/reliable. For example, Skype used to be a solid option for small gatherings with video. That is not true now for the free version and I use Zoom instead.
Additional resources – here are some examples from Kelly, on webinar roles and scripts:
Webinar Roles & Responsibilities
Kelly
Open the webinar room at 8:00 a.m.
Check webinar room set up and ensure presentations are uploaded.
Greet presenters at 8:30 and assist with any troubleshooting
Check in with presenters for any questions and remind them of the flow
Start the webinar recording when the webinar begins
Introduce webinar and role as facilitator
Co-facilitate Q & A
Set up central command room
Move “Who’s Speaking” Slides
John (Logged in as SPRING Project—Use Green Text)
Collect questions in the chat pod during presentation and pastes them into Google doc during the Q & A session
Pastes question and identification into the chat pod as Sarah asks them
Troubleshoot audio as necessary. For canned responses click here.
Monitor chat pod, encourage comments and responds to requests
Introduce new speakers in the chat box (i.e. Sally Abbott is now speaking)
Monitor chat pod, encourage comments and responds to requests
Monitor audio and mute’s speakers when they are not speaking
Sarah
Introduce webinar topic and presenters
Input on script
Introduce webinar topic and presenters
Co-facilitate the Q & A period
Cathy
Live tweet webinar, highlight important questions and quotes.
SPRING Webinar ‘Day Of’ Checklist
Before
Room Set Up
□ Ensure one drop cord and Powerstrip are in the room the day before.
□ Set up and test Ethernet Router on at least two computers
□ Place labeled Ethernet cords designated location for each presenter
Webinar Set Up
□ Import contacts from Webform into Constant Contact, schedule reminder email
□ Log in to the room as “named host” AT LEAST one hour before the webinar begins and open the room 30 minutes before the webinar begins.
□ Phones silenced
□ Open audio bridge for webinar room
□ Run Audio Wizard and test audio
□ Review all layouts and ensure that
□ Polls are Open and set to Broadcast
□ all chat boxes are cleared
□ PowerPoint presentations on all layouts are queued up correctly.
□ Once all layouts are set, lock pods (Pods→Move & Resize Pods- unchecked)
□ Test presenters’ connection and audio. Ensure all presenters at JSI are connected to Ethernet cables and that no presenters or staff are using Google Chrome.
□ Ensure everyone can communicate through presenter-host chat and remind presenters of the flow
□ Welcome people in chat and audio as they join
□ Welcome people via audio every 5 minutes starting 20 minutes before the start time
□ Ensure Record is enabled prior to beginning
During
□ Record Webinar
□ Monitor chat window and presenters’ chat
□ Participate in chat as possible; acknowledge most participants as they enter
□ Monitor email
□ Share resources and links as they are mentioned.
After
□ Conduct After Action Review
□ Thank presenters via email/phone
□ Send Chat text to yourself (→ through the menu of each chat pod)
□ Export polls
□ Check recording to ensure good sound and links work
□ Ensure final materials are saved to the Google Drive
□ Send web content and link to recordings and presentations to KM Officer via Google Docs
Liberating Structures has become central to my practice over the years. I have dabble with using LS online, but the call to do more online is getting stronger, particularly in introducing people to LS and getting immediately to hands on use. I wanted to share some 90 minute “studios” that I have been facilitating in different contexts to introduce LS in the domain context of the participants. In other words, the examples here may be in education, the approach can work with any domain simply by changing the invitations used with the structures. Also, I’ve used the studio approach face to face and it really works well. I’ll write that up another time!
Why 90 minute studios?
First, the term “studio” comes from the UdGAgora, work a team of us, led by Tanis Morgan of JIBC, with the University of Guadalajara on increasing learner engagement. It was structured as a participatory, hands on online and offline learning experience around the idea of a studio where content is only introduced, and the learning is focused on execution or use of the content. (More of our work with UdG here.) A studio also conjures up the space of an artist, and in many ways, the use of Liberating Structures is a form of social artistry. And yes, I like the term.
Second, the experience shared here recaps what we did at the e/Merge AfricaFestival of Learning online event in July, hosted by, among others, the amazing Tony Carr from University of Capetown.
90 minutes is a useful length of time online. It is just on the edge of “too much time” in terms of participant attention, and it is long enough to get an introduction to the content and use 2-3 structures applied to that group’s real domain/needs. Face to face, you can get 3 or even 4 structures in a 90 minute segment, but our experience is that things take longer online due to acclimatization to technology (in our case, Zoom) and the subtleties of converting a process to online.
Multiple 90 minute studios can be scheduled over time. Right now 3 rounds of studios seems to build enough traction for people to begin experimenting with and adopting LS into their practice, but I have not done a rigorous follow up. That would be a wonderful experiment. AND, you can do a stand alone studio – absolutely!
Studio “Strings”
Liberating Structures are often used in a sequence called a “string.” What follows are some different strings for studios, options and my rationale behind each string.
Studio 1 – What is Liberating Structures and Why Should I Care?
Purpose: Provide just enough experience with and information about LS so that participants want to try it and/or learn more. It’s like that yummy food sample in the market that draws you in.
Impromptu Networking in pairs or 1-2-4-All to immediately demonstrate how distribution of power (in this case to everyone in pairs) can change interaction, particularly online where we have been “presented to” to death! Debrief by showing the LS microstructures underneath Impromptu Networking/1-2-4-All and transition into…
Brief introduction to LS (slides and chat) to get the fundamentals visible. (An example here of slides for three studios in the education domain.)
Users Experience Fishbowl to hear from real practitioners in the domain share the good, the bad and the ugly of using LS in their work. What is great about doing this online is you can tap into practitioners anywhere which is super powerful.
15% Solutions to get participants to think about something they can do with what they learned NOW.
Point to resources and, if appropriate, future studio opportunities.
Studio 2: Real Application of Liberating Structures
Purpose: Use LS to do something real in the domain of the participants that gets results in 90 minutes.
In the application studio, we find someone in the organization/group/network domain who has a real need or challenge and we design a string of LS for them to use in addressing that need. The practitioner(s) are in the center and the other participants are essentially watching a coached design session. Note: this session always seems too short, but I hesitate to go to 2 hours!
Something to “lift off from where we left off” from the first studio. A fun way is to get the practitioners to briefly share their challenge, then have the whole group do some creative destruction to make way for innovation with TRIZ .
Next we get to the issues. The team shares their challenge with options like Celebrity Interview using Purpose to Practice and Matchmaker for draft string. I notice that we blur the boundary between structures as we get intensely into design. The other participants are in “watching mode” but also able to contribute via chat. We have everyone NOT on the design team turn off their cameras in this phase.
What, So What, Now What with everyone to debrief, re-point to resources, microstructures, LS values and invite for session #3 as appropriate. Sometimes if we need to close rapidly and lost our debrief time, I close with “Just Three Words” (10 mins)
String 3: Diving Deeper into Liberating Structures
Purpose: Peel back enough layers to reveal the basic structure of LS, some related complexity theory and show that there are many layers of value in using LS.
The intention behind this studio was for people who attended #1 and #2. What often happens is we get new folks, so you need to be attentive to give at least a little context at the front end. The string should be very flexible and often I use the beginning of this studio to find out what people want to try and do, and then wrap the explanation and theory around it.
Reset Context/Liftoff with Impromptu Networking around burning questions, or What, So What, Now What? This can be very rich in pairs or triads. From the results, we choose what structure to do next.
Discuss user groups, the LS Slack, immersion workshops, website, book, app and other resources.
Do an Ecocycle on our LS practices (or other domain related topic) to expose people to one of the richer but (in my opinion) harder to initially grasp LS.
And complete with 15% Solutions to stimulate follow up, action and behavior change. For example, if this was with a team working on learning and diffusion, we would explore the next opportunity they needed to unleash and engage people in the work, and what LS they might try. If we skip Ecocycle, I love doing 15% Solutions and then Troika Consulting to use peer input to deepen and refine an idea.
Implications of LS online
All of the Liberating Structures mentioned above have been successfully and repeatedly done online. We are still experimenting with other LS. They do require the type of break out room capability that Zoom has. The use of video cameras really enhances the process – and sometimes people don’t have cameras, or even microphones, so make sure that is addressed in your preparations. There are certainly some particular tips about doing these structures online, but that will have to wait for a later post!
Resources and Examples
Recordings and artifacts from the e/Merge series on LS for Increasing Online Learning Engagement in July, 2018.
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