Workshop facilitation is magic
Did you ever read Lord of the Rings? It’s by some old guy named J.R.R.R.R.R. Tolkien.
It’s good. Like, really, really good. Like, it’s basically the foundation from which we, as a society, have built all of high fantasy as a genre. They also made a couple of movies based on the books that were ok…
Do you remember the wizened old wizard, Gandalf? Do you know what made him great?
It wasn’t his cool sword that glowed in the presence of evil. It wasn’t that he was a maiar, sent to Middle Earth to help the creatures there. It wasn’t his incredible power over fire which was derived from wearing one of the elvish rings of power.
Gandalf inspired, united, and pulled people towards a singular vision. Over and over again, we see Gandalf bring people together, united to defeat the forces of darkness.
I want to be Gandalf (as long as I don’t have to die and be resurrected to get my next promotion). I want to cast vision and invite others to participate in solving giant, complex problems.
Workshop facilitation is a magical tool that can unite seemingly disparate collaborators.
It’s the art of bringing diverse groups of people together to collaborate, ideate, and problem-solve in a structured and creative way. Whether you’re a designer, product manager, or entrepreneur, design workshops can help you generate new ideas, solve complex problems, and create better products.
People are shortsighted.
They focus on only what’s in front of them. It’s the rare person who sees outside themselves and their immediate environment. It’s even rarer for a person to lift their head, see the people around them, and change how they interact with those people based on others’ needs.
Designers, the hard truth is that engineers are trying to improve things. But they don’t care about your Figma files. And product managers are trying to make a product that will make more money. They don’t care about your latest user research. That way.
It requires effort to care and to see beyond yourself. I know firsthand that fostering collaboration can be an uphill battle, especially across multiple teams.
That’s why workshop facilitation is so important.
If you’re trying to build consensus between a disparate group of people, you must have them agree on what’s important. You need to give them the opportunity and capacity to see outside their little world and peer into the worlds of others. You need to develop a shared language, values, and goals.
Lead a workshop.
You’re a designer. It’s part of your job (even if it isn’t, you should do it. You’re the creative “design person.” People won’t question your ability to lead a “design thinking workshop, right!).
I used to think that workshops were silly. I’ve always preferred group work. I always felt when doing workshops, only one or two people would contribute most of the work while everyone else sat back and disengaged.
It wasn’t until I started leading workshops that I realized how powerful they are. For research, for problem-solving, but primarily for consensus and alignment.
You’ll see who’s on first.
Tell me if this sounds familiar… You think you know what we’re doing. They also think they know what we’re doing. I think I know what we’re doing. But we all know that we’re thinking different things, right?
None of us are actually on the same page. In fact, sometimes we’re reading different books in totally different languages. When feelings like that arise, it’s probably time for some alignment workshopping.
While getting time across multiple peers’ schedules is tricky sure. Trust me when I say that taking one to two hours out of your busy schedule to collaborate will be a game changer for your team’s ability to accomplish your goals.
For me, alignment is often necessary on new projects or with new team members. You need to ensure you’re all aligned on the vision for the project. Sometimes, aligning at set intervals (say every quarter) can be helpful.
We use it to align everyone’s assumptions about the goal of the projects, people’s roles, and how we’ll work together.
Ready to start. What’s the goal?
What is it that you’re trying to accomplish? If you write this down, you will get quick feedback from your stakeholders. Make sure that everyone understands the workshop’s goal and refer back to it if you start getting off-topic.
Create your list of stakeholders.
We often work in a triumvirate of Design, Engineering, and Product Management in software design and development. Having representatives from each branch often makes up your stakeholder list.
However, sometimes, things can get complicated. You may be working across multiple products or departments or need subject matter experts as key members of your work.
Take time to include all necessary stakeholders. It will be important to get their thoughts, feedback, and expectations. But understand that the more people you include, the more difficult it will be to coordinate schedules. If coordination becomes too difficult, you can allow some users to participate in the workshop a-synchronously.
Every workshop is a little different.
Here are some common exercises that I have used to create alignment across a group of collaborators. This list is by no means exhaustive, but it should be helpful to give you some ideas for what you can do.
Think about your goals and how you and your collaborators need to align. Are you new to a team and need to understand how to work together? Do you all understand and agree on the problem? Do you need to generate and prioritize ideas?
Lucky for you, I’ve translated all these exercises to Miro templates for your personal enjoyment!
Hopes and Fears
If you’re starting a project, kicking-off a workshop, or bringing in new team members, this actibity helps you get to know each other, expose aspirations and concerns, and prepare everyone to start.
The Hopes and Fears exercise is a design thinking activity that allows individuals or teams to articulate their positive aspirations and concerns about a particular project, product, or experience. Participants are encouraged to think deeply about what they hope to achieve and what they fear might go wrong, and to express their thoughts in a safe and supportive environment.
Stakeholder Map
Identify and understand the key individuals, groups, or organizations that have a stake in a project or initiative, and to visualize their relationships, influence, and needs.
The Stakeholder Map exercise is a design thinking activity that helps teams to gain a comprehensive understanding of the stakeholders involved in a particular project or initiative. The exercise involves creating a visual map or diagram that identifies the key stakeholders and their characteristics, such as their interests, influence, and potential impact on the project’s success. The map also helps teams to identify potential conflicts and overlaps between stakeholders and to develop strategies for engaging and communicating with them effectively.
Journey Map
Identify areas of improvement in a user’s experience by creating a map of it.
By mapping the steps of your service or product, you can start identifying your user’s level of frustration or delight at any given stage. Doing this helps you see how the experience can be improved by making frustrating steps more delightful.
How Might We…
Transform a problem or observation into a solvable question.
A problem on its own can seem daunting. Rephrasing problems as questions is a powerful way to switch the mind from panic mode to solution mode.
Crazy Eights
Generate a lot of ideas, quickly. Eight crazy ideas in eight minutes!
Sometimes, to be truly creative, our brains need structure and rules. By restricting space and time, but letting everyone know that anything goes – this tactic forces ideas out, fast.
Priority Map
Find out where to focus based on criteria important to the group.
Find the magic combination between seemingly competing demands. This tactic encourages a debate about what is more important in any given context. Ruthless prioritization is the secret super-power behind effective teams.
Who, What When
Leave a session with a clear plan of goals and deadlines.
Leave the room knowing who’s committing to what, and by when. Encouraging the group to define their own actions and deadlines creates accountability, which means its more likely to get done!
Rose, Thorn, Bud
Evaluate an idea, project or process, identifying positives, negatives, and opportunities.
Evaluate something as a group in order to find out what you really love about it, what might not be working, and how to improve it.
The only way to get good is to do them.
You will learn and grow. You’ll also develop the ability to pivot when necessary. I’ve facilitated workshops where after some initial conversation, I realized the exercises just weren’t applicable, and we pivoted to something more pertinent. This skill will grow in time.
It’s also important to lay some ground rules, especially for people unfamiliar with design workshops. Here are the ones I use:
- Write before you talk. Write or sketch your ideas on sticky notes before discussing them. Capture the main points on sticky notes and post on the wall during discussions.
- There are no bad ideas. Start big—diverge to get everyone’s ideas out there. Remix to discuss, cluster, and seek patterns. Then converge to determine the strongest ideas.
- Stay focused on your users. Tell stories about users to keep them at the center of your attention.
- Everyone participates. Everyone has a Sharpie, and everyone has a pad of sticky notes.
- Stay engaged. Avoid side conversations. Use a parking lot to capture off-topic issues.
- Start on time, stay on time. We need to watch the clock and stick to the plan to meet our goals.
- Yes, and… It’s easy to play the devil’s advocate. Instead of dismissing your teammates’ ideas, push yourself to build on them.
Make sure that you time-box every exercise.
It will be very easy to get off track. You may need to step into an important discussion and refocus the group. If that happens, add the discussion topic to the parking lot and move on with the exercises.
This is usually a section of your whiteboard where you can post topics people bring up but don’t have time for. At the end of the workshop, if you have time, refer back to the parking lot and pick up any conversations that still feel important.
TLDR: Workshops are super powerful
They can help people on your team feel empowered, heard, and understood. And they can circumvent a lot of potential problems.
Use them. Get good at facilitating them. This is a very valuable skill to have in your pocket as a designer.
Resources
Here are a couple resources I think you might find useful: cards, a podcast, a book, and a class.
Cards – Workshop Tactics
Link to cards
A fantastic resource and framework for building workshops. This is a small deck of cards that contains workshop recipes, exercises, and techniques. If you buy the deck, you also get access to digital resources like videos and miro boards.
Podcast – Conversation Factory
Link to podcast
Daniel Stillman is a great facilitator and owns a consulting company is called the Conversation Factory. He has a podcast where he discusses how to have meaningful conversations in the workplace.
Book – Facilitators Guide to Participatory Decision Making
Link to book
By Sam Kaner, this book demonstrates that meetings can be much more than merely an occasion for solving a problem or creating a plan.
Course – Workshop Facilitation
Link to Course
Britt Andreatta, PhD, discusses the role of the facilitator, and walks through how to effectively design, prepare for, and facilitate a workshop.