Networking online – Events in times of Corona

Onboarding event under pandemic conditions

Normally, we would invite all new employees to the networking event “Meet the new” at the top of the Innovation Space on the 18th floor. With a view over Cologne, the newbies listen to exciting presentations by colleagues on innovation and New Work and then exchange ideas with long-time employees over drinks and snacks. Of course, this is not possible during Corona. The TÜV Tower has been empty for months, with most employees working from their home offices. And even the new colleagues have often never seen their workplace from the inside.

This meant we had to come up with something! After all, they should also feel welcome at TÜV Rheinland. And so “Meet the new online” was born

Hybrid Event – Preparation and program

A hybridi event – production team and moderators physically present, participants and speakers online – needs to be well prepared. To ensure that the connection is stable and the transmission runs smoothly, you need a lot of technology – and people who know how to use it.

Our technical crew with the technology for the event

The time had come on March 16 – Meet the new goes online. More than 80 participants from 15 locations throughout Germany joined the event live from home or the office. Of course, we were very pleased that our peer2peer-event was met with such great interest. The program started right away. My colleague Saskia Jakisch from HR Development & Diversity and I moderated the event.

This is not a virtual background. This is what our meeting room in the Innovation Space really looks like. 😉

Franziska Weiser from the Future Mobility Solutions team gave our first presentation. In her key note on the topic of “New Work for New Mobility,” she told us how she brings her passion for new, sustainable, and social mobility to TÜV Rheinland and designs solutions for it herself.

My colleague Stefan Ritter brought along tips for a mindful meeting and workday with “Work Consciously.” And Andreas Dickmeiss from the IT team gave an outlook on the new possibilities of the digital work tool Microsoft Teams under the motto “More team in Teams”. Breakout sessions, where all attendees could exchange ideas, rounded off the program.

The moderation team and the technical crew were tested negative for Covid-19 in advance.

Networking online? Any time!

Conclusion: “Meet the new online” was a complete success. 95 percent of participants found the format very good and would recommend it to others. This is the result of a survey we conducted with participants during and at the end of the event. They also immediately mentioned a number of suggestions for topics for follow-up events. In addition, we had set up a virtual community guestbook on Microsoft Teams where the new colleagues could leave their feedback:

An excerpt from the community guestbook.