How to Build Inclusive Virtual Events: An AirMiles Case Study
Figuring out how to develop a virtual event that accommodates the various needs and desires of your team isn't easy. What worked in-person, pre-pandemic isn't going to work now and many companies’ cultures are suffering because of this.
Did you know, the difference between bad and good culture can drive over a 20% difference in productivity? At scale, this means good, inclusive remote culture is worth 10 more weeks in a year, and $20M+ annually to top distributed organizations.
- Triple Play
So how can you develop fantastic, inclusive virtual events that leave employees with increased feelings of connectivity and appreciation? Let's take a look at a case study via our client AirMiles (LoyaltyOne) and the lessons we’ve learnt.
The Context
In 2021, we were approached by Nina Kain of LoyaltyOne's AirMiles Canada team. LoyaltyOne has 900+ employees working in a hybrid work structure distributed across Canada. The team wanted to design a special virtual initiative for the 2021 holiday season that would connect employees, celebrate diversity, and accommodate the needs and interests of a varied team spread across Canada. Ensuring the initiative was inclusive was central to our goals for the event series. Here are the lessons we learnt:
1) Engage a Diverse Lineup of Talent
Your speakers and talent are the face of your event and should be as diverse as the audience you want to appeal to.
For LoyaltyOne, the idea was to celebrate holiday traditions from across the world through food. We did this by engaging four diverse chefs who each led a cooking workshop highlighting a holiday dish or menu special to their families and culture.
2) Give Participants Choice
Include a lineup of activity options that gives your event participants the choice of signing up for the session that speaks most to them. This will appeal to a wide variety of interests and ensure high engagement by tapping into the power of autonomy.
With LoyaltyOne, participants were given the option of choosing between one of four sessions spread out between December and January:
Hanukkah with Carolyn Cohen
Jamaican Christmas with Laura Edwards
Indian Harvest Celebrations with Ruchira Hoon
Lunar New Year with Haan Palcu-Chang
3) Capture Accessibility Needs During Registration
In your pre-event registration process, include an accessibility checklist to gauge any special requirements that your attendees might have, such as session interpretation or dietary needs. Knowing people's needs in advance will ensure you have ample time to ensure everyone is accommodated and, as a result, feel a sense of belonging when attending the event.
As an example, for a culinary event, it is essential to ensure each person's dietary needs are accommodated. Your event attendees could have cultural, religious or health-related diet restrictions, and you need to make it easy for them to participate. Our Care/Of team takes pride in accommodating all dietary needs - from Halal to Kosher to Gluten-Free.
4) Go Out Of Your Way to Reach Participants, Wherever They Are
As workforces commit to remote or hybrid work structures, having a team distributed out of the office and across Canada is the new norm. And for virtual employee engagement initiatives, this means developing a strategy to reach participants wherever they are. Sending out physical packages as part of an event can be a fantastic way to build excitement, enhance engagement and show appreciation, but you'll need to determine where participants are located and the best way to get packages to each person. Consider what's going into your event packages and how quickly you want them to arrive at their destinations.
Ask yourself: is there anything perishable inside the package? Given the timeline, what third-party courier service is the most economical? How are we going to communicate to participants when their package is arriving? Will we share the tracking numbers? What is the unboxing experience like? In case a package doesn’t arrive, what's the contingency plan?
For our collaboration with LoyaltyOne, we used an overnight shipping provider to get fresh, perishable ingredient kits to employees located across Canada, from Halifax to Victoria.
5) Assign a Strong Host & Build a Run-Of-Show
Having a strong event host can make or break a virtual event. They become your event's captain, steering the ship and ensuring no one falls overboard.
Once you've assigned a strong host to the event, take the time to brief them on the run of show in advance of the event day.
Questions to consider are: what's the flow of the event? Who will be attending? What accessibility accommodations should the host be aware of? Are there breaks built into the event? How will the event open and close? Are there certain question probes the host can use to encourage engagement and thoughtful conversation throughout?
For LoyaltyOne, we engaged our experienced in-house host Angela Gabot to lead all four sessions. This ensured consistency, and we were able to prepare her with a series of prompts to encourage sharing and thoughtful conversation.
6) Collect Feedback
After the event, ensure you encourage both your organizing committee and attendees to provide feedback. This will provide input on what worked and how you can improve for next time.
In the case of LoyaltyOne, the four sessions were spread across 8 weeks, so we were able to collect feedback after each session and adjust the next ones accordingly. Feedback is your friend!
Designing a virtual event where all attendees feel included requires deeper effort in learning and taking time to be thoughtful. It requires you to ask tough questions, to be comfortable being uncomfortable and recognize that you probably won’t get everything right the first time. What’s most important is that you continue to be intentional about your goals and outcomes and continue to ask questions to learn and improve your events.
Don't hesitate to reach out to our team at Care/Of if we can help support you build inclusive events.