The very first virtual conference (for these leaders)

Remember that time were stuck in our homes for months on end?

Well, work had to go on - in this case, the quarterly legal department all-hands at a major financial institution in Melbourne needed to go on, online.

For this piece of work I was brought in after a well-meaning senior consultant promised we could deliver a stelar online experience - the first of many - without knowing how or with whom. I was tasked with leading the co-design of the experience; from overarching experience design, to speaker liaison and prep, to technology coordination, and output creation - all within an anxiety-laden and uncertainty-filled environment that was the pandemic early days.

This meant co-designing purpose and outcome of the day, setting the run sheet and interactions between segments (as with face-to-face experiences) but also working with in-house technology teams (and limited technology) to produce an engaging experience. And, a big part of this engagement was coaching the senior leaders (CEO and department head) client-side about how to best show up int he online space, when they were used to having an impact face-to-face.

The result was a highly engaging set of 3 1/2 day sessions delivered via client-specific internal technology (not on Zoom) involving speakers from across the APAC region and audience participation from across the globe.

A big challenge in creating this piece of work was to help people feel involved in the conversation on the other end of a phone line. To that end we used questions that actively populated the answers on screen (as pictured above) to help people understand that others - roughly 150 others - were on the call. We also employed our extremely talented graphic recorder to capture the output of the 3 days in his signature style. This artwork not only helps participants recall the conversations over the 3 days but crucially helps them feel what they felt listening to the conversations.

This engagement was a great team effort - a collaborative co-design toward an outcome that felt like a momentous occasion when we completed it. It was the very first online gathering of this scale this business had attempted!

Why include redacted images?

I think it's important to capture the realities of the experiences I design - which inevitably include sensitive information - while respecting the anonymity of those involved and safeguarding the business-relevant information shared during these experiences.

Want to know more?

Ask me about it.