Driving Collaboration in virtual sessions

By Kelly Hanson, Process Improvement & Change Management Intern

May 5, 2021

A few months ago, the Office of Process Improvement (OPI) faced a new remote work challenge, converting process mapping to a virtual format. Under normal circumstances, this would have been done as a group session with whiteboards, swim lanes, and sticky notes in a large conference room. This setup encouraged collaboration and decision-making between team members, which is essential when multiple inputs are needed. 

Finding a virtual format to incorporate all of these elements was difficult. One of the projects where this came into play is Operation Good Neighbors, an initiative between the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) and the Denver Department of Transportation and Infrastructure. The different agencies had two different communication formats, Microsoft Teams and Google Suite. It was important to find a virtual format that worked with both formats. As a result, the Google virtual whiteboard, Jamboard, was not possible to use. Similarly, it was difficult to incorporate the necessary collaboration aspect into the process mapping tool Visio. 

Luckily, OPI found MURAL; a digital workplace for virtual collaboration. With MURAL's features, the project had an area where team members could share ideas and work together on process mapping. Despite having to work remotely, MURAL has made collaborative meetings possible again. Seeing the capabilities of MURAL, OPI has been working to find other projects that could benefit from the use of MURAL. 

To highlight MURAL’s features, OPI has created the following videos. For a quick MURAL overview, check out the MURAL Introduction. To see how we have used MURAL for process mapping, view MURAL - Virtual Process Mapping. 

Interested in using MURAL for your meetings? Contact Gary Vansuch at gary.vansuch@state.co.us.