Welcome! This guide is about how Soapbox Project facilitates virtual gatherings, generally known as Action Hours. Our core values are courage and joy. Our three outcomes are learning, connection, and action.
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If you are facilitating an official Soapbox event, please follow these guidelines. If you’re simply seeking to infuse some of our concepts into events you’re hosting, think of these as puzzle pieces for your own puzzle—move them around, try different combinations, and repeat until you’re happy!
Anatomy of an event
It's important that as a regenerative community organizer, you're clear on what your event actually is. That's why at Soapbox, we've broken down our view on the anatomy of an event. This is the same whether it's an in person or a virtual event.
We have the welcome, the body of the event, and then the momentum. The welcome and the momentum will probably apply to your events too. The body may change, but generally, the learning-connection-action format applies to most climate or social justice gatherings.
A Soapbox Action Hour is composed of:
- Welcome
- Connection
- Learning
- Action
- Momentum
Here's how we think about infusing courage, joy, and purpose into each of these pieces!
Welcome
- Get a cohesive visual element for all event helpers (e.g. add a ✨ emoji to the front of people’s names, have a shared virtual background, etc.)
‍ - Have something that signals to people’s brain that they’re at a gathering and can relax. This can be music, an initial icebreaker, you wearing something silly, etc.
‍ - Have 2 welcomes
‍- The first is to greet people at the “entrance” — this could be in the event chat or even in the waiting room
‍ - The second welcome is more around context-setting and grounding
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- You might have conversation prompts to help with the “buffer” time of waiting for people to arrive. The goal is for the buffer to feel like “real” event time, not “filler” time. Reward the people who got there on time!
Connection, learning, and action
- These outcomes should already be confirmed before your event is live. These outcomes are in order; we like to lead with connection.
- Have someone in charge of taking screenshots/capturing the chat/noting down profound quotes or insights/documenting questions
- Here is a blurb to introduce Soapbox. You could use this or make your own depending on the context of the event.
This event is (co/)hosted by Soapbox Project, a nonprofit organization that creates joyful community spaces to heal the climate crisis through connection, learning, and action. At Soapbox, we believe that climate anxiety and loneliness are two of the BIGGEST barriers to taking action on climate change, so our goal is to help you make friends in a space where you belong, learn something new, and do something to help your community before you leave.
Momentum
- Have a slide with QR codes or follow-up links. If you’re offering access to a WhatsApp/community chat post-event so people can join it, account for some time so they join it before they leave
‍- Have a prompt for them to post in the group before they leave
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- Announce any upcoming events
‍ - Optional: ask guests to record video testimonials about their experience
Facilitation principles
These are Soapbox Project's facilitation principles! If you're running your own organization, it's important that you come up with your own definition and corresponding principles.
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Your job as a facilitator is to be a courageous, charismatic channel. This means you:
- Hold the vibe. Model courage, joy, and curiosity wherever you can.
- Proactively check in on corner-sitters. For in person events, if you see someone who looks lost/confused, check in on them! You can say "hey, how's it going?" and ask them if they need any help navigating the space. For virtual events, the best way to do this is to leave time for quieter people. If volunteers are raising their hands to share an insight, wait an extra 10 seconds in case quieter people decide to speak up. When there is “awkward” silence, just wait it out. This is hard but very powerful.
- Be a channel not a dam. Our main principle of dealing with conflict in this space is to see how we can leverage it to make things better. Direct people’s energy instead of shutting it down. It’s a good idea to jot down some sample “spicy scenarios” that might come up before the event and what your response(s) might be.
‍ - Use your best judgment. This is a high-trust environment, so you can use your discretion to deal with tough scenarios. For Soapbox events: we just ask that you share afterwards with Soapbox HQ what you did/said, so that we can decide if that should be standard practice going forward.
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Virtual facilitation checklist
Here's a link to a virtual event template you can duplicate and modify.
Welcome
- Play some music that sets the stage
- Pull up any centering GIFs
- Share a land acknowledgement if appropriate and meaningful
- Pick a prompt to gauge energy level in the chat
- Invite people to hide their self views so that they can be present in the space
- Remind people that this time is for them and the best way to honor that is by closing tabs/turning off phone notifications
- Invite people to make any adjustments that make them 10% more comfortable—getting water, moving to a comfortable spot, standing up, stretching, etc.
Connection, learning, & action
- Do a 3-7 minute icebreaker in a breakout or a similar activity that gets people talking within the first 5 minutes of the event
- A go-to prompt is why is it important for you to be here today? and the wording of this prompt matters. The ideal group size is 3.
- Request 2-3participants to share in the larger group
- Share our community values, which we’ll have a chance to practice on the event
Momentum
- Announce upcoming events and opportunities
- Take a group pic via a screenshot
- Reiterate the skills and experiences people had on this event and include that in the follow-up email
After the event: the afterparty‍
- Stop the recording and welcome everyone to the afterparty!
Here's the link to your own facilitation checklist!
