After nearly 3 years, are you exhausted by arguments about the relative virtues of physical, virtual or hybrid events? I certainly am, so I’ll summarise briefly:
The much longed-for reintroduction of physical, in the room events, is slower than many of us wanted. The reasons? Virtual is cheaper, more convenient and usually better for the environment, which is why it’s still winning out over the in-person alternative.
When physical events happen, they must be more precious, emotional and worthwhile. A recent large study in Nature this May concluded that virtual collaboration may actually hinder innovation.
The message is clear: if your event is mainly about information-sharing and updating people, then you might as well do it online. But if the aim is to create something new, to capture hearts and minds, then in- person is naturally your better option. Hybrids, in my experience, tend to fall between these two stools.
Putting the Live ‘Feel’ into Online
I’ve loved the physical events I’ve done this year, and have played numerous roles: Co-designer of conferences, Keynote Speaker, Moderator and Facilitator. But we are still in a predominantly virtual conference world, so I’ve been working hard at getting more of the live feel into my online events. That’s why I was especially heartened to get this feedback for a presentation on Mindset I gave recently to 200 leaders of a global pension fund:
“Nigel was a speaker at our strategy event in June 2022. In order to involve colleagues from different parts of the world, the event took place via Teams. We’ve gotten used to that during Covid, but still it remains tricky to get everyone engaged via the screen, rather than answering e-mails. Not only did Nigel get across the exactly right message fitted to the purpose of the event, but he also managed to keep everyone’s attention with his contagious energy, enthusiasm & humor! The feedback we received from colleagues was that it felt as a live event – and was in general very positive.”
I loved the bit about “it felt as a live event.”
Reference: Nigel Barlow
