Hybrid meetings and blended event experiences are the buzz of many organizations this year…
Here are four reasons, from recent studies, that show the positive impact on learning by adding virtual experiences to your face-to-face meeting or events.
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@Sam – I just love it when you start sharing education learning tidbits with us. Now, we just need to discover creative ways to get more “social and informal” learning strategies into face-to-face conferences and events, as well as our virtual experiences.

@VelChain – I like point number three to make sure that the marketed outcomes are met. I think the challenge is to define some outcomes that can be met with audience engagement, and not depend entirely upon the “sage on the stage” but the “guide on the side.”

@Midori – Ok, so you don’t like my term “vindicated.” I chose it because I was seeing a lot of backlash against adding virtual elements to a face-to-face presentations. Also, I was seeing people stating that virtual “took away from” or watered down the face-to-face education. I do like your term “vitalized.”

Also, thanks for sharing some of your background. I think those of us that have entered the meetings and events world that came from an education background view the meeting experience differently. We tend to focus on the education design of an event, whether virtual or face-to-face. What a great experience you have with a mix of education, meetings and events, AV and the green eco-friendly lifestyle. Thanks for adding to the conversation.

One important change that I usually see occur when organizations really dive into adding virtual elements to their events or pursuing full-blown e-learning is that they have to think about learning strategies and the design of learning experiences much more than they have ever had to before. The impact of this greater focus on strategy and design (and the higher learner engagement that results) really can’t be underestimated. It is one of the key elements that contributes to findings like those you report from the DOE. – Jeff

Great Analysis and Tons of super data! As you know I am a fan of the Journal of Computer Mediated Communication Article.

In my mind, there is a strong case here for integrating event technology, leveraging virtual elements and updating event formats to make them more social.

Personally, I don’t think that there is really enough attention paid to the attendee and their needs. (Your post makes a great case for this). Here are some additional arguments:

(1) 70% of our learning is Social and we only remember about 20% of what we hear. Our learning is much greater when we “do” and “teach.”

(2) Out of an average of 6 hours of learning more than 90% of the session time is speakers talking to participants.

(3) Adults have 20 minute attention spans, yet the average session is 60 minutes.

(4) In the Forbes Report on the meetings industry, the Managers that were interviewed even agreed that “information dissemination” was not worth meeting face2face. They recommended virtual in this case.

Given all of this – why aren’t we getting attendees to spend more time talking, sharing and learning from each other?

- Sam (@samueljsmith)

PS Here is reference to some of the stats that I mentioned: http://interactivemtgtech.wordpress.com/2009/09/22/do-you-allocate-enough-time-for-interaction/