Business Moderation: The Detailed Procedure – Tips for Successful Moderation Design

Last time we occupied ourselves with a rough schedule for your workshop / business moderation. You have defined the start and end times, you may already have decided on an opener and closer, decided whether a start presentation is necessary and scheduled breaks. Very nice! 🙂 Now you have to fill your workshop with content and design the exact procedure:

5. „How will my workshop actually go?“

Fitting with the fantastic weather of the last few weeks, you can compare your workshop as a large spring cleaning. If you see it as a whole, it seems quite huge and looks like a project that could overwhelm us quickly. But divided into small parts – “This morning we will clean the windows”, “in between, I do not begrudge myself a good cup of coffee”, “then in the evening, the feather duster will be used” and “tomorrow I turn the hoover really loud” – it can be a lot better digestible.

Even if you‘re still not really in the mood for cleaning, I think you understand where I am going with this: Dissect your workshop into small, well cut easily digestible bites 🙂

What is your topic again and what are the objectives and non-objectives which you want to achieve? Which methods can you employ to get to your destination? What questions do you have to ask of your participants to put them on the right path?

Remember: the better your questions, the sooner you will reach your objective!

We shall look at the topics of “questions” and “methods“ in detail in one of the next contributions.

Then put the individual parts into an order. Ask yourself, what has already been discussed, so that something else can be resolved. Define milestones and key criteria for proceeding with the topic. Where do you need feedback, in order to continue?

Also, think about when you can split up your group into small groups, to work more concrete on a topic. Small groups (max 5 people) are more productive than the work in a plenum. In a plenary session results can then be presented and discussed and decided.

Finally check the entire time frame again and determine how long it should last. Put everything into your Excel spreadsheet (see last post). If you realise that it takes too long and that you have packed too much topics to be dealt with in your workshop, set your priorities and shorten where necessary.

Great, your workshop is taking shape! Next time I will tell you more about the different methods that you can use in your workshop – incidentally, one of my pet subjects, because here you can really develop your personal creativity! 🙂

Kind regards and until next time!
Birgit