Running an Online Workshop with 30 People


Userlevel 2

Hi everyone,

I will be running my first-ever 20-30 people workshop on Miro and I would love to hear any advice you guys could give me! I’m lowkey worried that it would be laggy, but I don’t know - I’ve only tried working on it with 10 people at once so far (this morning) and that worked fine. But other than that- does anyone have any tips to share?

So far, I’ve thought of (and prepared) the following:

  • Separate “Google Hangout” meeting links to allow for different groups (there are 2-4) to split the discussions, so that they can be free to talk amongst themselves. (Me as the floating facilitator, I’ll jump from one “call” to another to provide help where necessary.
  • Provided working templates separated into 5 sections for each of the groups (i.e. Information Download, Idea Brainstorming Area, Affinity Mapping Area, Voting, and Idea Conceptualization Area) along with instructions & examples positioned at the start of each section.
  • Adding “individual workspaces” with pre-made set of post-its for individual participants to use
  • Adding color-coded “dot voting stickers” for individual participants to use
  • Adding “start” and “finish” tags, as well as numbering these sections for easier navigation

...Is there anything I might have overlooked?

Nervous, but excited! Will definitely share my learnings here too in case that’ll be useful for anyone else.

Thanks you!

Regads, Sasha


12 replies

Userlevel 7
Badge +5

Hey @Sasha, I hope our workshop experts will chime in as well :wink:


For now, I can suggest you looking through our own guide on remote workshops in Miro, it is here. And also remote facilitation best practices here. Hope that helps a bit!

 

And no worries, everything will be just fine :hugging:

Userlevel 3
Badge +1

Hi @Sasha,

Everything you’ve prepared so far sounds great! A few pointers that might come in handy:

  • If possible, I would recommend using Zoom’s breakout room feature to split people up in multiple conversational groups. It gives you a lot of control over timing, broadcasting a message to all groups and hopping in and out of sessions. More here: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/206476093-Getting-Started-with-Breakout-Rooms
  • The fact that you created individual work areas + instructions is awesome! I would also try to appoint a “lead” for each group. 
  • Make sure collect feedback from the participants after the session. This will help you understand what you can improve as a facilitator. 

That’s it. I think you’re going to rock this session! Let us know how it goes ;)

Userlevel 2

@Marina thank you for the links! Have been checking them out hehe

@razburciu ah yes, thank you for the advice!

  • I didn’t use the Zoom feature on Miro, but did try the Zoom desktop app. Had to move out of Zoom though, because apparently even with one of us having access to the paid version of Zoom - turns out the rooms can’t function if the room creator is online using another link… So then we went back to Google Hangouts instead and that worked fine (except for the cases where I had to be invited in, which was weird cos I was the one who made the links).
  • And noted regarding the feedback! I’m glad to tell you that we did have a debrief and I’ll be writing up a guide for future remote workshops :)

Hey @Sasha Im looking forward to reading that guide :grinning:

Thanks @Sasha @Marina @razburciu - this was a really useful thread. 

Userlevel 3

Hey @sasha! 

 

You can join our webinar tomorrow if you’re interested. https://go.miro.com/webinar-remote-meetings-and-workshops-in-miro-one

Userlevel 2

Hey @sasha! 

 

You can join our webinar tomorrow if you’re interested. https://go.miro.com/webinar-remote-meetings-and-workshops-in-miro-one

omg! I just saw this, my bad. Would love to join the next one (if there will be one!)

Userlevel 2

Hey @Sasha Im looking forward to reading that guide :grinning:

Haha omg it completely slipped my mind to share it. Here’s a draft I wrote up: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1rUZ1hRUNgLMI_fwFylrM9KJ2ea0LGJvOREM1WEcRfW0 . Been tryna figure out how to best “lay out” the information, which is why it took a while for me to share it… But let me know what you (or anyone else who’s reading this) think! And do feel free to add comments to it if anything needs elaboration/clarification.

 

Hopefully it can be a working doc that can be improved over time x)

 

@everyoneworkingatmiro omg I love miro I keep talking about it to my colleagues as if I’m it’s PR gal :joy: I think I’m inching closer to becoming a digital nomad in the midst of all this wfh from covid. Thank you so much for such a great product #remoteworkshops4ever

Userlevel 7
Badge +5

Thank you, @Sasha :hugging:  I’ve shared your feedback with the team!

Also, thanks for sharing this guide. It should be interesting to our Product Team as well; they always look for new ways to enhance the workshop solution in Miro - this is a great resource!

@Sasha Thanks for sharing this. I am new to miro and planning a series of workshops with 10 odd participants in each.  I have a question about “dot voting stickers” you mention.  Is this a feature of miro?  How did you implement it?  Would appreciate if you can share.

Thanks

Shubu

Userlevel 7
Badge +6

@Shubu -

The below image shows how to get to the dot voting template:

The idea is simple - each collaborator gets a fixed number of dots to apply to one or multiple items being voted upon. The items garnering the most dots are the ones considered the highest priority by the group.

Kiron

@Kiron Bondale - Thanks a lot!  Perfectly fits what I am trying to do.

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