Let’s face it: some projects feel doomed before they even begin. Potential problems include ambiguous objectives, unforeseen delays, and breakdowns in communication.
To prevent these problems you should hold a scoping workshop at the start of the project. This will set you up for total alignment and clarity among your stakeholders.
In the following article, we’ll give you everything you need to know to run a successful scoping workshop.
The Fundamentals of a Successful Scoping Workshop
Essentially, a scoping workshop gathers your project’s stakeholders for a structured, collaborative meeting. These “stakeholders” could include people like your investors, managers, clients, team members, government representatives, vendors, and even members of your community.
Just as it sounds, the meeting aims to clarify and define the scope of your project. This includes the project’s objectives, timeline, methods, budget, boundaries, and many other aspects.
The main takeaway is that the participants should work together to both understand and communicate the requirements and limitations of the project.
For this reason, it’s important to prepare carefully to execute a scoping workshop that all participants find valuable. Before you hold a workshop, ensure that you do the following:
- Outline your objectives: This will help you set your agenda and keep you organized.
- Align objectives: Double-check your project’s objectives to ensure that they align with your workshop’s objectives. You may discover that there’s a subject that you ought to have discussed in the scoping workshop that you would have overlooked otherwise.
- Craft your invite list: Go beyond simply your team members. Consider inviting people from all the different areas your project might touch. This will guarantee you have a diverse set of perspectives.
- Personalize your invitations: This will help improve attendance—tell each participant what their participation will add to the meeting, and they’ll more likely try to attend.
- Collect data: Gather any important data, research, documentation, or other information relevant to your project. It can be a timesaver to have this on hand, in case anyone needs to refer to it during the workshop, and it will help those less familiar with the project to get up to speed.
- Distribute data: Consider distributing reading materials ahead of the workshop so that participants have an opportunity to digest the material.
Crafting the Perfect Scoping Workshop Agenda
Every scoping workshop needs to have an agenda. Ideally, this agenda should be distributed to all participants before the workshop so they have a chance to prepare.
An agenda also helps the workshop move along smoothly. When participants know in advance that there is a specific time to deal with a particular issue, they’ll be more likely to stay on the subject with their questions and comments.
We all know how exhausting it can be when someone brings up an unrelated subject, and the meeting feels as if it will last an eternity.
Below is an example of a full-day scoping workshop for a (fictional) app called CubiPulse which is preparing to develop the third generation of its software.
- 09:00 – Welcome and introduction, objectives for scoping workshop, overview of agenda
- 9:30 - Understand: product goals, context, business environment, ,
- 10:30 – Coffee break
- 10:45 – Dream: ideation, brainstorming, vision, risks
- 12:15 – Lunch
- 13:00 – Define: user personas, user journey, product features
- 14:45 - Coffee break
- 15:00 - Priorities: development phases, milestones, funding goals, timeline
- 16:30 – Wrap up and action planning.
Let’s use this sample agenda to help us understand the main sections of a scoping workshop agenda and to create a scalable template for projects of various complexities.
Introduction
Be careful not to underestimate how much time is needed for your introduction and opening remarks.
Your workshop will include participants who may not be as intimately familiar with your project as your team members might be.
During your introduction to the group, go over the agenda briefly, clearly outline the goals for the scoping workshop, and allow everyone the chance to introduce themselves.
Instead of a typical introduction which might list their name, company, and job title, ask them to explain briefly what value or expertise they bring to the project.
Project Overview
The first key subject to discuss in a scoping workshop is the context, purpose, and background of the project.
For example, at VeryCreatives, we spend the majority of the workshop understanding various aspects of your product and business.
This lets us move forward with planning the features of your MVP and align them to your business goals and incentives.
Project Goals
In this section of the agenda, you should clearly articulate the project’s objectives and goals. Ensure that participants have a way to voice their concerns and questions during this time. This is where diverse opinions can contribute to the shape the project.
Also, keep in mind the overall goal of your scoping workshop – aligning the development process with the product strategy. This will make sure you place financial resources in areas with the highest revenue potential.
The CubiPulse team uses an open discussion followed by breakout groups to work on the goals. In their case, it is articulating possible improvements to version 2.0 of the software and describing what is involved in making those improvements.
By strategically breaking the group up into smaller groups based on the participant’s expertise, the team can process a lot of information in a short time. This approach may work for smaller projects, like the app upgrade, but may not be appropriate for more complex projects.
For more complex projects, a multi-day scoping workshop may be necessary, and a full day may need to be devoted to identifying project goals.
One additional goal of your workshop should be to get the entire team working together and have a first impression of how the collaboration would look like. It’s a great way to spot any immediate communication challenges and address them before they become a bigger issue.
Brainstorming and collaboration
The key element of a scoping workshop. Here, you should prioritize ideation and creativity.
Encourage the participants’ activity. Everyone should be able to contribute their ideas to the project. To make it easier, you can bring post-it notes to the meeting and hand them to every participant at the start.
You can also utilize various ideation exercises, such as crafting an elevator pitch, engaging in brainstorming and brainwriting sessions on various topics, as well as collaborating on User Persona creation in groups.
One exercise we particularly enjoy is inverse brainstorming. Instead of pondering how we can enhance the product, we ask ourselves, ‘How could we make the product worse?’ Although it may seem amusing and straightforward, this exercise yields valuable insights. By compiling a comprehensive list of potential pitfalls and risks during the reverse brainstorming process, we equip ourselves to navigate these challenges effectively throughout the project. …
Discussion of Scope
After detailed presentations, brainstorming sessions, panels, and discussions, you’ll be ready to set the scope of the project. This is where, as a group, you finalize your agreement on the project’s goals, methods, timeline, and task assignments.
During this phase, you should set boundaries and clearly delimit what the project seeks to do and/or not do. Otherwise, your project will be susceptible to “scope creep.” This is where team members or other stakeholders add other functions/features to the project that were not agreed upon.
For this reason, it’s important to clarify all ambiguous language and make sure everyone is on board with the scope, budget, timeline, and assignments. For example, if the CubiPulse team agrees to “reduce the app’s launch/loading time,” then a good facilitator would ask, “Who will work on this?” and “Reduce by how much?”
Action Planning
Lastly, your meeting should conclude with a detailed overview of next steps. This is a good time to assign various responsibilities and to set timelines for the project’s main tasks.
At this stage, it may help to bring in a professional team to help you finalize the plan.
Leveraging Technology in Scoping Workshops
Relying exclusively on PowerPoint presentations can drain a scoping workshop of energy, creativity, and collaboration, so you should diversify your technological toolset.
You can also aid or even fully automate scheduling, reminders, follow-ups, data analysis, documentation, and document sharing. This will help your workshop have improved productivity, transparency, and accessibility.
Here are some tools you should consider:
Asana
Asana is an application designed specifically for project management. It helps you to manage and trace tasks, organize roles, set agendas, and plan collaboratively by creating a visual boards, roadmaps, and lists that each of your stakeholders can access.
Figma (FigJam)
Figma is a collaborative design tool that enables teams to work together in real time on designs, wireframes, and prototypes.
It allows your participants to provide feedback and make changes simultaneously, resulting in improved productivity and communication within the team.
Google Meet
Google Meet has become the standard for video conferencing and remote/virtual/hybrid meetings.
Post-workshop Strategies: Documentation, Follow-ups, and Measuring Success
Perhaps the most important strategy after the scoping workshop is documenting the workshop itself.
Record detailed meeting minutes that include all the discussions, decisions, and action planning. It helps to include the names of each stakeholder so that follow-up is easy. Provide these minutes as soon as possible after the meeting ends.
It may be helpful to create a separate document that tracks all the action items in particular. This will allow you to be more detailed about what the action item entails, who it is assigned to, and the timeline of milestones/completion.
Alternatively, set up some of the virtual tools discussed above to help make this list collaborative.
Lastly, collect as much feedback as possible from your stakeholders by conducting surveys and/or interviews. It may be wise to ask participants to articulate their takeaways so that you can gauge the level of shared understanding.
For example, by asking questions like “How feasible is the planned timeline?” and “What features should be prioritized” it may become clear that participants weren’t as satisfied with the plan as they led you to believe during the actual workshop.
In this case, you could offer follow-up sessions with a more targeted focus. In this case, it could be a feature refinement workshop and a timeline session. Another option may be to create smaller teams or committees to review and address these concerns.
Summary
Holding a scoping workshop is an essential part of product management. By carefully planning attendance, discussing objectives, documenting action plans, and following up with participants, you can anticipate many problems and increase productivity and efficiency.
Handled correctly, a scoping workshop can spark creativity, inspire dedication, and propel your project to the finish line!
Learn more about scoping workshops and other product development concerns by booking a call with VeryCreatives!
