Not every collaboration needs to happen in real-time. Sometimes, the best ideas emerge when people have space to think, reflect, and contribute on their own terms. That’s where asynchronous collaboration comes in — and it’s exactly what Beekast’s Participant Mode was designed to enable.
Instead of cramming everyone into the same timeline, Participant Mode lets team members engage with content, complete activities, and share input at their own pace. This leads to more inclusive participation, deeper thinking, and better outcomes for your team.
In this guide, we’ll show you five practical ways to use Beekast’s Participant Mode to transform how your team collaborates — from weekly check-ins to brainstorming sessions — without adding another meeting to anyone’s calendar.
What is Participant Mode in Beekast?
Participant mode in Beekast is a self-paced session experience. It allows participants to move through the slides and complete any interactive activities at their own pace — instead of waiting for the facilitator to “lead and control” the experience.
Facilitators still retain visibility into participant progress through the Participants tab. Here, you can see who’s connected, how far they’ve gone in the session, and completed activities. You can also track engagement using points and “Bees” — a participation-based score.
Who is Beekast Participant Mode for?
Participant Mode is perfect for any type of asynchronous collaboration, including:
- Self-paced training: give learners time to absorb information, revisit slides, and complete activities without feeling rushed.
- Onboarding programs: new hires can work through sessions at their own pace while you track progress and follow up when needed.
- Distributed teams: no need to juggle time zones or force calendar alignment, everyone can participate when it works best for them.
- Workshops and brainstorming: capture thoughtful input by giving people space to reflect before contributing.
- Project updates or async standups: replace repetitive live meetings with structured sessions that keep everyone aligned.
Benefits of Participant Mode for Your Meetings
Not every meeting needs to be live or facilitator-led. Sometimes, giving people space to engage on their own time leads to better focus, input, and outcomes.
Here are some common reasons why teams use participant mode when hosting an interactive meeting on Beekast.
1. Participant Mode Makes Your Meeting Inclusive
Participants don’t have to engage with your content at the same pace. Fast learners can move through the session quickly, while others can take the time to absorb information, reflect, and interact with each slide.
This is super valuable when you’re working with teams across different roles, learning styles, or comfort levels with digital tools. Some people thrive in fast-paced discussions. Others need quiet time to think before contributing. Participant Mode gives both the space to engage in a way that works for them, without disrupting the flow for anyone else.
As a facilitator, you’re not stuck trying to deliver the ‘perfect’ pace. You can focus on designing the right experience, knowing that each person will move through it on their own terms.
2. It Reduces Meeting Fatigue
About 95% of employees experience video meeting fatigue. When every meeting requires real-time presence, people multitask, struggle to keep up, or simply zone out.
Participant Mode helps break that cycle by removing the need for every session to happen live. Instead of sitting through another real-time meeting, people can engage with content when ready. It reduces unnecessary calls, reduces context switching, and gives people more control over their time, leading to more thoughtful participation.
3. It Improves Engagement
It’s easy for a few voices to dominate live meetings while others stay quiet. But in Participant Mode, everyone gets an opportunity to interact with content, respond to activities, and share feedback.
When people have time to think, without pressure to respond on the spot, they tend to give more thoughtful, relevant input. This leads to better-quality responses, broader participation, and more useful input for you as the facilitator.
5 Ways to Collaborate Asynchronously Using Participant Mode.
First, you need to enable Participant Mode in Beekast:
Step 1: Create your Session by importing your slides or presentations, adding activities, and organizing your content.
Step 2: Click the Settings icon at the top-right of your session interface to access configuration options. Under General, select Asynchronous mode (scrolling by participant).
Step 3: After saving your settings, share the session link, code, or QR code with participants. They’ll be able to engage with content at their own pace from the moment they join.
Once you’ve set this up, you can start collaborating with your team.
1. Host Weekly Team Meetings to Stay Aligned
Set up an asynchronous session for recurring team check-ins at the end of the week.
Ask each team member to submit a quick “weather report” on how their week went, especially wins, challenges, and blockers. Managers can spot blockers early, get a pulse on team sentiment, and follow up before the next live session.
You can also use Beekast’s board activity to organize updates into columns like “To Do,” “In Progress,” and “Done.” This becomes a single source of truth for tracking task progress and providing visibility for everyone on your team.
2. Brainstorm Ideas and Collect Feedback
Brainstorming doesn’t have to mean corralling everyone onto a two‑hour video call. Plus, it’s challenging to get the best ideas from your team when you put them on the spot.
Instead, include a canvas or board in your asynchronous session where people can contribute ideas over several days. Participants can drop in a thought whenever inspiration strikes and use a message board to comment on one another’s contributions.
This slow‑burn approach lets quiet thinkers shine and avoids the pressure of generating ideas on the spot. When the idea‑collection window closes, invite everyone to vote on their favourites before the live discussion.
3. Track Project Status
Large projects often suffer from endless check‑ins. Sometimes, you spend more time syncing on project status than actually getting work done.
Instead, include a Kanban board (with a shared view) in your asynchronous session to collect task updates. Stakeholders can update task status and blockers, and keep everyone informed on their own schedules.
When it’s time to meet synchronously, you can dive straight into problem‑solving rather than reciting status updates.
4. Host Self-Paced Training Sessions
When onboarding multiple people or rolling out training to a large team, it’s not always practical to host live sessions for everyone. And even if you could, learners might still struggle to review materials, revisit slides, or ask follow-up questions in the moment.
With Participant Mode, you can upload your course materials, add interactive activities, and let learners move through the content at their own pace. They can submit responses or questions asynchronously, and trainers can monitor progress, give feedback, and follow up where needed.
If a live Q&A session feels helpful, you can always schedule one once everyone has had time to go over the essentials.
5. Collect Input from Your Team
This tracks closely with our point on brainstorming. Asynchronous sessions can be a more effective way to collect input from your team and vet ideas before jumping into decisions. They give people time to think, reflect, and contribute without the pressure of having to speak up on the spot.
You can take a blended approach here. Start with an asynchronous session where everyone shares their ideas on their own time. Then, during your live meeting, you already have a pool of ideas to build on — so the conversation is focused, not starting from scratch.
It’s a simple shift that leads to more thoughtful contributions, better use of meeting time, and a wider range of perspectives, especially from quieter team members who might not speak up in a live brainstorm.
Best Practices for Asynchronous Team Collaboration in Beekast
These best practices ensure that asynchronous collaboration is effective:
- Set clear expectations upfront: let participants know what’s expected of them, what they need to complete, when to complete it, and how their input will be used. This helps people prioritize and avoid confusion later on.
- Keep sessions focused and lightweight: don’t overload your session with too much content. Focus on one objective per session. Remember, clarity improves team engagement and interaction.
- Use structured activities to guide input: boards, polls, and open questions can structure the conversation. Instead of a blank canvas, offer prompts or categories so people know how to contribute meaningfully. Beekast has several interactive meeting activities you can add to your sessions to improve engagement.
- Make it easy to navigate: in Participant Mode, everyone moves at their own pace. So keep slides clear, label activities intuitively, and group related content together. A logical flow reduces drop-off.
- Check progress and follow up: use the Participants tab to see who’s engaged and what’s been submitted. Follow up with reminders or targeted nudges if someone’s falling behind or if a discussion needs more input.
- Blend async with live when needed: async doesn’t mean isolated. Consider scheduling short live sessions to kick off a project or wrap up with a discussion, using the async session as the foundation.
- Close the loop: summarize key takeaways or next steps at the end of the session so participants know how their input was used. This builds trust and encourages future participation.
Help Your Team Collaborate and Interact Better With Beekast
Instead of defaulting to another live meeting, you can create space for deeper thinking, broader participation, and more meaningful contributions with Beekast.
Start small. Pick one recurring meeting or collaboration challenge your team faces and try the asynchronous approach. Enable Participant Mode, set clear expectations, and watch how giving people time and space to engage on their own terms leads to better outcomes for everyone.
Your team’s best ideas might be waiting for the right moment to emerge, and that moment doesn’t have to happen in a conference room.
Want to see how Beekast works for your team? Create your first async meeting session for free.