- Location
- California
- Size
- 10+
- Use case
- Corporate learning & development
Poll Everywhere is a way of creating community and finding commonality in an online meeting.
Shelly Anderson, Principal at Envision, brings client training and planning sessions to life with real-time engagement. “Since I run trainings that span across multiple days, I really like how easy it is for participants to respond to my activities on their phones every time. The fact that they can be engaged on both devices rather than switching away from the meeting is really nice.”
Energizing virtual meetings
Shelly helps a variety of teams with facilitating group processes. “I work with leaders and their teams to help them collaborate more productively together, and I also work with a number of companies on their first-level and second-level leadership development programs. Until March I did it all in person, but then my work came to a standstill.”
With the sudden transition to a virtual format, Shelly started looking for ways to enhance her workshops. “When I started to convert the activities I would lead in a room, I realized that I needed some way to create more interaction. One of my clients told me about Poll Everywhere and after creating my account, I found that it was a really easy way to gather feedback and level set with a large group.”
Since then, Shelly has found unique ways to get everyone talking.
I initially started testing Poll Everywhere with icebreaker activities as a way to bring people’s voices into the room. Then, I tried using it as a way to debrief, find commonalities, and open the door to discussion.
Opening the floor to discussion
Recently, Shelly ran a two-week virtual training session with plenty of opportunities to engage. “I don’t think it would’ve worked without Poll Everywhere. Since I could create my activities in advance and embed them in my PowerPoint slides, I was prepared but could still adjust settings on the fly. The integration was a game-changer.”
With another session around the corner, Shelly has planned exactly where she’ll be spending time interacting with the audience/participants. “For an upcoming training on giving and receiving feedback, we’re starting with an open-ended question while everyone is joining the call. Then, we’ll be checking in about an exercise from last time with a multiple choice question. Finally, we have a series of questions using Poll Everywhere as a proof of concept, where participants respond to different scenarios we present.”
I find that you need to have interaction for every ten minutes of didactic content or instruction. Over the course of a three and a half hour program, I would include about ten activities throughout the presentation and about three breakout sessions so attendees can get to know each other. I love using Poll Everywhere word clouds — they’ve been dynamite to keep a group engaged.
Poll Everywhere for learning and development
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