How does an online whiteboard help you run efficient brainstorming sessions?

It is essential that you and your teams get the most out of your brainstorming sessions. There used to be a time when all work was conducted in the same workspace. If you held a meeting, everyone attended in person and there were limited ways to save and disseminate information. These days that has all changed. 

There are multiple apps, networks, channels, platforms, and so on. Finding the right information in the right format at the right time can be extremely hard work. And managing people and systems to ensure that the work they are doing is efficient, effective, and continuing to drive the business forward in the most productive way can be challenging.

Finding a tool that provides an ideal workspace for engaging and efficient team brainstorming – that has multiple other applications too – is critical. A tool like an online whiteboard.

Working in-person or remotely with one digital workspace

To avoid the constant problems thrown up by the numerous apps and platforms that so many companies now find themselves working with, teams can work with one digital workspace instead, such as a collaboration platform. This creates a cohesive and efficient work environment and enables teams to achieve their goals more effectively.

A single digital workspace offers a centralized hub where team members can access and share information and all the relevant resources relating to a project. This helps teams save time, reduces confusion, and ensures everyone has easy access to the latest updates and materials. 

Collaboration is made simpler as a common platform allows for easier real-time communication, file sharing, and simultaneous editing. Whether a team is based in the same workspace or is working on a remote or hybrid basis, collaboration can be seamless. Team members can easily access shared documents, brainstorming boards, project plans, task lists, and so on. This promotes a more productive work environment.

When you have a team of people working together it helps if they can establish streamlined workflows and processes. With a single digital workspace, a team can follow consistent practices. This promotes efficiency, reduces errors, and improves overall productivity. It will provide better organization and structure for the team’s work as files and documents are all in the same space and can be categorized, tagged, or stored. 

Team members can quickly locate and retrieve relevant information, reducing the time spent on searching for important resources or finding ways to ensure they are all easily accessible. With version control you can also reduce the likelihood of people working on the wrong version of a document and keep track of any changes made: as well as being able to revert to former versions if necessary.

There will always be apps or other software that your team might need to integrate into their workspace, and it makes sense to use one that allows for this. You need videoconferencing facilities that are tied in with all your documents and workflow. This will help to reduce the necessity for duplication or switching between multiple apps. 

It is also more secure as team administrators can set permissions and restrictions so that sensitive information is protected and only accessible to authorized individuals.

How an online whiteboard provides the centralized brainstorming workspace you need

An online whiteboard has multiple functionalities that benefit teams working on projects together. It does all the things you need a single digital workspace to do. As a versatile collaborative tool, it enhances productivity and efficiency and makes teamwork more rewarding.

A virtual whiteboard provides a centralized platform for information sharing with real-time collaboration. It can be flexible and adaptable to accommodate various workflows, and readymade templates are available to make your sessions more consistent and productive. 

Because an online whiteboard is accessible from anywhere at any time, teams can easily work and run efficient brainstorming together remotely or in person. Integration with other tools is possible, enhancing its usefulness and making it a versatile and essential component of a digital workspace.

Why an online whiteboard is essential for efficient brainstorming sessions

Brainstorming is a vital component in any project management, as well as being a useful tool for many business scenarios when an innovative solution is sought. The basics of brainstorming are very simple but there are many ways to approach a session, depending on the circumstances and what you wish to get out of it. 

However, regardless of the type of brainstorming session your team would benefit from, using a virtual whiteboard can enhance your team’s productivity and creativity. This applies to remote brainstorming sessions and those being run in person.

With an online whiteboard you have all the functionalities of a traditional whiteboard, plus a whole load more. With an online whiteboard you get:

1. Real-time collaboration 

An online whiteboard enables real-time collaboration among team members, regardless of whether they are in the same workspace or dispersed across the globe. Participants can simultaneously contribute ideas for brainstorming sessions, creating a dynamic and interactive experience. Ideas can be rapidly generated and refined, saving time and effort.

2. Accessibility and inclusivity 

One of the key ingredients to a successful brainstorming session is diversity. The more team members you have on board with varied experiences and outlooks, the more likely you are to get creative and innovative ideas. 

An online whiteboard makes sessions accessible to all, regardless of where they are based. You can therefore include team members with different perspectives without worrying about the cost of getting them to a meeting or taking up too much of their time.

3. Visual management 

An online whiteboard allows for the visual organization of ideas. Team members can use digital sticky notes and drawing tools to visually structure and connect concepts. This can make it easier to understand complex ideas and see relationships between them. It can be much quicker and easier to identify patterns and rearrange or group ideas as needed when you are using a visual management tool.

4. Documentation 

Instead of completing a brainstorming session and then having to circulate various things to various people while ensuring you have the right version of every document, your teams will have an easily accessible digital record of the session. 

All the ideas, discussions, and annotations made on the whiteboard will have been captured and saved for future reference. This means that no ideas are lost, and team members can review the session at any point in the future. If any team members were unable to attend, they will be able to access the session when they choose.

5. Asynchronous brainstorming 

Not all brainstorming sessions have to be undertaken as a collaborative exercise in real time. Remote team members or those working in different time zones can contribute ideas and provide input at a time that suits them, asynchronously. This helps to ensure a broader range of perspectives and reduce any scheduling constraints.

6. Integrations 

While many tools, such as videoconferencing and time and project management tools are already an integral part of a good online whiteboard, there may still be other collaborative tools that would be beneficial to a brainstorming team. The ability to integrate other elements allows for seamless communication and information sharing is vital.

By leveraging the features of an online whiteboard, teams can streamline their brainstorming process. This will help increase team engagement and improve teamwork, leading to more productive, efficient, and successful sessions.

How remote teams can benefit from brainstorming with an online whiteboard

It used to be extremely difficult for teams working remotely to collaborate and share ideas in real time. Emails would go backwards and forward while multiple versions of the same documents would be in circulation. No one ever quite knew what was going on or what the outcome might be.

With an online whiteboard, not only can remote teams work together more efficiently, but large numbers of people can also contribute to the same event. This offers all sorts of possibilities.

1. Large remote brainstorming sessions are easily manageable with an online whiteboard

For example, L’Oréal, the world’s largest cosmetics company, needed to organize a brainstorming session under lockdown conditions with more than 250 participants based throughout the world. This was no mean feat, but an online whiteboard and all the right tools made this possible.

Vincent Arcin, the manager responsible for organizing such a large brainstorming session was able to set up and organize a meeting with just five days’ notice. Using the Klaxoon whiteboard and its readymade brainstorming templates designed to produce the sort of results the session was looking for, he was able to create two sessions with the same whiteboard: one in the morning, and one in the afternoon. This meant that there was some flexibility with timing while ensuring that all the information gathered went to the same place.

It was a great success: ‘The workshop groups ended with no less than 700 unique ideas, many more than similar meetings at L’Oréal had ever achieved in the past’. Once they had gathered all the initial ideas, the team at L’Oréal whittled these down to five, and eventually the one that would go on to inform the next phase of their project.

2. Efficient brainstorming sessions with hybrid teams

Hybrid teams can be the best of both worlds or the worst of both worlds. With a hybrid team brainstorming session, you have all the benefits of a remote team and of a team working together in person. But how do you put them together and create something that works? 

Remote team members can be anywhere. This means you can have greater diversity as you are not constrained by distance from the meeting. This has a significant impact on the time and costs involved in getting someone to attend. With team members in the same workspace, you have physical interaction and all the benefits that can bring, such as the advantage of non-verbal communication and other social advantages that can help with bonding and engagement.

SIG, a local service provider based in Geneva, Switzerland, needed to run a brainstorming session that involved 200 people, some of whom were based in the office, and some of whom were based remotely. Using a virtual whiteboard meant that each participant had the same experience regardless of where they were based. All the information was gathered in the same central space and the ideas that were generated could be assessed and worked on by the team managers as soon as the session was finished.

This hybrid session produced more than 300 ideas. They were sorted into themes using the relevant online whiteboard tools rather than having to go through them individually and assigning them a category. Data could also be extracted and represented visually, making it simpler to understand. 

An online whiteboard also offers an interface that means people can remain anonymous if they wish to. This can lead to more candid responses and can help inform future strategies more honestly.

3. Brainstorming with your teams in person

The traditional way of brainstorming is enhanced using an online whiteboard, for all the reasons we have looked at. And if you have the choice between an interactive whiteboard and a virtual whiteboard, why wouldn’t you use the latter with all its additional functionality?

Everything you need for efficient brainstorming with a virtual whiteboard

Board, the online whiteboard from Klaxoon's collaboration platform, offers a range of ready-to-use brainstorming templates to enhance your workshops or meetings. 

The right collaborative tools can help teams improve their efficiency, whether they are in the same workspace or based remotely. Why not check out our resources to see how we can help you?