How to Run a Q&A Session
The people have questions!!
Question and answer sessions are often tacked on to events without much thought, but they can be very useful. Today’s post looks at how to run them.
Why: allows a lot of voices to be heard from an audience.
When to use a Q&A from the audience:
Broadcast meetings such as a conference, all hands etc.
The Q&A is a great way to get as many questions from the audience and allow either a single speaker or a panel of speakers answer the questions.
There are a few ways this session can go wrong.
Questions seem to be selected because the speakers feel comfortable with them and avoid questions they aren’t comfortable with: deal with this by either having your audience use a software that allows voting on questions or don’t allow the audience to see the questions one they are submitted, or just answer the questions!! Also you can promise to send an answer out on some central system/email if you can’t answer them all in real time.
The speaker talks too long on one question. Double remind the speaker(s) about how much time they have so they can judge how much time to spend on each question.
I hope this helps your next Q&A run more smoothly. If you have any other tips, share them on Facebook or LinkedIn.
