Promoting Early Engagement#
Short Description#
Establishing facilitator presence to engage with participants as they are joining the Zoom call.
Also Known As#
The power of welcome; creating a friendly environment
Context#
This pattern is most useful at the start of any module where you want to encourage active participation. It is often difficult in a virtual environment to encourage participants to engage early.
Problem#
Participants often join a Zoom call and are simply left waiting for instruction. It is important to value participants from their time of entry, rather than their time of instruction.
Solution#
Incorporate a system for facilitators to provide welcome from the start.
Forces#
Encouraging early contributions
Creating a comfortable atmosphere for participation
Implementation#
Facilitator Presence: Both facilitators should be present 5-10 minutes before the official start time.
Personal Welcome: As participants join, greet them by name and acknowledge their presence. A short welcome script can be used and then adapted. For instance, you may also ask where they heard about the BCO course. This is more interactive than simply waiting in silence and could also provide insight for future campaigns.
Simple Prompt: Encourage people to write something in the chat, but don’t enforce. The prompt should be something simple, such as where they are logging in from.
Examples#
The facilitator asks “Where are you joining us from today?”.
Observation from CSV: “Welcoming people - Asked people where they heard about BCO - Helped give us clues about referrals and also how much people talk”
Rationale#
Prompting early participation has the benefit of easing the group and the facilitator(s) into the group.
Consequences#
Positive: Increased participant engagement, improved flow of future communications
Negative: May be some workload as the facilitator may need to do this alongside other tasks. May feel forced if the prompt isn’t genuine or relevant.