Fostering innovation among your team means practicing and using innovation processes on a regular basis with your team. During the pandemic, working closely in teams has become more of a challenge while trying to incorporate physical distancing. The good news is that nearly all of the video conferencing apps have added breakout rooms.
Over the past 6-months or so, we've helped teams create exciting results using the breakout rooms to support virtual innovation sessions, often with teams spread out across the country (talk about physical distancing!)
Bringing a larger team together to tackle a product development challenge, process improvement challenge, or even to design an HR policy can be challenging and require skilled facilitation to create the desired impact. However, breaking the team into smaller groups with specific questions to answer and pitch back to the group, can be an effective tool for getting lots of great ideas and fostering innovation and collaboration among your team.
The good news is nearly all of the virtual meeting platforms now have the breakout room feature. We have been using the feature in ZOOM since early this spring and more recently in Google Meet. Today, Microsoft Teams has announced the addition of this feature as well.
So, the next time you need to find ideas for a new opportunity or challenge... try a team approach made even easier through a virtual meeting & break-out rooms.