How to Use the 5 Phases of Design Thinking to Build Your Virtual Event

“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
— Buckminster Fuller

Even Buckminster Fuller, the 20th Century master designer and thinker, would be hard-pressed to build a new model for live events after the abrupt stop due to COVID-19. The projections are bleak - most venues are closed, travel is risky, and there have been waves of layoffs. So, our task now is not to change but to re-create events. However, with so many of the fixed points suspended, where do we begin? Emphatically putting the end-user at the center of solution building is a basic tenet of Design Thinking.

What is design thinking?

Developed over several decades in the latter part of the 20th century, design thinking places the consumer or user at the center of conceptualization and ideation of a product or service. The goal is to fully understand the needs of the user, challenge any preconceived notions, and provide solution-based approaches to problem-solving. Simplified: design thinking uses empathetic experimentation around the end-user. For the ultra-curious, you can learn more about design thinking’s origin here.

What are the 5 phases of design thinking?

While there are many variations to the design thinking approach, MAP Digital uses the five-phase model developed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University.

1. Empathize
2. Define
3. Ideate
4. Prototype
5. Test

Challenge: How can I use the 5 phases of Design Thinking as I plan my virtual event?

1. Empathize: Talk with your attendees. Empathize with their needs. Remember, you are asking them to engage in a totally new medium in their homes. They have not traveled in months, there is no badge around their neck, and they have not just entered a dark and frigid General Session Room with hundreds of their peers. Now, they are in sweats, shoes are optional and their children are being homeschooled.

A good way to start is to ask them what they miss about the onsite experience. And then, what they don’t miss about live events. Ask them what they like about the virtual events they have attended: reconnecting with their peers, access to many more speakers, the content is archived, interactivity of breakout rooms, chat, Q&A, and polling. And what they find difficult, exhausting, and unfulfilling about the virtual event experience. Most importantly, ask them for a wish list. Write everything down with no judgment. Encourage them to give examples. Review and organize their input according to themes, and look for patterns, keywords, and parallels. If you keep an open mind in this empathic discovery phase, you will be surprised by what you will uncover.

2. Define: This stage is where you analyze your attendees’ input along with your observations to define a specific problem to be solved.

“If I had only one hour to save the world, I would spend fifty-five minutes defining the problem, and only five minutes finding the solution.”
— Attributed to Albert Einstein.

Identifying the problem is key. Try phrasing the problem from the attendee-at-the-center point of view. For example: “Attendees often feel alienated by the ‘coolness’ of the virtual medium. We need to make them feel more engaged.” Instead of, “Our sponsors mandate that we must ensure the attendees watch our program until the end.”

What can you do to make your attendees feel more engaged? Remember their specific needs and the critical wish list that you initially empathized with. Now that you have defined the problem from their point-of-view can, you can proceed to the Ideate step.

3. Ideate: At this stage you present the problem to be solved along with a brief to your brainstorming team. Make sure you have many point-of-views at the table: technical, sales, operations, marketing, and project management. Encourage them to challenge all assumptions and “blue sky” their ideas. The task is not to replicate a live event — virtually, but to use virtual event platforms’ intrinsic features and your curation of content and experience to make your attendees feel less isolated. It is recommended that you record these sessions because often in the heat of an ideation session, a kernel of an idea that could be the key to the solution gets overlooked. There are no wrong ideas as long as you empathize with the end-user.

Suggested Solution: You have now empathized with the fact that the attendee is at home with many distractions and have defined that you need to deepen their engagement. One potential idea is to schedule speakers to conduct a breakout session after their general presentation for those attendees who want to engage in a peer-to-peer roundtable for a deeper dive into the subject.

4. Prototype: Now is the time to build. Ask the selected speakers and the attendees from your input group how they envision a virtual peer-to-peer roundtable. Would they like to use a whiteboard, have someone take notes, record the session, access slides, white papers, take a poll, network with each other…and perhaps form their own Slack group to keep the investigation going? Fortunately, it is inexpensive to prototype in the virtual platforms, and many useful platforms have already integrated with them. Make sure to document all discussion, note behavior, and capture data.

5. Test: Fortunately it is easy to track user behavior in the virtual medium. How many attendees signed up for and then attended the virtual peer-to-peer roundtable, what content did they engage with: did they access slides, whitepapers, view videos? Did they ask questions, use the whiteboard, or connected with other attendees? Examine all data and look at commonalities. What resonated with your attendees and who engaged the most. These people are influencers and should be invited to continue to contribute to the design of your virtual event model. Review your test results, refine, and begin again.

How can I achieve success using design thinking for my next virtual event?

MAP Digital uses MetaMeetings, our proprietary digital conferencing platform. MetaMeetings puts the attendee experience at the center and triggers data collection points so the host can measure relevance, revenue, and interactivity in order to perfect their ability to engage with attendees. Schedule a consultation today.