Best Practices for Hybrid Events

As we make the triumphant return to in-person gatherings, we’re also beginning to see the return of live events. While it is certainly exciting to see the return of live group learning and especially the rise of hybrid type events, they’re not without their own set of challenges.

If you’re unfamiliar with the term hybrid event, it is the process of combining a live event with a virtual one, so that people can attend regardless of their location and level of comfort given ongoing concerns related to Covid-19.

While restrictions have been lifted in most places, there is still hesitation from many to travel or attend conferences where there are a lot of people in one place, making the hybrid structure a great avenue to accommodate a larger and more geographically dispersed audience.

Benefits of Hybrid Events

Aside from the obvious benefits for those feeling uncomfortable with in-person gatherings or events, there are several key...

I fondly recall one of my favourite childhood television series, The Littlest Hobo, a show starring a stray dog who befriended humans in need. That sharp-as-a-tack German Shephard would gallivant all over the country, meeting new people, solving problems, and then moseying along to the next town unwittingly seeking a canine hero.

Every episode ended with the affable pooch sauntering solo down an empty road in search of the next adventure and fresh companions.

How brave the beast!

I fell in love with the series. We moved around a bit when I was younger, so making new friends was a necessary part of fitting in. 

"Every stop I make, I'll make a new friend

Can't stay for long, just turn around and I'm gone again"

-Terry Bush, Maybe Tomorrow

If you grew up hearing that theme song, you’re welcome for the earworm.

If the show left the same impression on you, perhaps you also share in my reflections on the customs of that furry cur. Befriending new...

Subject matter experts or SMEs.

If you are one, you likely know others in your field who share your knowledge base. Your contemporaries might be well-known and respected superstars with tenure and a massive fan-base, or they may be junior staff with few connections who are thirsty for mentoring, or, perhaps, they are somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. In any case, being a SME, in whatever your industry, can surface feelings of competition with those who play in your sandbox.  

Whether we are competing for a cut of the annual allocated wage increase for our department, or vying for the same potential client, our fellow SMEs might induce us to step up our game and polish our natty ways. And that’s healthy. We should always try to be our best selves, right?

I appreciate that not everyone feels this way.

During a recent networking event, I suggested that I’d like to connect a SME with another in their area of expertise – I’ll call...

In those first few precious seconds of meeting someone new, they have already made dozens of assumptions about you.

Some of them might even be accurate.

Our amygdala, that part of our brain responsible for fight-or-flight, is wired to make decisions about our surroundings before our sensible thoughts can catch up. We immediately decide whether we like someone or whether we want to run away from them. We subconsciously calculate personal risks to our wellbeing and forecast various hypothetical scenarios in our minds based on very little information. Because of that, according to a large body of scientific research, our first impressions are most often inaccurate.

If people we meet are drawing conclusions about who we are and what we are like, wouldn’t you agree that it’s important to increase self-awareness of our non-verbal signals, our body language and facial expressions?  

At a networking event, attendees are sizing up folks in the crowd,...