VIRTUAL FACILITATION TOOLKIT

1. Meta-level tips

Virtual facilitation requires more effort and thoroughness in the preparation and
follow-up processes than an in-person meeting. On average, you might expect it
to take 2-4 hours to prepare a well-facilitated, 1-hour session. And if you are
planning a long virtual gathering (e.g. one-day long or more), consider splitting it
into separate days to avoid overwhelming your participants and enabling them to
stay fully present.

Non-verbal communication cues and physical tools are not available during
virtual convening, so it is even more important to have very skilled virtual
facilitators who can read the energy of participants through digital means and
know how to keep them engaged and interested.

It is therefore even more important to be very intentional about the atmosphere

you want to create for your participants, as well as the objectives you want to
achieve – both in terms of how the virtual convening ties to your strategy and in
terms of the outcomes for participants.

2. Tips on pedagogy

Your participants have different learning styles so you should diversify your
activities to ensure (as much as possible considering the purpose and topic of
the virtual gathering) you accommodate all learning styles. In our experience, the
PEMS model is a useful tool that recognizes four different ways in which people
relate to the world that influence how they are most likely to engage and learn.
Practical: Doing, taking action testing, prototyping. People with a practical
preference like action and movement and learn best through doing. In a virtual
gathering, formats like open space or world café are suitable for practical
learners.

Emotional: Relating, making friends, getting to know the people around

you. People with an emotional preference feel everything and everyone
and place huge importance on sharing feelings. In a virtual gathering,
check-ins, check-outs and small group bonding activities are suitable for
emotional learners.

Mental: Thinking, discussing, using facts, creating models and systems.

People with a mental preference like to analyze, debate, and discuss – to
the smallest of details. This is the easiest to accommodate in a virtual
gathering and actually most of the time, it is the only learning style taken
into consideration.

Spiritual: Being inspired, seeing the bigger picture, asking “why”. People
with a spiritual preference look for the greater purpose in things and learn
best when they feel a task has significance. In a virtual gathering, take
some time to explain the bigger picture and get buy-in from your
participants (or give them the chance to share their concerns and doubts).
Moreover, as you plan your virtual gathering, we invite you to empathise
with your participants by putting yourself in their shoes. What are their
expectations towards this virtual convening? What is their level of
expertise about the topic? What do they want to learn and what do they
need to experience? What is your learning style and how do you avoid
imposing your learning style on your participants? Here are a few
additional tips offered by the Virtual Communities for Impact Toolkit to help
you cater for different learning styles:

If relevant, use visuals while speaking (for the spatial visual learners).

● Include quick exercises, hands-on examples, and signs that people can
use to show their approval or disapproval (for kinesthetic physical
learners).

● Share pre-readings and written summaries, or invite participants to join

a shared editable document to take notes or add their questions,
comments, and remarks (for linguistic verbal learners).

● Use videos or music to bring a message across or allow for smaller

discussions where participants can digest and repeat the content (for the
auditory-musical aural learners). Finally, consider where participants are
at when they join the virtual gathering: What timezone are they dialling in
from? Would it make sense to host the same call at different times to
ensure everyone can join at a “decent” time rather than at 6:00am in the
 morning or 11:00pm at night? What is their native language and how
confident are they with the chosen language for your virtual gathering?
Where would you like to “land” your participants by the end of the
meeting? If possible (and applicable), you may consider sending out a
quick survey to your participants before the virtual gathering to find out
more about their learning styles. But if this is not possible, it is safe to work
on the assumption that your participants will have different learning styles
and so it is important to vary your approach and activities.

3. Tips on tech

Before discussing all the tips for creating a great agenda for your virtual
convening, let’s address one of the biggest sources of stress for virtual
facilitators: tech! This is partly due to the fact that many elements are out of your
control, but we believe there is still a lot you can do to prevent or mitigate tech
hiccups. As mentioned previously in What is virtual facilitation? at
ChangemakerXchange we use the online meeting platform Zoom. This means
some of our tips below are applicable to Zoom but may not be applicable to other
online meeting platforms. Zoom offers various plans and pricing options so check
out which one is the most suitable for your virtual convening.

Tips for facilitators

● Make sure you have a strong reliable Internet connection and quiet
surroundings.

● Test your tech before the call to make sure your image and sound are
as clear as possible. Remember to check your camera, microphone, and
light. Also, practice using the chosen platform to make sure you know
where everything is: e.g. access the list of participants, open the chat,
change view layout, share screen or present slides, record the session,
form breakout groups, etc. There are a lot of features available on Zoom
so we invite you to spend some time playing around to activate the most
suitable features for your virtual gathering.

Use the chat to share the guidelines for the activities you would like
participants to do (especially before creating the breakout rooms) as well
as sharing key insights, links, resources, etc. You can also use the chat to
send a private message to a participant, checking in with them, offering
support, answering their questions, etc.

● Extra perk: Did you know that Zoom allows you (and your participants
too) to choose a virtual background? It might add an element of
playfulness to your virtual convening. Imagine you have a space-like
background and you’re calling from your sofa! Open your Zoom app >>
Settings >> Virtual Background.
Tips for participants

● Ask participants to download the application before (or any relevant

plugins) and test their tech before the call.

● Ask participants to rename themselves by clicking on the “Participants”

tab and then on their name (you might ask them to also add the
city/country they are calling from). It’s important their names are visible to
everyone, especially to you so you know who’s in the room!

● Ask participants to please keep their microphones on mute unless they

are speaking. This is obvious, but there are always a few who don’t mute it
and it creates a distracting background noise for everyone. If necessary,
proceed and mute the participants yourself (though bear in mind they
might not be able to unmute themselves afterwards as you need to do it
for them). You may also want to consider “muting” participants when they
join the call (log into your Zoom account >> Settings >> “Mute participants
upon entry”).

● Ask participants to occasionally look into the camera to create the

feeling of being seen and directly spoken to.

● However, ask participants who don’t have a strong reliable Internet

connection to turn their videos off as this increases the speed and quality
of the connection. We know it’s nice to see everyone’s faces, but it’s most
important you can hear them and they can hear you.

● Invite your participants to switch their view layout between speaker’s

only and full group to see all the other participants in the call (top right
corner).

● Ask participants to use hand gestures to react even while they are on
mute, which are especially recommended in large groups. For instance:

○ Thumbs up for “I agree”,

○ Thumbs down for “I disagree”,

○ Raising one hand for “I would like to ask or say something”, and

○ Raising and moving both hands for “I resonate with what

someone has just said”.

○ Use the chat to encourage participants to write their questions or

comments in the chat, as well as engage with each other via the
private messaging function.
4. Tips on time, participants, energy, and attention management

Some of the tips included below have been inspired by the Virtual Communities
for Impact Toolkit.

Time and participants’ management

● Before your virtual gathering, identify points in the agenda that could be
shortened if you are running behind schedule. It is important that you do
not put time pressure on your participants.

● Always start and finish on time. Extra brownie points if you finish a
couple of minutes early; participants always appreciate that!

● Be clear with your participants on whether this is a drop-in / drop-off call

or whether it is mandatory that they join from the beginning to the end. If
it’s the latter, consider a contingency plan for those who join late.

● Be kind but strict with the group. For instance, if a participant is taking
too much space, thank them for their input and remind them and the group
about the principles you set at the beginning, and then invite others to
share. Alternatively, you might communicate a specific time limit per
comment, e.g. 1 minute max., which makes “interrupting” people who take
too much space easier as you can refer to the time rule.

● Use your time wisely. For instance, if you are speaking in front of the
whole group, try to keep your presentation no longer than 10-15 minutes
at one time as participants’ concentration starts to fade after this. On the
other hand, if you divide participants in breakout rooms, give them at least
15-20 minutes; less than this and they either some people won’t have the
chance to speak or their conversation will stay at a superficial level, not
reaching the depth you are looking for. This is very important because it’s
easy to run over time with your presentation and then decide to cut their
breakout room time – please resist the urge too!

Energy and attention management

As we explored in the Facilitation basics, you are responsible for the participants’
overall energy during the virtual gathering. This means you should first and
foremost check on your own energy levels because if you are feeling drained or
exhausted, it is more likely that you will struggle to sustain the energy level of
your group. Moreover, you must also learn to read the energy level of your
participants, which can be difficult if they don’t have their cameras on, are multi-
tasking during the call, or checking their phones. We know it can be frustrating so
here are a few tips to help you retain participants’ attention and engage them.

● How big is your group? The size of your group will impact participants’
level of engagement. Usually, small groups allow for more participation, as
 long as you foster trust so participants feel safe to expose themselves to
the group.

● How often do you engage the group? We already mentioned not to

speak for more than 15-20 minutes at one time but even when presenting,
try to engage your participants every few minutes.

● Do you listen to the group? When you are not speaking, do you really
listen to your participants or do you pretend to listen while you prepare the
next activity? Active listening is key for all facilitators. It’s always a good
idea to refresh your active listening skills, so here is an activity for you to
practice. Now, despite your best attempts, some participants will get
distracted and disengaged. Remember not to take it personally – it
happens to all of us that we get distracted so be kind to your participants
and provide them with ways to bring their attention back to the group. It’s a
bit like mindfulness meditation: our mind wanders off but instead of
judging ourselves because we got distracted, we acknowledge the
distraction and gently bring our awareness back to whatever we were
focusing on. How can you get a sense of whether your participants are not
engaged? Here are the most common signs:

● They turn off their videos (unless they do so because their Internet
connection is not stable).

● They have a somewhat fixed stare or gaze, meaning they are probably
responding to an email or doing something else (we all do that at times
and we know that despite our best efforts to hide it, it’s impossible to!).

●You ask a question and no one responds (unless the way you formulated
the question is confusing so always make sure to be clear in your
delivery!).

● You only get a few responses to a poll question. If you sense that not
just one or two participants are disengaged, but that the whole energy of
the group is dropping, adopt one of the following coping strategies :

Ask participants to stand up and stretch their bodies quickly. Give them a short
break to get a drink or snack (or just some fresh air). Change up your delivery
methods if you notice you’re giving them too much input and not enough time to
process, digest, and feedback on the content. Add more breakout conversations
to get people to talk to each other in smaller, more intimate groups. Check with
your participants on how they would like to use the remaining meeting time to
make sure it’s valuable for everyone. Don’t be afraid of cutting the meeting short
if there’s no energy for it!
5. Tips on roles

We find it helpful to have five main roles when it comes to hosting a virtual
gathering. Please note this doesn’t mean you need five different people – one
person can fill more than one role!

● Main facilitator: This person is in charge of the overall flow of the event and
the facilitation of its activities, as well as welcoming participants, setting
the frame, handing over to their co-facilitators, wrapping up the call,
clarifying the next steps, etc. When they are not facilitating, the facilitator
can also share their insights and observations to help participants work
through a collective process more easily.

● Co-facilitator: This person (or people) facilitates specific parts of the agenda
and they will be welcomed and given the word by the main facilitator. The
main facilitator should brief them carefully and request from them any
slides they wish to use, so they can share them with the tech support host
and make sure everything is in place. When they are not facilitating, the
co-facilitator can also share their insights and observations to help
participants work through a collective process more easily.

●Tech support host: This person is responsible for the meeting’s technical
elements, including breakout rooms, polls, slides, etc. They will also take care of
answering incoming questions in the chat, as well as checking in with participants
via the private chat function to provide one-on-one support without distracting
other participants.

● Energy keeper: This person pays special attention to the mood of the group
and their energy levels. This role can be filled by a participant as well and they
are tasked with noticing when the energy drops and an intervention may be
required, e.g. “I notice our energy has dropped and I wonder if we need a quick
energizer or break...”

● Harvester: This person documents the essential insights and decisions that
emerge from the group process. They make sure to capture learning and insights
in a meaningful way so that it can be shared with participants during the call (e.g.
to recap the process made so far), as well as distributed after the call.

6. Tips on the agenda

6.1. Check-in

It is good practice to start your call by welcoming your participants and doing a
quick check-in to allow participants to “arrive” into the meeting and be fully
present with each other. The same way as you leave your baggage on the side
when you check-in at an airport or hotel so that you may enjoy your trip or stay,
check-ins serve the purpose of allowing participants to distinguish between
mutual space and personal space and decide what heavy luggage they want to
leave behind. Your check-in will vary depending on the size of the group and the
time allocated for it (some online huddles have the sole purpose of allowing
participants to check-in, in which case the entire call is dedicated to just that!).

Here are a few suggestions for different types of check-ins:

1. Medium or large groups: If you have a medium or large group (say 10+
people) and a relatively small amount of time for your check-in (say 10
minutes), the best way to conduct your check-in is by asking a question to
your participants and inviting them to use the chat feature to answer. For
instance, you may ask them to type in the chat an emoji that describes
their mood in that moment, what word describes how they are entering the
call, or what is their internal weather forecast. As participants type their
answers, you can read them out loud to make sure they feel
acknowledged.

2. Small groups: If you have a small group (say fewer than 10 people) and a
relatively small amount of time for your check-in (say 10-15 minutes), you
can ensure a bit more interaction with and engagement from your
participants. For instance, you can ask them a question and invite them to
(briefly!) share their answer one by one, either popcorn style (this takes
longer though) or by nominating the person who will speak after them.
Here are a few sample questions: What is alive for you as you come to
this session? Why is it important for you to be here today? If you were a
weather system, what would be your report? If you were a color, what
color would you be and why? What are your expectations towards this
session? One-breath check-in (i.e. only speak for the duration of one
breath).

3. EQ check-in: This is a check-in around emotional intelligence and it can

work both for small, medium, and large groups and it can be adapted for
quick check-ins or expanded for longer check-ins.

4. Short meditations: Another way to help your participants feel more

grounded into the call is to guide them through short mindfulness
meditations or visualizations. Below are a few suggestions for you to try
out, but make sure you are comfortable leading this type of activity (also
make sure you speak with a relatively soft and gentle tone and that there
is minimal background noise in your surrounding otherwise you risk
distracting your participants).

a. 4-7-8 breathing technique

b. Body scan meditation

c. Color-breathing meditation
 d. Heart-breathing meditation

e. Mindful check-in

f. Morning intention setting

g. Simple breathing exercise

6.2. Framing

After the check-in, we suggest you give a clear framing for the virtual convening.
Below are a few topics you may wish to cover in your framing:

● Overall flow and agenda (what is going to happen?).

● Clear objectives and outcomes (why are we gathered?).

● Ways in which they can contribute (how can you contribute?).

● Functionalities and principles of the virtual space (how do we run our

event smoothly?) – see section 3 Tips on tech. Remember that for some
people, this might be the first time they attend a virtual meeting and use
that particular online meeting platform so it’s important to give them a
quick tour around the space.

● Get their permission to record the session (if applicable). We then

suggest you begin your meeting with a short breakout session that allows
participants to connect in small groups of 2-4 people by introducing
themselves and answering a general question such as: Why are you
here? Why are you really here? Why is this topic relevant for you? This is
unless you’ve already dedicated some time for small group interactions
during the check-in.

6.3. During the gathering

We already covered many tips in earlier sections, but the most important
reminder is to engage your participants regularly and in different ways. Below are
a few suggestions:

● Keep your presentation time to an absolute minimum.

● Use breakout rooms as much as possible (and as much as appropriate

given the topic of your virtual gathering).

● Invite participants to use the chat feature to ask questions, make

comments, share concerns, etc. and engage with other participants via
the private messaging function.
 ● When inviting your participants to share in a large group or plenary
session, use a mix of popcorn style (spontaneous contributions) and
choosing specific people who might not otherwise volunteer.

● If the energy is low, do a quick energizer – for example, ask people to

stand up and take a stretch or give them a short breather to get some
fresh air.

6.4. Breakout rooms

Breakout rooms are a great feature to split your group into smaller subgroups
and allow them to have a more intimate time to bond deeper , have meaningful
conversation, learn from each other, and brainstorm creatively. Here are a few
tips:

The ideal time is 15-20 minutes – anything less than that is pointless whereas
more than 20 minutes is possible but should be facilitated.

● If possible, assign one facilitator per breakout group (who are briefed
prior to the call on the guiding questions). If it’s not possible, ask the group
to choose a volunteer who will then report back the main takeaways from
their conversation (based on the task).

● Keep it simple – be clear in your guidelines but don’t provide more than
2-3 guiding questions.

● Trust the group to be able to self-manage and make the most of the
breakout room.

6.5. Polls

Pools are a great way to get an immediate pulse of the group on something you
are discussing, exploring, sharing, especially for large groups. If you choose to
conduct a poll, remember to:

● Use a simple provider, e.g. Google Forms.

● Keep the poll anonymous to avoid any GDPR implications.

● Prepare them in advance!

6.6. Wrapping up

Returning to our baggage analogy (cf. section Check-in), it is good practice to

host a quick check-out to allow participants to add something new or relevant to
their bags, so they go away feeling more enriched. We always recommend doing
a check-out, but this is especially crucial for virtual gatherings that last 1.5 hours
or longer or that involve the sharing of important information. Your check-out will
vary depending on the size of the group and the time allocated for it.

Here are a few suggestions for different types of check-outs:

● Medium or large groups: If you have a medium or large group (say 10+
people) and a relatively small amount of time for your check-outs (say 10
minutes), the best way to conduct your check-in is by asking a question to
your participants and inviting them to use the chat feature to answer. For
instance, you may ask them to type in the chat what the biggest takeaway
from the session is, what they enjoyed about the activities conducted,
what will be their next step...

● Small groups: If you have a small group (say fewer than 10 people) and
a relatively small amount of time for your check-out (say 10-15 minutes),
you can ensure a bit more interaction with and engagement from your
participants. For instance, you can ask them a question and invite them to
(briefly!) share their answer one by one, either popcorn style (this takes
longer though) or by nominating the person who will speak after them.
Here are a few sample questions: How are you leaving this day /
session? What landed for you that you take away with you? If you were a
weather system, what would be your report now after the meeting? If you
were a color, would it be different from the one mentioned in the check-in
and why? One-breath check-out (i.e. only speak for the duration of one
breath).

After the check-out, briefly bring the virtual gathering to a close by summarizing
the main takeaways, actions, and follow-up steps and by thanking your
participants for joining you. Make sure you recognize your participants and their
efforts by showing appreciation for their time, energy, and contribution to the
virtual convening.

7. Tips on accessibility

You may have participants with different disabilities so it is important you do your
best to create a safe space for them to be fully included in your virtual gathering.

● Physical disability: No particular concerns, but if you decide to do an

energizer that requires movement (e.g. stretching), choose simple moves
that can be performed sitting (e.g. neck, shoulders, arms, hands
stretches).

● Blind or partially sighted: Ask everyone who speaks to always introduce

their name before speaking so it is easier for the participant with a visual
impairment to recognize who is speaking. If possible, avoid using slides,
or if using them, make sure to describe carefully what’s on the slide (so
instead of saying, “As you can see from the graph in the slide...” say, “This
slide shows a graph that describes XYZ...”). Also, minimize the non-verbal
 guidelines you require participants to follow (e.g. hand gestures) as it will
be difficult for your participant with a visual impairment to know what is
going on. Finally, if possible, provide the participant with the main talking
points of the virtual gathering before the event so they can use a voice-
reader to prepare themselves ahead of the call.

● Deaf or partially hearing: Provide the participant with the main talking
points and as much of a script as possible (at least for your presentation)
before the event so they can read it and prepare themselves ahead of the
call. During the call, you can nominate a person (e.g. your co-facilitator or
tech support host) to be in charge of the closed caption writing. You can
activate this feature on Zoom. Unfortunately, Zoom does not allow for
automatic captions but if you don’t need breakout rooms, you may
consider using Google Hangouts Meet because this platform does have
automatic closed captions available. It’s not 100% perfect, but it’s pretty
good!

● Learning disability: No particular concerns but make sure you give clear
guidelines (you might repeat them as well) and to give enough time for
people to reflect without feeling rushed or put on the spot. You can also
give examples of possible responses to your prompt.

Autism Spectrum Disorder: People with A.S.D. might struggle with abstract,
metaphoric prompts so opt instead of more direct questions or use visual
materials as prompts (e.g. slides with images).

SOURCE:https://fellowship-europe.ashoka.org/sites/fellowship-
europe/files/atoms/files/ChangemakerXchange%20Virtual%20facilitation%20Tips
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