Education
Challenge:
How do you pull your attendees, some hesitant or unwilling, into the content design portion of your event?
Solution:
By having them share their own experiences with their fellow participants.
The attendees of this conference were seasoned professionals and therefore it was vital to provide peer-to-peer learning opportunities for them, as they learned as much, if not more from each other than they learned from the “experts.” In many cases, they were the experts.
For years, this conference had utilized co-creation by inviting attendees to volunteer to lead small group discussions as part of the educational program. This could be anything from sharing best practices and new solutions, to sharing a challenge and inviting others facing that same challenge to brainstorm together to generate innovative solutions.
Year after year, it would be mostly the same attendees who would lead these sessions, and year after year the introverts would sit quietly, preferring not to volunteer.
How did we encourage these introverts to get involved?
By designing the sharing to be visual, rather than just oral presentations.
We created a “museum of ideas” with defined categories, or galleries as we called them, and invited everyone to provide photos, videos, marketing materials or other memorabilia from their organizations as the exhibits.
The physical space was set up as museum galleries with a central area connecting them. Photos were enlarged, printed and hung as “art” on gallery walls. Monitors were set up with videos on loop. Displays were set up with cases or shelves displaying the memorabilia or print materials. Those who provided these “exhibits” also provided a brief, 2 – 3 paragraph description of their offerings which were displayed next to the exhibits.
The galleries were open throughout the conference, and meals and breaks were placed in this area so people could wander around and take in the “exhibits” throughout the event. Session rooms were placed amongst the galleries. We invited some people to provide a brief presentation and conducted these sessions next to their display as part of the conference schedule.
Results:
More attendees participated in contributing to the educational content for that year’s event than ever before. People could take in as many or as few of the displays as they wanted. Just as people experience a museum — by reading every description or by only taking in the visuals — attendees could experience the exhibit-style content the same way.
