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Carla Urrea Stabile
Carla Urrea Stabile

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Giving a Three-Hour Workshop: Do's and Don'ts

Today I gave my first three hour-long and in-person workshop. I've delivered talks, made videos but never actually gave a full on workshop. In this blog post are my main learnings from it.

✅ Do - Install Software in Advance

If you can, provide attendees with a list of requirements or pre-requisites to make the workshop go smoother.

I thought of this a bit too late and some folks were not able to install the software or had some issues that made them lose some time and it's just not a nice feeling.

🚫 Don't - Use the Full Time Slot

If you have 1 hour and a half, estimate your workshop to last only 1 hour. Many things can happen along the way, lots of troubleshooting so give yourself and attendees some extra time.

✅ Do - Take Breaks

For a three hour workshop we had only one "big" break of 15 minutes. Unfortunately there was an event after the workshop and time was limited but in an ideal world I'd have done three breaks:

  • 5 min bio-break after the first 40 minutes
  • 10 min coffee break at 1h 20 minutes
  • 5 min bio-break at 2h 10 minutes

🚫 Don't - Rush It

If folks came to a three hour workshop it means they are there willing to learn. Don't rush your words or the explanations you are giving. This aligns with using your time properly.

Top comments (4)

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jess profile image
Jess Lee

Install Software in Advance

Yep yep yep!! In an ideal world you could also have workshop assistants that help people who got stuck at home.

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Carla Urrea Stabile

This would be next level for sure hahaha but I love the idea

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Cesar Aguirre

Breaks were the first thing that came to my mind after reading the title :)

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Carla Urrea Stabile

I know ! Although sometimes you might not have enough time for them depending on events happening before of your slot 😩 but I tried my best