Are Webinars truly engaging?

Are Webinars truly engaging?

I recently attended a webinar on facilitating interactive, engaging online webinars. Ironically, nearly all the good points provided in the webinar were not actually put in place during the session. There was essentially no interaction; the Q&A was only 5 minutes at the end of the session; there was nothing fun or engaging.

I was neither engaged, nor was I interacting with the system!

The live aspect of Webinars….

In these instances, I have to ask “Why is this offered as a live event?” Given there was only a brief period of time at the end to ask questions, wouldn’t it be a better use of time if this was a recorded on-demand event that was linked to a moderated discussion forum? This would allow attendees to rewind, pause, or fast forward past sections that aren’t of interest. It would also provide an avenue of discussion (through the forum) that would provide more direct feedback and guidance than the live session.

Webinar versus classroom…

Don’t get me wrong, I believe there is great value in a live event, but we should remember that the live event should mirror its offline counterpart, i.e. classroom, seminar, meeting, etc. Let’s focus on classrooms. Outside of college or university, would you ever conceive of having a 1 hour classroom whereby the facilitator lectured in front of the class for 55 minutes? Even in post-secondary institutions, I would question its merit. During that live classroom event, the facilitator would typically open the session, have participants introduce themselves, discuss objectives and agenda items, position the session, and then ask questions to create discussion and interaction. There may be role-plays, story-telling, energizers and other fun activities. Why would we not do any of these similar activities during a live online event?

Final thoughts…

Participants must get involved. Facilitators must prepare (and practice) some key provoking questions that will demand a response. Unless there is feedback required by the participant, I would suggest the event should not be live at all, and can have the same impact by simply providing an on-demand session.

Philip Rocca
eLearning Consultant
www.engaging-eLearning.com

Tags: classroom, virtual, webconferencing, webinar

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Comment by J P on July 27, 2009 at 8:07pm: Thank you. I agree. Who wants to look at their phone for 1 hour or a slide show?? It just sounds cool to have a webinar. And what is the draw with podcasts? I think video conferencing is a better way to get the audience interested. As for engaging, a blog perhaps?

Comment by Kerin Ho Mayne on July 28, 2009 at 2:12pm: I attended my first webinar about 4 weeks ago. It was given by Wikispaces to help introduce wikis and what the site has to offer. I REALLY enjoyed it. The facilitator, Sarah, and the chat moderator did a good job of fielding questions throughout the session. I appreciated that there was active chat, the questions were answered either by the moderator and/or the facilitator. Even though this is the only webinar that I've attended, I would imagine that the platform used for the webinar probably makes a difference. This webinar used Elluminate to host the event. Good graphics and easy to use.
Perhaps for a business webinars are not the best way to go, but for education purposes I think it's a great option.

Comment by Philip Rocca on July 28, 2009 at 2:19pm: Thanks for the comment Kerin. I believe that webinar platforms are a great tool as well. I believe they provide so many more options to supplement traditional classroom options. I'm glad you had a good experience, as it sounds like Wikispaces made good use of many of the interactivity tools available. Unfortunately many people take shortcuts to providing an interactive, engaging virtual classroom session, and don't prepare or practice very much for the session. I think they are wonderful tools, and if used properly, provide a great and flexible alternative to traditional classrooms.