What's so special about Zoom?
In the old days before COVID, almost everyone used Zoom for online meetings. It was pretty much the only thing available. Almost all training was delivered in person and that’s what everyone liked – and was used to. Clients brought managers together from different locations for up to two days at a time. Participants complained about having to stop work but actually loved having the time to interact with peers, meet new colleagues and catch up with people they rarely see. Facilitators, highly skilled at creating a buzz in the room and encouraging learning and engagement, were positive about working in person with their participants. Everyone finished the day stimulated, tired and keen to do more.
Then we had COVID. Within a short time, everyone moved to online training. Some of the live online delivery became excellent very quickly. Some of it was a bit clunky. Unfortunately, some training providers have stuck with huge chalk and talk webinars, or a clunky powerpoint heavy approach. We are proud that our facilitators have worked hard to master a range of tools, to create a highly engaging, participative experience for learners. We aim to create an online experience that is every bit as good, as face to face learning in a room.
Then in 2020, Microsoft Teams suddenly became very popular and its usage continues to grow. Almost all of our clients use Teams on a daily basis. We started to learn how to work with Teams and then our clients began to request learning delivery via Teams. That’s when our internal discussions on the differences in delivering learning on Teams v. Zoom began.
It feels different
When you use Teams every day, it’s a basic work tool. Logging onto Teams makes it feel like work. Have you ever delivered internal training in a meeting room in the building? How often do you have to tell people not to run back to their desk to sort things out, or to put their phone down and ignore it? When you are at work you feel obliged to stay on top of your work, even though you need to focus on learning. That’s what happens with Teams. It’s a work tool so the temptation to deal with messages, or flags in channel can be too much to ignore.
We find that when people log into Zoom they start to behave differently. They relax, they treat it as something different and unexpected, which is just how a good learning experience should be. If you are investing in your people, you want them to learn new skills and have the confidence to put them into practice. Participants are generally more learning focused in Zoom, especially when they use Teams all the time. This helps them to be more present and more engaged. When it comes to learning, being engaged is critical. Engagement = learning and learning = change in behaviour. After all, that’s the point of training isn’t it? Helping people to do things differently.
Breakout rooms are great
In face-to-face learning, it’s normal to break people up into smaller groups. This not only encourages learning, it helps people to really think through the challenges they face. While Teams does have break out rooms, it’s great for the facilitator to be able to pre-assign or auto-assign people to groups. We might want to mix the groups up and it’s very simple on Teams. Just as you want the trainer to walk around and dip into each of the small groups working on learning, Zoom makes it easy for the facilitators to jump between rooms with just one click. We can broadcast messages and share our screen with everyone in breakouts (for example time checks or instructions they need for group work). The facilitator can reopen breakouts multiple times, without any tech issues. Trainers are also able to post messages directly to individuals while they are in breakout rooms, as the chat function continues to work smoothly. Honestly, it’s much easier in Zoom.
Lights, camera, interaction!
Keeping learning and engagement going is crucial. How you do that depends on the facilitator’s skills and the tools they have available. Zoom has good built-in tools for learner interaction—reactions, polling, whiteboards, annotation. Screen sharing is cleaner too. The trainer can share just one window or app instead of the whole desktop. This is great when the facilitator is juggling materials behind the scenes. It stops people getting distracted by what else is on the facilitator’s desktop!
The trainer may be using a variety of apps to create the best learning experience for everyone. If we are using your Teams platform, then it’s often difficult for us to access the same apps that we take for granted in Zoom. Your IT team certainly don’t want us to download our apps and specific material onto your Teams and that means we have to find workarounds. That’s not the best option for learning.
Stability
If you are including people who are in different countries it’s crucial to have a stable learning platform. Our experience is that facilitators who routinely work with participants in Africa or Asia, or facilitators who are based in those continents, find it much easier to keep people in the room with Zoom. Other platforms are not always so stable. There really is nothing worse than losing participants and waiting for them to reconnect. Not only does it disrupt the flow of learning, people get distracted and start to do other things. An unstable platform can cause real frustration for everyone.
Access all areas
When clients insist on Teams, facilitators are treated as guests on Teams. So the ability to use tools and functionality is usually severely restricted. It’s like going to a hotel room to do some training and being told you aren’t allowed to use whiteboards, flipcharts or pens and by the way, not everyone can have a chair. It means we have to redesign around the limited functionality. If you are paying for engaging training where people are focused on learning, restricting the facilitator’s ability to work, means you don’t always get the best from the learning.
Of course, if your organization has a platform that must be used then of course we will use it. Just be aware that what we delivered in a demo and what we deliver on Teams for example, may not be the same thing as the functionality is restricted.
What next?
Wherever your people work, they deserve the most impactful training. Do get in touch to discuss how we can help you bring your learning to life. For learning that takes your managers and leaders up a notch, click the button below.
