Hosting a Community Workshop: FAQs

Who can host/attend an ON Community Workshop?

Any member of the ON Community. That includes you! 💪

What does it take to host a workshop?

To organise a workshop, you must have:

• A topic that you'd like to discuss.
• 20 minutes to think about and write down
• A description of your topic
• Your questions
• The type(s) of experts you’re looking for (e.g. people who have faced a similar challenge, people who have management experience)

Then pass them on to Becca, who'll set up the event page and share it with the community.

• At least 1 hour for the actual discussion.

Why should I host a workshop?

You should organise a workshop if/when:

• You've got a challenge/issue on your hands that you would like to discuss with someone who’s been through something similar.
• You would like some advice on a topic from people who know a lot about it.
• You want to bounce ideas off of a panel of experienced ops people who can help you figure out the way forward.
• (There's probably a million other good reasons!)

Why should I co-host a workshop as an expert?

You should sign up to participate as a co-host/topic expert if:

• You feel like you have a ton of knowledge or experience regarding the subject and would like to give back to the community by sharing your advice.
• You want to make new connections with like-minded ops people.
• You’re interested in hearing other experts’ opinions on the topic you know and love/hate. 👀

What can I host a workshop on?

• Any topic related to operations (you've got a vast choice as ops can cover pretty much everything!), personal/professional growth, etc. Because you're an ON Community member, if a particular topic is interesting to you, you'll most likely find that many other members will take an interest in it, too.
• The more narrow the topic, the more defined and helpful the conversation will be (e.g. "How do I improve my data analytics skillset?"). For broader topics, we recommend hosting a roundtable - more info here.
• For inspiration, check out our Events Calendar to see the topics of our previous workshops.

Who normally attends and what's the format?

• Depending on the topic, we usually have 10-30 attendees.
• So far, the format has been:
• Becca welcomes attendees and asks first the experts to introduce themselves, then asks the host to introduce both themselves and their topic.
• From then on, it’s up to the host to ask the experts for their input and converse with them for about 50 minutes.
• During the event, we encourage non-speaking attendees to ask questions via the chat. It’s up to the host and the experts to decide (ahead of the event) if these questions will be answered during the conversation/by having a short Q&A at the end of the session/after the session by putting answers in a shared document, which is created so everyone can add their notes and questions.
• Having said that, there's no fixed standard format - this is your session and you can run it in whatever format you'd like. Be creative!

What's a successful workshop?

• If at the end of the workshop, you feel like your question was answered and you're leaving with a solution or a couple of actions to apply, we consider it a success. 🎉
• Clear next steps. Are there any actions that we can put together as a group to tackle the issue/topic at hand? 🤔

You decided to host a workshop. Awesomeness! 🤗 What's next?

Planning

• Pick a topic.
• Think of a few questions that you'd like to tackle during the discussion. 3-4 questions are normally sufficient.
• Think of a few people you’d like to discuss the topic with. For example, are you looking for people who have faced a similar challenge, or people who have experience with a particular tool? Maybe someone who had to pick up a skill fast and how they went about it?
• Pick a date. 3-12 weeks from now, starting at 8:00 AM or 5:00 PM UK time, Tuesday or Wednesday. Ideally, it should be on a week that doesn't have any other ON Community events - Becca will help you by providing info until we have a private event calendar set up for the community.
• Let Becca know what's your topic, date/time, preferred format, and send us your questions. This is the format the event will be presented to everyone. Send us a short paragraph on the topic and the questions you'd like to include. DM Becca on Slack or email community@operationsnation.com. Also, let us know if you'd like to stick to the regular format.
• We will set up your event on Luma and send you the link for any changes / your final approval. We will be adding you as a co-host to the event so you can see the data, registrations and feedback in real-time if you're interested. NB: Luma is like Eventbrite, just better for our use case. 😉
• We will share your event with the community at least 2 weeks before the date of the event. You don't need to do anything. :) We'll make sure that everyone has a Zoom link and know where to make notes relevant to the event.
• We will send you and all attendees a Google Doc open to edits, where everyone can start adding their notes and comments ahead of the session.

During the event

• Becca, along with Aušrinė and/or Astrid will be there to help you welcome everyone, start off the event, and keep it to the schedule.
• In the beginning, we'll ask
• Experts for a short introduction (~2 mins)
• The host for a short introduction (~2 mins), a description of the topic (~3 mins), and what you're looking to get out of the session.
• We'll then let the host lead the discussion with the experts, while the ON Team keeps a conversation going in the chat.
• If you chose to answer chat questions during the event, the host will keep an eye on the chat and build their questions into the conversation.
• If you chose to have a Q&A at the end of the event, Becca will let you know when to switch over to chat questions.
• If you chose to have a Q&A after the event, Becca will compile the list of questions in the Google Doc and remind you to answer them within the next week.
• 5 minutes before the end of the event, Becca will signal to you that it’s time to wind down and add some final words or remarks.
• It's a wrap! 🌯

After the event

• That's it! You're done! Thank you so much for being the awesome host that you most definitely were. 💪
• Totally up to you, but if you'd like to do anything else with the workshop’s content (e.g. write a blog post, etc.) please feel free to. The only thing we ask is to keep basic sensitive details confidential - e.g. keep people anonymous unless they’ve given you permission to share their names. ☺️

Workshop format

2-3 SENTENCES INTRODUCING THE TOPIC.

Thankfully, our community is full of great minds - so let's find the answers to these questions together.

Hosted by YOUR NAME, YOUR TITLE at YOUR COMPANY we've asked some community members to help us answer these questions. We'll be joined by some amazing volunteers:

LIST OF HOSTS (3-4 COMMUNITY MEMBERS)

By the end of the session, we're hoping to ACHIEVE THIS GOAL.

Please feel free to bring food and drinks to consume during the session. See you soon!