Knowing something about your fellow participants is an obvious way of improving communication, and yet it is often neglected or executed poorly. (278)
The most common way for participants to get to know each other is to have them introduce themselves. The simplest form of this is the roll call, where the participants announce themselves by name. A roll call at the beginning of a teleconference, for example, can vastly improve the quality of the ensuing conversation, because the medium otherwise prevents you from seeing who's there. (See the Tools section below for more on teleconferences.) The biggest challenge with introductions is keeping them brief, yet meaningful. There are a number of ways to do this, as discussed in more detail below. (279)
Remember that introductions are not the only way for participants to get to know each other. People will naturally get to know each other by interacting. You can design the interactions in such a way to optimize this process. For example, at the Tools for Catalyzing Collaboration workshops, we skipped introductions entirely. Instead, we designed the exercises so that people progressively learn enough about each other so that they can work together effectively, and we supplemented this with things like NameTags and AttendeeLists?. (For more on this, see TccWorkshop:WorkshopDesign2006.) (27A)
Face-To-Face Events (27B)
A great way for people to get to know each other at face-to-face events is to use IceBreakers. You should also have NameTags. AttendeeLists? are a great way for participants to get to know each other both before and after an event. (OnlineProfiles? are a form of AttendeeLists?.) (27C)
Tools (27D)
OnlineProfiles? are a good way to get to know the participants in a group or community, both in a face-to-face and an online context. SocialNetworking? tools act as a form of OnlineProfiles?. (27E)
MailingLists and telephone conferences don't have a way of seeing the other participants by default, so you have to overcome these in other ways. This is an advantage of using OnlineConference? tools or VoIP? technology (like Skype). (27F)