Using a Workshop Experience Inventory When Workshops Go Wrong

Today’s post is by author, editor and book coach Alissa Butterworth.

Over the last two decades, I’ve participated in and moderated many workshops and critique groups. I will never forget stopping in the bathroom after an MFA workshop session concluded, only to run into a classmate whose work was just discussed. She’d sequestered herself there, sobbing. Something in the workshop we’d just attended had touched a deep nerve for her, and it didn’t seem like it felt good.

Writing workshops and critique groups are great—I run a longstanding one! They can be places of insight and growth. They can also be places where human nature gets the best of us, and all sorts of emotions enter the critique room. Writers who share their work are vulnerable folks—they’re putting not only their work out there, but also something of themselves.

With vulnerability comes the possibility of getting hurt. While sitting through a critique of your writing might be uncomfortable, it shouldn’t leave you feeling icky, distressed, or persecuted. You should leave a workshop feeling invigorated, not defeated. If a group discussion of your writing makes you regret sharing it or unsettles you deeply (think of my MFA colleague), then something’s gone wrong.

When a workshop goes wrong, what can you do?

Some writers withdraw quietly, dealing with their conflicted feelings alone. Others resolve to stay away from classes led by that particular instructor, or by that writing group. Still others avoid workshops in the future. The worst outcome is when a writer stops writing altogether.

When a critique group doesn’t work, it’s easy to let heightened emotions guide your next steps. The problem is that in letting the emotions caused by a negative workshop experience dominate your decision making, you’ll potentially miss out on many better experiences going forward.

Instead of writing off workshops and critique groups all together (pun intended), try using a Workshop Experience Inventory to objectively examine what happened and why it made you feel as you do. In reflecting on your experience in a systematic way, you’ll get back to writing sooner and with more confidence.

The Workshop Experience Inventory is an investigative tool designed to help evaluate your experience in a workshop or critique group. You can use it when workshops go well, but it is especially useful for situations when they don’t. The Inventory falls somewhere between data collection and journaling. The goal is to help lead you toward real and deep reflection on what happened in your critique group so that you can move forward.

Here’s how the Workshop Experience Inventory works.

Part 1: The logistics

In the first part of the Inventory, capture the objective details of your workshop experience, like how often the group met and who participated. These details will be helpful to refer to in later parts of the Inventory. By starting with an overview of the workshop, you’ll be able to uncover elements that were particularly successful or unsuccessful.

• Where did the group meet? How often? Was it in-person or virtual?
• How did the group exchange manuscripts and feedback? (e.g., Google drive, paper copies, discussion) How often?
• Who moderated meetings? (ex. an instructor, a group member)
• What sort of writer did the group serve/attract? How many writers participated?
• What work was required during meetings? Between meetings? (e.g., three hours a week reading and responding to manuscripts)
• Are there any other relevant details? (e.g., the room you met in had uncomfortable seating, video conferencing was easy to use)

Once you have the objective details down, you’ll move on to how those elements made you feel in Parts 2 and 3 of the Inventory.

Part 2: What worked

When a critique group leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth it’s easy to focus on what went wrong. While understandable, this doesn’t let you see the experience fully, for both what worked and what could have been better.

In the second part of the Inventory, focus on what worked well for you during the workshop. Even when workshops go wrong, there’s likely something positive you can take forward. You might have learned about a new craft book, explored a new genre, or made a new friend. By identifying what worked, you’ll know what to look for in your next critique group.

• What was most successful in the workshop? (e.g., having submission deadlines, meeting online)
• Did you accomplish any goals through your participation? (e.g., you finally got feedback on your cliffhanger ending, you wrote and revised a new poem)
• What relationships and connections did the group provide? (e.g., a sense of community, a new friendship built on your shared love for speculative fiction, a coffee date with a potential accountability partner)
• What was your impact on the other writers in the group? Recognizing that you both give and receive in a workshop is key. Were you engaged in discussion? Did you support other writers to the best of your ability? Were you a friendly face? A knowledgeable resource?
• Finally, note any other useful features of your group experience that you’d look for in workshops going forward. Be as specific as you can. (e.g., you liked meeting on Tuesday afternoons, the moderator was adept at leading discussions)

Part 3: What didn’t work

In Part 3 of the Inventory, reflect on what didn’t work in your group experience. This is where you’ll address how features from Part 1 made you feel. Even though it might be difficult to focus on what went wrong, remember that by unpacking what happened you’re doing essential work to help yourself get past it.

Be as specific as possible so you can pinpoint exactly what elements caused you to feel as you do. Aim to be precise in your answers, rather than broad. This allows you to drill down to what the real problem was, rather than what your emotions might make you think it was. For example, it’s a lot more useful to your process of inquiry to say, “The moderator allowed some overly negative comments to slip into conversation” rather than “Everyone in the group was mean.”

Here are some common ways that workshops and critique groups might not work for writers. Choose what applies, taking notes on the specifics of your situation.

• Logistics: Were there too many or not enough submissions of your writing? Too much work between meetings? Did the group meet too often or not frequently enough?
• Venue: Would you have preferred in-person meetings? Virtual meetings? A mix? Was the venue hard to get to or to access?
• Participants: Were there too many writers, or too few? Would a shared-interest group have been a better fit (e.g., a group geared for stay-at-home parents, a memoir-only group)? Or would more diversity in participants have helped?
• Stage of the writing process you’re at: Did you discover you’re still drafting and your work isn’t yet ready for others’ eyes? Was there a mismatch between where your work was and that of other participants (e.g., you had a final draft while everyone else was generating ideas).
• Attitude/etiquette of the workshop: Were writers overly negative, or unable to provide positive feedback? Was the writer’s voice respected and experience validated? Was there a balance of commentary on what’s working, as well as what could be stronger, in your work?
• Workshop format: Were you asked to stay silent during discussions of your writing? Did you have a say in how your discussions went? Could participants ask questions about feedback?
• Ineffective moderator/workshop leader: Did conversations often stray off topic, or fail to address the work at hand? Were single participants allowed to dominate the conversation? Was there a strong guiding moderator to keep the discussion productive? Were certain writers, genres or forms favored over others?
• Something else?

After you evaluate the specifics of what didn’t work, note what action you took or didn’t take to resolve the problem. Honing in on your own agency can help you to feel empowered and capable of handling similar situations in the future.

• Was there anything you did to address the problem at the time it occurred? If so, what was the result? How did you feel about it? It’s always okay to not address the problem at the time, especially if it feels threatening or unsafe to do so.
• Is there anything you can do now to help address what happened? (E.g., talk to the moderator of the group, give yourself time to consider suggestions from participants more fully.)

Part 4: What comes next

Investigating your workshop experience can help make you feel better about what went on. But without a plan of action for what comes next, it can’t help you get back to the page or to enroll in a new writing group more quickly.

That’s why Part 4 of the Inventory is so important: it is where you take what you’ve learned so far and use it to make a plan. You’ll explore what comes next in terms of your writing and in your participation in future workshops. By looking back at the elements you wrote down in Parts 1, 2 and 3, you’ll be in the best position to make an informed decision about what is right for you going forward.

Will you refrain from returning to the critique group, but find another more suitable for your needs? Will you give yourself time to sit with feedback that didn’t resonate at first? Will you speak to the moderator privately about what went on so you can be better equipped in your next writing group?

Free write about what your next steps look like for your writing and for workshops. You might include notes on what your next revision will be, plans to meet up with a writing partner, a timeline for when you’ll enroll in a critique group, or anything else. Don’t be afraid to get specific, and to try something new.

Give yourself time to sit with your reflections. You don’t need to act on them right away, or at all if that’s what feels right. Self-awareness is always power. In naming our emotions and their causes, we free ourselves from having them dominate what we choose to do next. Getting to the bottom of what works for you and what doesn’t will help you now and when you return to your writing.

I hope that every workshop you join is a wonderful experience, that you gain new insight into your writing and leave invigorated and ready to hit the page running. But if that’s not the case, remember that there’s a lot you can do to help process what happened in your critique group. Once you do, you’ll be ready to approach your work and maybe even another workshop with confidence.

Alissa Butterworth

Alissa Butterworth is an author, editor, Author Accelerator-certified book coach, and educator. She has appeared on television and the radio, and her short fiction, poetry and nonfiction has appeared in print and online. Alissa teaches creative writing and facilitates a longstanding writer’s workshop. She is particularly interested in helping writers discover (or rediscover) their own voices and gifts. Alissa is the author of To Die Is Different Than Supposed, her debut literary fiction novel. She earned an MFA in fiction from Lesley University. Alissa lives in the mid-Atlantic region with her family, which includes a silly rescue hound named Scout and a boisterous preschooler. You can find her online and maybe even sign up for your next writing workshop with Alissa at alissabutterworth.com.