Breakout Session Strategies and Ideas:

Your Guide to Memorable Conferences & Events

Breakout sessions can be a highly effective and fun way to break up your main meeting into smaller, topic-focused sessions.

These sessions can be used to achieve a specific goal or discuss a certain topic. The smaller groups can also add an extra element of fun by adding a theme, or by having them in a unique venue, like the Exit 33 nightlife and lounges at Turning Stone.

Keep in mind how attendees will flow from your main session to the breakouts. From beverage stations to bathrooms, your Turning Stone event specialist can help you plan the flow of your breakouts and help keep people engaged. We’ve put together some of their top strategies and ideas to help you make the most out of breakout sessions for your next meeting or convention in Central New York. Let’s dive in.

REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL

Why Breakout Sessions Matter

Meeting planners know that no matter how thoroughly and thoughtfully a conference has been planned out, attention spans eventually decline as the day goes on. Breakout sessions can offer enjoyable and motivating activities for smaller groups, getting people up and moving but also offering a fresh setting to keep the day – and the energy – flowing.

For example, personalized and interactive sessions can make it a fun experience. Think quizzes, games or even outdoor sessions.

You can also separate certain breakout groups by common interests. Here’s an example for brainstorming sessions:

• One group for football fans
• One group for golfers
• One group for baseball fans

Having a common interest makes participation easier, introduces an organizing metaphor you can use to theme content and is also rewarding by building connections with other attendees.

Improved Attendee Engagement

If a conference schedule is missing arcs of interest, fatigue and disengagement can sometimes go hand-in-hand, affecting the attendees’ moods, performance or interest. Breakout sessions can offer informal or even whimsical sections that can liven up the day.

A growing body of science points to something we’ve all known since childhood: make a game out of it, and people are more likely to engage in gamification. Start the breakout by going on a quest or adventure and have a mini celebration when the breakout ends.

The gamification could continue throughout the day, or even the conference, and stoke some friendly competition within the group or teams.

Networking Opportunities

When given the chance, attendees love to network. If networking is one of your goals, keep seating style in mind. Try to avoid seating configurations like auditorium and go for banquet, cabaret or hollow square or U-shaped seating for higher interactivity. Your event manager can help you plan what’s best for your particular group, depending on your goals, group size and how well they already know or work with each other.

Always plan to get everyone engaged. For extroverts, incorporate dynamic, interactive exercises that encourage collaboration and lively exchanges. One-on-one interactions and quiet reflection within the group setting may work better for introverts.

You can also consider using PechaKucha as a networking idea. Popularized in Japan in the early 2000s, this presentation style uses 20 slides with 20 seconds each for non-stop storytelling in 400 seconds per presenter. Both challenging and fun, it keeps the energy moving and nudges people to share something about themselves or their role.

At Turning Stone, there’s also plenty of room to let your creativity roam. Our professional meeting and events experts can help you set up breakout networking opportunities at beautiful meeting spaces in unexpected locations, from the barn-style Tin Rooster Dancehall & BBQ to the Gatsby inspired Turquoise Tiger lounge and cocktail bar.

EXPLORE VENUES

Deeper Dives into Specific Topics

If you’re holding an accounting conference, for instance, breakouts could explore specialties within your industry. One breakout could learn more about “Nonprofits Accounting” vs. “Government Accounting” or specialty topics like “Forensic Accounting.” Get people up and moving into breakouts by audience segments, regions, guest speakers or industry experts.

Turn to trends not only in your own industry, but across the zeitgeist of the day, like the ever-changing role of social media on younger clients or the growing prevalence of AI.

This allows attendees to choose a special topic of interest for them, but also keeps from layering too many one-size-fits-all topics across the conference.

Cater to Diverse Interests and Learning Styles

Attendees have a variety of different learning styles, and breakouts allow you to try to incorporate all four learning styles:

1. Visual (slides or visual aids)
2. Auditory (encourage discussions or storytelling elements)
3. Reading/Writing (provide handouts and opportunities to write)
4. Kinesthetic (hands-on activities, take breaks)

Also, if you know your presenters’ styles, plan your day to match the arc of an event. That also mixes the various learning styles up so that you don’t have an afternoon of passive viewing of presentations, or your best interactive presentations at the beginning of the day when energy is already the highest.

Planning Your Breakout Sessions: A Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1: Set Your Time Frame

On average, many breakout sessions often last a half-hour to an hour. Some virtual breakout sessions may be even shorter, like 10-15 minutes.

Check with your presenter to see what length would be ideal for them. Also, keep in mind to allow time for food, drinks, and restroom breaks.

Step 2: Define Your Objectives

Objectives are not only helpful for the organizer or presenter, but they give attendees helpful structure too. When setting your breakout objectives, keep these three goals in mind:

1. Have clear instructions
2. Keep goals achievable
3. Have a way to measure your success

Step 3: Choose the Right Format

• Presentations (traditional where a presenter shows the information and makes the material relatable to their audience)
• Workshop (shorter, deeper work, often emphasizing interaction or collaboration)
• Discussions (opportunity to share thoughts and opinions either as a limited panel, typically on stage, or open to all.)

Step 4: Get Creative with Content

Here are a few breakout session ideas at Turning Stone Resort Casino, New York’s most awarded resort:

• Brainstorming session at The Lodge Boardroom. This lets you flow to our panoramic Great Lawn, via your own private access, for a memorable outdoors food and drink celebration once the session ends.
• Networking with a team building at the Golf Academy
• Icebreaker session at The Gig
• Speed networking at NY Rec & Social Club

Step 5: Optimize Your Space and Technology

When selecting meeting rooms, keep size, seating and flow in mind.

Some breakout sessions can benefit from getting larger meeting rooms that let you choose more space-intensive styles like banquet, cabaret or hollow square seating. While these can require a lot more space, the right seating style can make all the difference to a successful breakout session since they allow for more group interaction.

But if a breakout session is more educational based, classrooms or chevron classroom style can certainly work as well.

Finally, keep in mind that some cool interactive technologies can make your breakout more enjoyable and efficient, too. These can be used live, and sometimes in combination with hybrid remote events.

• Polls
• Quizzes
• Surveys
• Brainstorming
• Leaderboards

Step 6: Facilitate and Moderate Effectively

A great breakout facilitator is often the secret sauce for productive sessions. An experienced facilitator can not only read the room to engage attendees, but also keep the session on track toward your goals.

If you’re not sure how effective a facilitator was, check the audience feedback from your last conference. If a session received lots of positive feedback, chances are the facilitator did their job well. Don’t let that be your only guide, though. Some sessions may have received some negative reviews due to technical or timing issues that are unrelated to the facilitators, of course.

Measuring Success: Going Beyond Attendee Satisfaction

Gather Feedback

Surveys or polls can be super helpful to see how useful the breakout session was.

• You can also hand out printed survey forms after the breakout session.
• . Interactive polls on sites like SurveyMonkey can also be sent to participants. This could be as a text message when the session ended, or
  also as an email later that day.
• As the session ends, you could do this with a show-of-hands to see how everyone liked the session.

This feedback lets you see which sessions were most successful, and get comments and reactions to what went well, or what could be improved next time.

Track Engagement Metrics

Technology is everywhere to track engagement but can also offer fun participation. Consider using tools such as:

1. Live polls
2. Enrollment metrics
3. Registration for bonuses or giveaways
4. Gamification (like downloading a certificate at the end, or enter a challenge or contest)
5. You can also track metrics by having attendees post certain hashtags on some social media sites

Breakout Sessions at Turning Stone

Curious how else we can help you plan your group event? Call 888.361.7958 to speak with an Event Specialist or submit an RFP using the button below. From event planning to catering, breakout session ideas to some of the best meeting and entertainment venues in Central New York, our expert team is here to help take your next meeting or convention to the next level.

REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL