Most guides to online events focus on engaging customers or growing an audience. Those are worthwhile goals that are well worth pursuing. Focusing all of your online events on external groups carries a risk: your employees may become disengaged and withdraw their best contribution.
The High Cost of Low Engagement
There is plenty of research on the value of encouraging high employee engagement. In brief, high employee engagement means staff brings enthusiasm, new ideas, and creativity to their work. On the other hand, low engagement means employees are focused on doing the bare minimum to get by.
In the past, employee engagement discussions focused on motivation and productivity. There are new dimensions to employee engagement given our experience over the last few years – well-being. According to new Gallup research, only 24% of employees feel that their employees care about their overall wellbeing.
Feeling cared for has significant benefits for organizations. Employees who feel their employers care about their wellbeing are 69% less likely to be searching for a new job. Further, these employees are 71% less likely to experience significant burnout.
Driving high employee engagement and well-being requires multiple strategies, including events. If your organization has a hybrid or remote workforce, you need online events ideas for internal meetings.
Online Events Ideas for Internal Meetings For Growth
These online event concepts are powerful tools to inspire your employees to pursue challenging goals.
1. Virtual Annual Sales Meeting
Annual sales meetings are a proven way to engage your salesforce. These events typically involve a compelling keynote speaker, presentations from executives, and insights to help salespeople succeed, rather than flying in employees from multiple locations.
To make your event memorable, use these tips:
Feature An Exciting Guest Speaker.
The right guest speaker can fill your sales reps with inspiration and tactics. For example, you might invite Jeb Blount to speak to your team about prospecting, negotiation, or other sales skills.
Offer Customer Data Insights.
Your most successful sales reps probably understand your customers deeply. What
about the rest of your sales team, especially the new hires? They may not know your customer base as well. To give your sales team a leg up, equip them with insight from your customer data platform.
With the Arena customer data platform in place, you can identify critical patterns in customer behavior. For example, you might find that industrial customers typically read two ebooks before they join a sales call. In that case, you can suggest your salespeople adjust their efforts to reach out to the right prospects.
2. Giving Company Awards In An Online Event
Recognition is one of the most enduring human motivations. Paying your employees well is just the start of recognition. You can also make employees feel appreciated by giving them awards. A company awards event can work well online.
To maximize engagement in your awards events, you can use a few techniques.
Offer Prizes.
A plaque or trophy is significant, but offering a prize can make the award even more memorable. For example, you might offer a gift card to the best restaurant or hotel in town so your winner can have a memorable night out.
Be Specific When Giving Awards.
The public praise you receive upon receiving an award makes the experience much sweeter. Ask your event moderator to prepare a short speech of 30-60 seconds describing some of the award winner’s specific achievements (e.g., completing a complex IT project on time or exceeding sales quota)
3. New Leadership Online Event
The arrival of a new CEO means change. Employees will want to know about the new leader’s personality, goals, and background. Meet these expectations effectively by organizing an online event.
With this type of online event, strike a balance between the leader making a presentation and allowing plenty of time for employee questions. It is best to use Arena Live Chat to manage the question and answer session in a larger event. Arena includes content moderation capabilities so that you can avoid off-topic questions.
Online Events Ideas for Internal Meetings for Well Being
The above online events ideas are powerful to stimulate ambition and productivity. However, that type of event is not appropriate for every context. If your employees have been burning the midnight oil to meet a challenging deadline, your staff may have other needs. It’s more than possible that employee well-being has suffered.
4. Diversity and Inclusion Virtual Event
When employees feel mistreated or discriminated against, they are less likely to thrive. Planning an annual online event related to your diversity and inclusion goals can make a big difference.
There are different ways to structure this type of event. You might highlight specific inclusion efforts, such as efforts to promote women and people of color into management positions. Alternatively, you might share a progress update regarding your organization’s diversity goals.
Data and metrics are not enough to make this type of event successful. It’s also powerful to feature stories from your employees and leaders. For example, invite employees to share stories about facing discrimination and overcoming those challenges.
Advancing diversity and inclusion goals, especially when new to your organization, can provoke questions and controversy in some cases. Give your team members the chance to ask questions and seek clarification using Arena Live Chat.
5. Stress Management Online Event
An online event focused on healthy stress management techniques can go a long way to helping employees feel better. Assuming you plan for a 60-minute online event, there is a limit to how much you can cover.
Therefore, you might want to organize a quarterly event series covering different topics. This quarter, you might cover breathing exercises and meditation. Next quarter, you might focus on practical ways to set boundaries at work (e.g., start time, end time, and no weekend email).
Benefits of Creative Online Events
Creative online events offer numerous benefits:
- Increase Employee Engagement: Capture attention and encourage participation.
- Foster a Positive Company Culture: Strengthen team bonds and improve satisfaction.
- Improve Communication: Open dialogue sessions encourage transparency.
How Arena Transforms Internal Meetings
Arena’s tools revolutionize online meetings. Real-time chat and messaging keep everyone engaged. Interactive polls and quizzes add fun and competition, while customizable spaces tailor the experience. Arena’s AI-powered features provide insights into participant engagement, helping you tailor your strategies.
Tips for Successful Virtual Events
Ensure virtual events hit the mark with these tips:
- Encourage Participation with Incentives: Offer rewards for active involvement.
- Use Breakout Rooms for Smaller Discussions: Facilitate focused interactions.
- Keep Sessions Short and Focused: Maintain energy with concise meetings.
- Incorporate Fun Elements: Use humor and games to boost engagement.
Bring Your Internal Meeting Event Idea To Life
There are all kinds of ways you can use online events ideas to inspire your workforce. You can introduce new leaders, give out awards and help employees improve their well-being.
An idea is not enough to create transformational results. You need specific techniques to plan your event’s content and technology so that everything runs smoothly. Download your copy of Arena’s live events ebook to learn how to plan and execute an engaging event in less than a week.
