Designing workshops with three pieces of Blank paper
There is terror and opportunity in a blank piece of paper.
It is actually really rare that we do anything with an entirely blank page. There is always a template, an example or a process to follow which means we are always working along the lines of something that has been done before. There is nothing wrong with that of course and reinventing the wheel is almost never the right course of action.
However, for the purposes of thinking about designing a great workshop, it’s a great exercise to do exactly that. Meetings are inherently formulaic usually for efficiency. It’s normally a good clue as to whether a meeting could be done virtually to consider how much that meeting deviates from the previous one -people, process, content. If it’s less than 20% - it’s probably time to fire up the Teams.
Designing a good workshop can be delivered using three pieces of blank paper.
So – piece number 1
The process of designing a workshop starts with listening. Sit down with the people you want to run the session and have them talk about how they got to the point of sitting down and talking to you. Ask for the story of what has happened, what worries them, what is it important, ask what puzzles or mysteries they have?
Then, politely ask them to leave and sit down yourself and start to write. What was important about what you just heard? Write down a story about what you think the real problem is to solve, write down what you think good looks like for the outcome. Ignore anything in your head which says how you might do it.
When you have a A4 page of so of crisp notes and thoughts take a small moment of reflection and then rip in up into tiny pieces and throw it in the bin.
Then get a new piece of paper and write two questions.
1) The problem you are trying to solve is_______ and
2) You will be happy with the output if you get___________
Unless the answer is less that 50 words for each (go back to the start and have another go)
Your design hypotheses then goes in big letters on a white board and underneath goes three new questions
1) What are our objectives?
2) What are the things we need to include and what are the things we don’t?
3) What are the things we can’t change?
Then have another go with your customers whilst playing the ‘insightful toddler’, this means that you listen politely and ask the question why?, and then when you get an answer, ask why? again. Have one more go and you will have the answer you are looking for. The third ‘why?’ is the charm and whatever comes from the third answer is the one you write down.
Hopefully, you then end up with the scope, objectives and givens for the event and a clear view of what the event is about and what success looks like..
Then, it’s time for blank piece of paper number two
There are a thousand ways to run a session but they all include a combination of the following. People will be told something and learn something, they will think about what that means and decide what it is important, and then they will do something with it.
An event might be 98% of one and 1% of the others but they all follow a pattern. A fascinating quirk of different organisations is that every one of them is good at one or two bits and not good at a third. The design of workshops for different organisations will often follow a pattern where they want you to design the thing that they like doing whilst you push them to do the one they don’t.
Write on your blank piece of paper what you want to do for each. Maybe it is customer empathy, picking an intervention and then building it. Maybe it is assessing an operating model, identifying weaknesses and then building a plan. Write a % of time across each and pin it up on the board.
Then, go away and read as much as you can based on the inputs you’ve been given and then come back for another go. When you’ve got an answer you like, it’s time to turn to your tool-box.
You need to remember than methods are meaningless. It’s not Design Thinking that is useful, it is the principles and the techniques that you can apply to a situation. You don’t just ‘do’ design thinking – you take time to consider people and be empathetic, you take time to look at problems and think about what the real problem is, you ‘do’ something quickly using some imagination. It’s exactly the same thing as above.
What you want to take is the learnings on what makes a good empathy questionnaire. You want to use a good example of building a model to have people think about problems in a different way. You want to empower people to try something quickly without applying the usual constraints.
All of this means that you have to design something using your ‘collaboration toolbox’, a mixture of ideas, sessions and experiences of what has worked before and what hasn’t (and in what order in what context).
Plot a map of the modules against the different elements and think about how they meet the objectives you painstakingly built before.
When you’ve pieced it together, get the customers back in to show them your plan A, and when you’ve taken it apart and pieced it back together you’ll end up with Plan F.
The third piece
An event fundamentally is about people. The better the people and the more they are empowered to engage, the better the result. What is an absolute, is that what works for one person does not work for another. Your blank piece of paper should list the participants who are coming, the ones you’d like to come and people from outside. On the paper should be a review of who they are, what they are like, and how they like to work and get on with people.
The most common statements are ‘they are very difficult but absolutely essential’ and maybe ‘might be a bit shy to get involved but they are brilliant.’ Like a wedding seating chart, they are people to be not sat beside each other, children, and a table for guests.
Facilitation is more about managing the people and less about the process. (it is actually common to split the roles if you have more people). Taking the time to work out the dynamics of the people should determine what you ask them to and how you ask them to do it. For example, I’ve put people together in a ‘bomb group’ who you know are going to explode but you keep them together to limit the damage. I always avoid asking testers to do some ‘crazy blue sky’ thinking. There are different paths to the same destination.
Putting the paper together
The pieces of paper start blank because you need to take the time to learn and think about what is important yourself. An event should be bespoke because the context and the people are different every time. It is not about using templates and methods to drive the outcome. It is the reverse.
A blank piece of paper can help you with that. (and so can I so click here to contact me)