Online Q&A Session Best Practices

Online Q&A Session Best Practices

Try the Glasses and Chair Methods to Engage with Your Group

I love powerful questions. But even more than that, I love helping people create conversations worth remembering.

In this chapter, I’m going to unpack the glasses method and chair method, which you can adapt and implement in your online Q&A sessions. These approaches are perfectly applicable whether you have 10 or 12 CEOs in a leadership group, 30 students in a classroom or 300 people at a virtual conference. Both the glasses and chair methods offer simple, subtle ways to create a totally different atmosphere for your Q&A session.

If you’ve ever attended a conference session with a Q&A or hosted one, you know that they can be really awesome—or abysmal. You can have that Q&A where 50 people line up in front of a microphone to ask their question. That usually turns into people nervously talking for two minutes before getting to their “question,” which was really more of an opinion they wanted to share. 

Ideally, you want people to ask crisp, powerful questions that let the presenter, speaker, panel or expert respond by sharing brilliant insights with the rest of the group. To do that, you’ve got to create a different atmosphere. This needs to be an environment that increases people’s psychological safety. People tend to ramble when they’re nervous.

The Glasses Method

I picked up the glasses method from a teacher-mentor named Matt Church. I don’t even know if he was intentionally teaching this, but I observed it in what he was doing. Matt has been voted the top professional speaker in Australia. He’s an amazingly dynamic, ultra-brilliant dude.

I was in a virtual workshop with him and he was lighting everyone’s brain up with some fantastic ideas. Then he took a break, and he could see that the chat was filling up with questions. He needs glasses to read, so he put his on. 

I don’t know if he even noticed this, but this simple act had a very powerful effect. By putting on his glasses, he essentially let everyone know he was “listening.” He was communicating to the group without a word that he was taking a break from sharing content to read through everyone’s questions.

You don’t need to wear glasses to use the glasses method. Rather, this is about developing a symbol or cue that makes it clear you are reviewing the group’s questions. This is particularly useful if you want to try to embed Q&As throughout a session. If you have a two-hour training session, for example, you might not want to hold questions until the last 10 minutes. At the outset, let your group know they can type their questions in ALL CAPS into chat as they come up and if they want to dive deeper into a topic.

Then every handful of minutes pause briefly, and put on your glasses, don a “Q&A hat,” start playing music, or commence with whatever your cue is. Basically just use a visual or audio cue of some kind to let your group know you’re paying attention to them and going to take a moment to address their questions.

It might take 15 seconds for you to read five questions, which is still about 10 times faster than if you had five to 10 people verbally ask a question. You can run a very efficient online Q&A session this way.

The Chair Method

When I’m delivering virtual keynotes or holding remote workshops, it’s really important for me to stand. I want my energy to come through as I’m presenting.

But there are instances when it makes sense to be a bit more relaxed, like for the Q&A. That’s where the chair comes in. When I’m ready to open it up to questions, I’ll let the group know, “I’m going to pull up my stool, so we can just have a chat.” I will pull in my chair from outside the frame and have a seat. What I’ve noticed from hundreds of remote keynotes and workshops that I’ve led is something shifts in people’s brains when I sit down. It creates a change of state. And as Matt Church often says, “State matters more than script.”

My presentation style is extremely conversational and authentic. I don’t put on an act. I’m just me. But there is just something about moving from standing to sitting down that feels like we’re grabbing coffee together. 

If you’re in a conference room with a thousand people, I might look like this tiny dot at the front of the room. But if we meet in Zoom, I’m right there, up close and personal. It’s as if we were having a one-on-one even if there are 493 other people online with us. It’s amazing how intimate Zoom can feel when you’re really intentional about how you use the tool.

Not an Afterthought

Now here’s a little bonus tip: Your Q&A session should never be the last thing that you do. The Q&A should be the second to last thing. 

When it’s time, I’ll pull up a chair to do the Q&A. But I’ll finish that about five minutes before the meeting is over. Then I’ll move the chair away. I’ll say that I know there were some unanswered questions. And I’ll let the group know that I’m going to send a video follow-up with more resources and answers to the questions we didn’t get to during our Q&A. 

After that, I’ll transition to how I want to end the session. That might be with a story, activity or exercise. This closing is something really intentional. I might, for example, invite the group to quickly share some closing statements, aha’s they had or actions they were excited to take. 

Sam Keen once said that “Nothing shapes our lives so much as the questions we ask, refuse or ask or never dream of asking.” Q&As can be really fun. But they typically have a more relaxed conversational energy. I want to end the meeting on a high note and infuse lots of energy into the group. To accomplish this, your Q&A should be the second to last thing you do, and you’ve got to be really deliberate with your closing.

If you’re interested in more best practices to Ask Powerful Questions and Create Conversations That Matter, you can check out our other book on the topic at www.amazon.com/we. You can also get a free book excerpt through our website at www.weand.me/free.