The Facilitator School gives people the skills, tools, and resources they need to run better meetings, and guide groups to results in today’s distributed world.

For René Nauheimer and Daniel Wirtz, co-founders of Facilitator School, being able to smoothly onboard their participants onto Miro—especially for participants who have never used it before—is a big success factor for their new masterclass.

Initially using Miro over a Zoom call, they found it hard to keep people’s attention on the right windows, with participants unable to start off on a similar page every time.

After using Butter’s Miro integration, Facilitator School was able to simplify the Miro onboarding and collaboration process, which led to raving reviews for their new masterclass. A huge win. 🙌

Challenge: Clunky Miro onboarding

The Facilitator School was launching its flagship training program: the Facilitator Masterclass.

It’s a six-week cohort-based course designed to introduce people to facilitation and online collaboration, with a mix of on-demand courses and live workshops where they can learn by doing.

Even before launching their first masterclass, co-founder René Nauheimer knew that tools would play a big role in their client satisfaction.

“We need to build trust with the people we’re teaching, especially at the start of the masterclass. Since everything lives in Miro, the smoother the Miro onboarding experience is, the better for us,” said René.

The challenge was that facilitating workshops over Zoom made it difficult to get people oriented on Miro boards—especially when participants were new to the tool.

“The main issue was that tools like Zoom aren't made specifically for workshops. It wasn't that we encountered many problems with our existing tools—it was more that they didn't provide anything extra to engage people, lift the atmosphere, and create a feeling of togetherness.

“Using Zoom, every Miro link needed to be opened up in another tab. So participants had to switch tabs all the time with the links we provided in the chat.”

Unfortunately, that created confusion for their participants.

“People got lost. You never knew how it loaded for them. It was easy to lose their attention.”

Solution: Butter time!

After hearing about Butter’s built-in Miro integration, René decided to give the tool a try. Here’s how it changed their masterclasses.

Smoother onboarding calls

“I like to make sure that participants get to test any tool in advance. That way, they check for technical issues, but also feel more familiar when the actual session starts.”

René said that running his initial onboarding clients on Butter was easy.

“We were a bit reluctant to use Butter at first, since Zoom was quite accessible and we work with a lot of clients with different company firewall policies, browsers, and devices. After testing Butter during individual onboarding sessions with participants, we were reassured. It was easy for people to get on the tool—there were no installs needed. So we were ready to go!"

They could introduce their participants to everything they needed to know about Miro, directly from within Butter.

Streamlined Miro collaboration

Once their clients were comfortable using Butter, René said that Miro collaboration became much easier within the actual workshops.

“The main thing that changed for us is that we could actually make sure that people saw the same thing when entering Miro. Especially when they use the tool for the first time, just being able to show the board in the call window made it much easier for us to get started with the workshop. It made us feel more at ease.”

Super-delightful masterclasses

René said Butter’s interactive features make it much easier for them to boost the mood in their workshops.

“I'm a big fan of the waiting room, the various forms of interaction, and the thought given to breakout rooms. Participants really enjoyed playing around with the reaction features and using the queue. It was fun for them to experiment.”

Flexibility for facilitators with in-session editing

René said he appreciated the flexibility he gained from Butter.

“I enjoy the ability to create random breakout groups. Sometimes your plans during a workshop change, and you have to improvise a bit. Butter gives me the mind space to adapt in-session because I can prep lots of things ahead of time.”

Results: No more facilitation stress

The launch of the Facilitator Masterclass has been a huge success.

Though their course is still young, they already have a favorite Butter memory.

“My favorite session was the last Facilitator Masterclass session where people were genuinely engaged and using the reaction features a lot. We took a group picture in the end and I often look back to that moment of connection.”

Overall, Butter has given their facilitation team the tools they need to put their energy back into facilitating—rather than managing technology.

“It certainly also helped in having a lower stress level when facilitating since the design is very intuitive and the facilitation options are straightforward.”

Even more importantly, René says they’ve received lots of positive feedback about their class.

“Butter helped us to add to our participant satisfaction in a way that felt more personal. We were able to come together as a group on this tool.”

René's top Butter tip: "I like to make sure that participants get to test it out in advance. That way, they check for technical issues but also feel more familiar with Butter when the actual session starts."

Great advice, René! 💡

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If you’re looking to up your facilitation skills, you should definitely check out the Facilitator School.

To start giving your participants a more engaging workshop experience, sign up for Butter for free.