What is Makeshapes?
Makeshapes helps organizations run group learning at scale. Until now, there were two options. Facilitated workshops work well, but they're hard to scale. E-learning scales, but people take it alone, and it rarely changes much. Makeshapes is a third option, On-Demand Group Learning: short, interactive sessions that small groups take together, wherever they are.
Each session runs itself. The group watches a shared screen and joins in on their phones, while audio and on-screen instructions guide them through each activity and discussion. The person running it is a host, not a trainer. The host starts the session and keeps it moving, and no expert needs to be in the room. We call this auto-facilitation.
How it works
Makeshapes covers the whole life of a learning experience:
Create: build an experience in the editor from media (video, slideshow or audio), interactive activities such as polls, post-its and word clouds, and group discussions. Start with designing an experience.
Deliver: groups take the experience in person, online or hybrid. Everyone responds on their own phone, so every voice is heard, including the quieter ones.
Report: see attendance, engagement and what groups said in analytics and reports.
Why organizations use Makeshapes
Many organizations train a few senior leaders and hope the ideas reach everyone else. They rarely do. With Makeshapes, every team has the conversation themselves:
Scale without losing quality: the same session can run with hundreds of small groups, and every group gets the same experience.
Less reliance on facilitators: the session guides itself, so you don't need to find, train and schedule an expert for every group.
Hybrid equity: learners joining from home get the same share of voice as those in the room.
Discussion turned into insight: anonymous responses are combined across groups, so you can hear what people really think, for example about a new strategy.
Safety by design: anonymous activities and shared agreements make it easier for learners to be honest.
To find a place to start, see common use cases for Makeshapes.