How to Run High-Quality Virtual Wellbeing Sessions
As a result of the recent pandemic, organisations have had to make a difficult and important shift to running their wellbeing sessions virtually. While many wellbeing professionals are well equipped and experienced with virtual delivery already, most are not. In this article, we share with you a few ideas to improve the quality of such sessions if you happen to be running them in-house.
Many of these will seem like simple recommendations, and getting all them right every time will make the difference over the long run, so feel free to run through this list in preparation for your next Virtual Wellbeing Workshop.
1. Set your screen at the level of your eyesight, with a light behind your screen.
Using video conferencing rather than traditional conference dial-ins is the new norm, and helps to personalise the conversation and to keep participants engaged. The quality of the light is one the aspects that will make the biggest difference in the quality of the video participants will see.
If your home office allows this, using a standing desk will also help in creating a better experience for participants; as a facilitator, you can access higher levels of energy and engagement that way.
2. Use a high quality microphone
While not everyone may have access to professional grade microphones, they are another large value add in wellbeing sessions.
High quality microphones will attempt to filter out and reduce the volume of extraneous distant background sounds and enhance the quality of your voice.
If the session you are delivering contains a guided meditation, high quality audio will mean higher levels of zen for your participants. If you don’t have a quality microphone, use headphones with microphone built in. Bose 700 headphones are great option, as they feature an unrivalled four-microphone system that picks up and isolates your voice.
3. Prepare participants before the session
Good sessions begin before the actual session. Make sure to communicate with participants beforehand, giving them clear expectations about what they should expect from the session, and also communicating with them any prep work that may be needed.
For wellbeing sessions, prep work may be as simple as answering a question:
What was the biggest stressor for you this week?
How has this new normal helped you reach a new level of wellbeing?
Or it may be recommending that participants spend 1 minute of deep breathing before the session begins. Both these very simple concepts can make a big difference.
4. Have a clear End in Mind
In the planning of the virtual wellbeing session, make sure you can get to the point where you can explain in 30 seconds what you hope everyone gets out of the session.
That statement should be clear, and very simple. Once you come to a reasonable end in mind, practice rehearsing it out loud a few times, given you should be sharing it with all participants at the beginning of the session.
Simple examples of a wellbeing-first end in mind might sound like:
At the end of this session, I want all of you to feel like you have a simple recipe to reduce your current stress level.
At the end of this session, I want all of you to feel at least 15% calmer than when the session began.
While some might suggest that an end in mind can sound a little tacky, we believe it communicates your professionalism, and very importantly, it also gives participants an early opportunity to interject if there is any disconnect between what they want to get out of the session, and what you propose to deliver.
5. Offer your continued support as a follow-up
In a wellbeing session, you want to create as many opportunities for interaction and engagement as possible. Come prepared with questions you want to ask of your audience, call on people specifically to answer them (in a polite, respectful way) if the questions are not personal.
Even with a high level of engagement, you will come to understand that many of the participants will not feel comfortable sharing their point of view in an open forum. It’s important that as the expert, you give everyone the opportunity for private 1:1 time with you if they need some extra help and guidance. This is a chance for you to understand how participants liked your session, to verify if your end in mind came across clearly enough, and to offer deeper advice on specific topics. Hearing directly from a participant in private will give you further insight into the topics that are particularly relevant and important, and will allow you to prepare for the next session.
In summary, as organisations make working from home and flexible working arrangements the norm, it’s likely that virtual wellbeing will need to become a critical part of every organisation’s wellbeing strategy.
Making the transition to virtual is not easy, and we’ve been helping clients continue to make the most out of their transition. We would love to help you if we can, simply email us and we’ll discuss.