The Virtual Gathering Experience
By Debbe Kennedy
A learning solution for putting our differences to work.
Social media continues to transform the way we communicate with one another, and I admit that I’m hooked. Are you?
Blogging, YouTube, virtual classrooms and meetings places, as well as platforms like Facebook, MySpace, and Xing have caught the attention of even the most resistant. In a groundbreaking cross-industry global study conducted last year by Melcrum (“How to Use Social Media to Engage Employees”), it was estimated that by this time, almost 60 percent of organizations would likely have some sort of social media program in place.
What is exciting about this Web 2.0 evolution is that there is an energy that comes with this new sense of freedom and connection—and companies are rapidly and wildly opening up new possibilities for collaboration we never imagined.
Technology helps put our differences to work
There is no doubt that technology is breaking down barriers in not only how we connect with others across time, culture, difference, and distance, but also it is presenting a new range of opportunities for learning, development, mentoring, and knowledge transfer that go way beyond what we’ve mastered so far. And it’s a good thing, because organizations and individuals all over the world are discovering that this new level of direct collaboration—this unprecedented growing capability for putting our differences to work—is the most powerful accelerator for generating new ideas, creating innovative solutions, executing organizational strategies, and engaging everyone in the process.
It seems important to clarify what is meant by “putting our differences to work.” It’s easy to rattle off an obvious answer like: “Putting our differences to work means creating an environment where people, naturally unique and different—diverse by nature and experience—can work more effectively in ways that drive new levels of creativity, innovation, problem solving, leadership,
and performance in the marketplaces, workplaces, and communities of the world.”
But what’s missing in such a definition is how limiting these words are; how ambiguous they are depending on your own differences and experience, as well as how absent the human element seems to be. Definitions are only words until we breathe life into them by our actions and example. Let me paint a more vivid picture.
Putting our differences to work at every level within an organization requires a new kind of intention from everybody. It means consciously recognizing one undeniable fact: People are the number one source of new thinking and new ideas needed for change and the betterment of business and society.
Opportunity is knocking
These new revelations present some compelling reasons to approach training and development with a “beginner’s mind.” Maybe even being willing to let go of some ingrained rules and methods that may not be producing the results we need in a business environment with conflicting realities, scarce resources, and continuous churn and uncertainty.
This shift also opens the door of opportunity for training and development organizations to be at the forefront of leading change. We need to ask ourselves new questions about how we can leverage technology—and our know-how—to creatively respond to what the organizations need most: an engaged, capable, adaptable, and willing workforce that is skilled at working across cultures and equipped to deliver new levels of leadership, innovation, and high performance in the global workplace and marketplace.
This need for change is also reflected in a new landscape for leadership that reaches way beyond hierarchy of the past. Although the top-down organization chart is still alive and well, the new business realities and new freedoms in a distributed workplace demand that everyone needs to learn to be a leader in their own span of influence at every level. Increasingly leadership today is as local as the individual sitting at a desk and as global as time, distance, and technology can take us.
The very nature of these undeniable changes in our work requires a fast, flexible, adaptable, and reliable means of “leadership mastery” by perpetual practice. No one has it all figured out yet, but the ever-increasing stream of new innovations using Web 2.0 and social media have great promise and continue to dare us to try the new and different. This new landscape for leaders is challenging training and development organizations to take a closer look, not just at latest and greatest enabling technologies, but also at the power of “virtual gathering experience” itself as a resource to deliver results.
Imagine what might be delivered at breakneck speed, if we did a little innovative rework on what we’ve mastered in leading, managing and facilitating in virtual and physical classrooms. We could transform login, click here, download, and mute your phone into an interactive, engaging laboratory for learning and practice.
There is a mounting body of practical evidence that is proving that the virtual gathering experience, when it is rich with dialogue and open exchange of ideas, is a vital, ongoing, low cost classroom for leadership, professional, and personal training and development for the new breed of leaders we badly need at every level in organizations—big and small. It comes with a built-in faculty, low overhead, and with a little thought, can almost run by itself, because we humans love to share our knowledge and explore ideas if given half a chance.
A personal story
This notion of the “informal virtual gathering” isn’t something I’ve read about or studied in the distance. Let me share a recent story of the outcome of a one-hour informal virtual gathering at the Greater IBM Connection, which is a professional business and social networking community for past and present IBM employees.
From the first time I heard about the Greater IBM Connection, I knew it was destined to become something far more than most of us could imagine. I serve as a moderator and contributing blogger. One of the ways that we engage the global community is through themed informal virtual gatherings with a focus on learning. Last year, I had an opportunity to develop and co-host my first one of these gatherings. It became amazing example of the results of putting our differences to work.
I teamed with a young, forward-thinking systems engineer from IBM India. I live in San Francisco and have owned my own businesses for more than 15 years, since leaving a rewarding leadership career with IBM. We didn’t know one another, but we were excited by the possibilities and knew we made great duo: a current IBMer with a former IBMer coming together across the world to create a meaningful gathering and learning experience for others—all virtually.
The topic was “All About Blogging.” Our mission was to share knowledge, introduce the Greater IBM Blog, engage others, and recruit new bloggers. We had no idea what would happen or if anyone would even show-up. The event was planned for one hour with a planned virtual “coffee break” following. We were warned that people might come in and out during the session, perhaps leave early, or even automatically press that infamous mute button and check-out from participating. This didn’t stop our passions. If anything, it made us collaborate more and test and try everything before its debut. We went for great slides to help engage the audience visually and developed a fast-moving, inactive agenda, hoping our good intentions payoff.
Here’s what happened:
- Forty-four people from eleven countries, representing every region of the world showed up; it was a diverse group in every respect.
- Everyone was actively participating in less than five minutes; they made an instant connection by first annotating a world map to show where they were in the world; through a poll and open mic, participants told us the primary reason for coming was because they recognize that blogging is changing how we communicate across the work in business and society, which established common ground.
- The agenda had fast-moving variety, which included reviewing IBM’s blogging guidelines; conducting a mini-panel with three seasoned Greater IBM bloggers who shared how they got started, why they blog, what blog about (an IBM Distinguished Engineer from the UK, a former IBMer turned filmmaker, and an IBM senior leader turned blogger each shared their stories in 3-5 minutes each and took a few questions); introducing the Greater IBM Blog with a brief tutorial of ways to participate, including how to comment and sign-up to be a contributing blogger.
- A fast-cycle “reflections” section let everyone could share what they gained from attending; we used open mic and a whiteboard for those who wanted to draw and write.
- We closed with an invitation to stay for a “virtual break” to continue the conversation; thirty-four stayed for an additional forty-five minutes. They talked, wrote down ideas and shared links on the “virtual café table cloth.”
- Eight new contributing bloggers were recruited.
Virtual gathering—and our role in it
Not so long ago, I heard a highly respected organizational development consultant make an assessment at a conference based on witnessing virtual and e-learning failures: “We’ve got to spend more time ‘knee to knee’ in dialogue.”
In reflection, this proclamation was actually providential, if we are open to see it in light of a paradigm shift in what “being knee to knee” in dialogue means. What pioneering training and development organizations have done with e-learning and virtual classroom is instrumental in making it possible for us to be at the forefront of shaping the future. We have the opportunity to apply our knowledge and know-how in new ways that result in to developing the leaders at all levels that are prepared to lead and collaborate across a wide spectrum of differences, wherever time and technology take them.
Everything we’ve learned helps us also recognize we’ve only just begun to understand the potential power that resides within the virtual gathering experience. With our unique styles and creativity, each of us has an opportunity to shape the future of training and development and it is clear that technology will play an increasing role in it. Futurist Joel A. Barker points out the importance of such a call-to-action and what is at stake: “You can and should shape your own future, because if you don’t someone else surely will.”
Informal Virtual Gatherings: Key Points To Pass Along...
Co-hosts that are diverse “characters” adds interest (men, women; voices that are different; perspectives that are unique). It also provides an opportunity to role model the qualities of collaboration you want to instill in others.
A great slideshow, used as a visual backdrop, adds interest, as well as illustrates that you put your heart into creating the environment.
As a dialogue leader(s) a minute-by-minute timed agenda is helpful, but allow participants to experience the virtual gathering moving effortlessly along in a natural flow, weaving in opportunities that encourage conversation from the whole group; ending right on time; use an agenda without times to guide the process.
Before ending, help everyone see how much they accomplished together in a short time by summarizing key facts: “In the last hour, we accomplished a great deal.” Summarize key points to draw the more formal dialogue to a close, imprinting what happened.
Ending with “reflections” from everyone on what they gained from the experience, helps everyone see its value in a broader way by hearing what others saw in it; it imprints the positive.
The “virtual break” as we’ve learned in physical space, invites networking and an opportunity to continue the conversation.
People like to learn what others are doing; ask questions; share knowledge; mentor; and be together; the just need the environment and opportunity to do it.
Debbe Kennedy is founder, president, and CEO of the Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies, and the author of Putting Our Differences to Work: The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, High Performance, Berrett-Koehler, 2008. Contact her or join in her monthly virtual dialogues at www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com.