​​Open sessions: jam with anyone, anywhere

This week we introduced new pricing to FigJam

, alongside plugins, widgets, code blocks, and new shapes—giving you even more ways to jam with your team. In addition, we wanted to make FigJam more approachable to everyone, and frictionless for you to invite anyone to your jams. That’s why we built Open sessions, a way for visitors to join your FigJam file without having to create an account. Now FigJam is a welcoming space for all participants—from the teammate, to the external partner, to the occasional jammer.

We were inspired to build Open sessions by the unique ways teams wanted to jam, from recurring meetings, to client workshops, to interviews. It’s important that occasional participants feel welcome from the outset and can start contributing right away. Extra steps like creating an account add friction to participating, and can even delay the start of your workshop or interview.

With Open sessions, visitors can join meetings seamlessly—no setup required. And you have control over when and how you open up your jams. By default, visitors are removed and every Open session ends after 24 hours, but you can always close a session early or start a new session for the same file if you need it.

Open sessions are best for one-off jams, whether you’re working with a large group or one-on-one. Here are some of the ways you can get started:

Workshops: Remove the friction from remote workshops. Whether you’re leading a client workshop or running research sessions with users, participants can jump into FigJam and start contributing without having to sign-up.

Interviews: Give candidates space to showcase their work and share the link with them ahead of time so they know what to expect. For technical interviews, use the CoderPad widget.

Cross-functional team meetings: Share priorities with leaders and get feedback from cross-functional stakeholders. Whether you’re running a team meeting, project retrospective, or brainstorm you can now include anyone across the company.

We designed Open sessions to be easy for you to kick off and simple for participants to join. Check out this playground file to learn how you can use Open sessions to run workshops, meetings, interviews, and more with your team.

Open sessions is available across all plans while FigJam is in beta. Starting February 1, 2022, Open sessions will be a feature on the FigJam Professional and Organization plans. Join us at an upcoming demo to learn more about FigJam and how to lead effective jam sessions of your own.