Can’t wait to be back in the room with others at conferences and training events? Or are you hoping the professional events that have been moved online in the past 18 months will continue online?

Currently, due to the uncertainty of the pandemic, event organisers are having to make the difficult call whether to risk planning conferences and workshops ‘in real life’ (IRL). Some are experimenting with blended IRL/ online events – I’ve just been involved in one of these so more on than later.

But even when the pandemic is over, I doubt we will ever go back to all professional events and courses happening online. 

Online events are often quicker and easier to organise and more accessible. The financial, time and environment costs are usually lower. So why would we consider going back to IRL courses, when can we justify the cost and when will IRL formats better achieve our objectives?

Safety questions aside, I’ve been having lots of conversations recently with clients and fellow facilitators about when it’s best to work together IRL and when online is a better option.

Below I’ve jotted down a few suggestions about what works well online and what I’ve found works better IRL:

When would you ideally do things f2f?

• Early in relationships or projects. If there are new members of a team then the informal opportunities afforded by IRL can support the ‘getting to know you’ stage.

• Peer-learning and networking: when making new or deepening existing connections is important then the informal spaces of IRL events are hard to recreate online. 

• Sensitive or personal topics: training sessions which involve developing self-awareness or sharing of personal stories. When participants need to feel high levels of trust in the group and psychological safety then IRL spaces can be more productive.

• ‘Tricky’ situations: if participants might not be very enthusiastic (ie mandatory training) or have reservations about the event. Being physically in the room together enables trainers/ facilitators to better observe body language as well as affording opportunities for more informal 1-2-1 engagement.

When can online work particularly well?

• Shorter courses: the ‘cost’ of travelling to a half-day session makes less sense than travelling to longer sessions. Content which can be delivered in 2-3 hours works really well online, assuming it is well designed.

• Regular sessions: if a group already works regularly together then it can be easy to work well online. A board of Trustees might consider having its annual strategy awayday IRL but its regular quarterly meetings online, for example. 

• Geographically diverse teams/ groups: online sessions have made bringing together teams and ad hoc groups for conversations easy. In the past few months I’ve facilitated a number of events with international participants which would never have been possible IRL. 

• Highly structured peer-learning, e.g. Action Learning sets, existing networks. My own long-standing AL set moved seamlessly online in March 2020. Many other AL sets had worked online long before CV19. Working online can keep the time and financial cost of participation low: often the biggest barriers to participation in the past.

• Technical content – some content lends itself better to online delivery than other topics. Technical information, theories, case studies can all work well online. 

It’s not black and white. Lots of sessions can work well in either format, but there are definitely some things which are easier to do IRL and others which seem to work equally well if not better online.

These are just my observations – I’d love to hear other perspectives so do get in touch to share your own views and experiences…