I'm facilitating quite a few corporate workshops every year and the stakes are getting higher and higher. So I'm wondering if anyone can share some good tips to facilitating a great workshop? As a workshop participant please also share what in a workshop you really like and what you dislike?
Can you share tips and tricks for running a corporate workshop?
Answers
Anders,
Can you help with information about:
1. Purpose/agenda, e.g. is this a strategy review OR a
2. Likely participants, e.g. execs, mid/senior level staff, front line (sales, customer service, shop floor)-numbers, all on site/any remote, domestic or multi-country)?
3. Duration: is it one workshop or a series?
I run workshops with clients for a living, happy to chat offline if you wish. Let me know.
Regards
Anders, it is all about the content and the facilitator. I have moderated well over 50 seminars for CFOs. You need to have content that is relevant and will help all that attend be better at their jobs. Also, an interactive environment is critical. The facilitator is key. It is not easy to create an interactive experience for CFOs. Talk to two of the best and get tips: John Kogan ,CEO, Proformative and Nick Araco, CEO, The
What ever the topic, you'll want the workshop to be engaging. Interactive does not equal engagement.
You want to engage with 90% of your audience. Make the workshop if at all possible fun. Add humor. Add distractions that make people focus because something has changed.
Nothing is worse that a boring (albeit informative) workshop, the loss ratio is too high.
The next one I am running is in November for
We have 2 days and the workshops will run for 2 hours at a time. Then we have various presentations surrounding the workshops.
Corporate workshops are great to be a part of because of the varied content that participants can learn. Congratulations on being asked to present several times in the past and coming up.
While I haven't benefited from a corporate workshop while at my employer, I have presented for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Tennessee at their annual All-Staff Retreat last year and earlier this year.
Something that helped me when I presented to them was to implement their purpose, vision, and other goals into my presentation to show them why what they do matters.
Do the folks you're presenting to in November have specific goals or visions they're aspiring to? If so, I'd say through them into the presentation. If they don't know the company's ultimate goal, and what part they play, then hopefully by the time you're finished they will know the goal and how to use what you present to achieve it.
I allowed for peer-to-peer discussion, even asking if others agree or disagree. I may have been the presenter/facilitator, but I realized I didn't have all the answers. Doing this helped me learn from them, as well as them learning from each other.
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Human Capital