Customizing the experience<\/strong><\/p>\nThe M12 team carefully considered how moving the event online would impact the presenters as well as the panel of judges: Steffens, along with Priya Saiprasad from Mayfield and Pivotal Ventures\u2019 Julie Wroblewski. They spread the pitch sessions out over two days; judges heard ten 30-minute pitches each day. M12 wanted to make sure each finalist had the judges\u2019 complete attention during their presentations, just as they would if they were presenting in a room. So rather than create a single meeting in which the finalists called in at a given time, M12 scheduled each presentation as an individual meeting. While one finalist gave her presentation, M12 Marketing Lead Colleen O\u2019Brien would jump to the following call to help the next one prepare. By organizing the event this way, O\u2019Brien was able to make sure each presenter had her deck ready to go and could check her audio and video in the \u201croom.\u201d Plus, it never hurts to have a little company when you\u2019re about to deliver a pitch and there are millions of dollars at stake.<\/p>\n
Preparing presenters<\/strong><\/p>\nIn the days before the call, O\u2019Brien held office hours so that each founder could call in and practice the pitch over Teams in advance. This way, they could work out any technical glitches in advance, get used to controlling the slides within the digital environment, and time out their presentation in front of a friendly audience. O\u2019Brien even sent the presenters screenshots so they got a sense of what the judges would see during the live event. This was essential for presenters who had not used Teams before, and it gave everyone a chance to get comfortable so that they could perform with focus when it counted.<\/p>\n
Another consideration: access to fast and reliable Wi-Fi varies. One founder dialing in from Pakistan forewarned judges that the Wi-Fi might cut out during her pitch. Another, who lives in a Michigan neighborhood full of online video game players, even took the step to contact those neighbors to request that they limit streaming during her presentation time. If they lost connection, presenters were given the option to call into the Teams meeting directly. And the judges were sent copies of every presenter\u2019s slides in advance. If a presentation stalled, they always had a local version to follow along with.<\/p>\n
Creating human connection<\/strong><\/p>\nTypically, when venture funds invest in an entrepreneur, they spend time getting to know the founders behind the startup. And during their pitch, presenters get a sense of the funder\u2019s reaction as well\u2014are they leaning forward and engaged? Are they looking back at the slides to better understand something?\u2014and can adjust based on these cues. The team wanted to enable this human connection as much as possible and kept their video on whenever possible. And because the Teams interface allowed judges to see both the slides and the presenter\u2019s face at the same time, the virtual presentation came alive to judges in a way it could not if they were seeing the presentation deck alone.<\/p>\n
Lessons learned<\/h3>\n While the M12 team is encouraged by the success of their virtual event, they did learn some things along the way.<\/p>\n
For event planners:<\/strong><\/p>\nSchedule thoughtfully.<\/strong> There\u2019s a certain energy that happens when you gather a group of people in a room. This energy is hard to recreate online and, without it, fatigue can set in earlier. Natural interruptions are fewer, and pick-me-ups like hallway chats and side tables with coffee, water, and snacks are notably absent at home. While the judges took breaks between pitches, hearing 10 pitches over two days proved challenging. In the future, the team plans to spread virtual events out a bit more than they would with in-person events.<\/p>\nFor virtual presenters:<\/strong><\/p>\nFind your light. <\/strong>We are used to presenting in professional conference rooms or from well-lit stages. Home lighting tends to be duller. Play with lighting to create a bright backdrop and enlist a family member to take pictures or video so you have a sense of what your audience will see.<\/p>\nHave fun!<\/strong> Even some of the most dynamic in-person presenters can be tempted to tone it down when presenting virtually. Resist the urge to read from a script. Practice just like you would for a stage performance, and deliver your pitch directly to the audience, as if you were altogether in a room. The M12 team also encouraged presenters to be authentic and embrace the experiment\u2014we are all working through a challenging moment together, and there is plenty of room for humor and humanity.<\/p>\nBy quickly moving their competition to Microsoft Teams, M12 is on schedule to announce their winners and deliver essential capital to four extraordinary female founders. They successfully took an important event online by considering how the move to digital would impact the event and its participants; customizing the experience to meet their specific needs; and giving presenters an opportunity to practice within the tool so they could be truly present during their pitch to the judges. They also considered potential issues, including a lack of familiarity with the tool and Wi-Fi quality, and put measures in place to address them. And they embraced a growth mindset, encouraging everyone to be authentic and understanding under challenging circumstances. We hope their experience is helpful to you as you work to bring your own events online. We\u2019ll be sharing more remote-work stories from our customers in the days to come, so please check back here often.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Here\u2019s what Microsoft\u2019s venture fund learned in the process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3368610,"featured_media":234134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ms_queue_force_push":false,"ms_queue_id":"","ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","_classifai_text_to_speech_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"audience":[4081],"content-type":[4033],"product":[4036,4070],"coauthors":[4726],"class_list":["post-234131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","audience-enterprise","content-type-events","product-microsoft-365","product-teams"],"yoast_head":"\n
M12 turned its Female Founders Competition into a virtual event<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n