We know that face to face events are a great way of bringing people together. Lots of knowledge and experience will get shared at these events. But for many people that attend a face to face event, it stops there. And this was our topic in our latest online chat in the Online Facilitators Community on the Knowledge Hub where we discussed How do you maintain momentum after a face-to-face event?
My quick summary
Watching the discussion and reading a bit between the lines, most face to face events are not built to continue the discussion. They are stand-alone, which for me is a big opportunity to waste.
If you want to create further engagement, build in elements where people can have conversations and work out what activities will continue the discussion online. But the planning of the event is only half of the key to success. A big part that is often overlooked is the facilitation of the event. Are you just going to be the host who keeps it all on time or can you do more? My answer is yes. But you don’t need to do it alone. Get involved, listen to what people are saying, capture those discussions, highlight what others are saying. This can provide ideas and content for months for your community. An opportunity not to be wasted.
The questions we discussed.
A big thank you to Joscelyn, Andy, Dimple, Glyn, Ed, Rhondda, Fiona, Mike and Nigel who shared some amazing insights and thoughts on the topic and I have summarised the responses for each question below.
Q1. Quiet, often the expectation of the people delivering the event and those attending the event are slightly different. If you were looking to design and build an event that was all about continuing the conversation after, how would you go about it?
Q2. What are the typical things that everyone wants to do at a face to face event but you run out of time and how can you use these to continue the conversation?
Q3. What activities can the community support you in creating and rolling out the event?
Q4. With face to face events. There are always those that can attend and those that cannot. This could be down to cost, seniority, location and multiple other factors. What issues could you foresee if your community always has the split of the same attendees and those that could not make it?
How do you maintain momentum after a face-to-face event for your online communities and how have engaged your community to help design and roll out events?