As a business owner, startup, or entrepreneur working with a development team, a Scoping Workshop gives you a chance to tell the developer what you need, walk through all the details and steps, and figure out a price for the work.
Not only does it set the stage for success, but it also reduces risks and saves a lot of money. Changing course during planning is significantly cheaper than it is during development, ensuring a clear picture and fewer surprises down the line.
You may also hear this referred to as a Product Strategy Workshop. Basically, it’s an opportunity for everyone to get on the same page so the MVP development process unfolds as smoothly as possible.
Why have an MVP Scoping workshop?
Whether you’re developing an app, a piece of software, or something else, development can be a complex process. Miscommunication or misunderstandings can cost both sides time and money. Worse, a shaky start can upend the entire project, producing a bad result or an end product that doesn’t fulfill the client’s needs.
Having a product strategy workshop cuts down on hiccups that can derail a project or cause costs to balloon unexpectedly. It’s also an avenue to discover and dig deep into both development and business risks, thinking about how to tackle them best in advance. When you have an in-depth scoping workshop, you can do exactly what the name says: scope out the project from start to finish.
What is the purpose of the scoping workshop?
One cannot underestimate the value of meticulous planning in project development. Inadequate planning often leads to what is known as ‘scope creep’, which refers to unplanned changes or additional features that extend beyond the original objectives.
The consequences of scope creep can be severe, especially during the MVP phase:
- Wasted Engineering Hours: Building not what customers want.
- Cost Overrun: More features mean more costs.
- Time Delay: Extra work pushes deadlines.
- Resource Drain: The team gets stretched thin.
- Quality Risk: Hurried work may lead to poor quality.
- Team Morale: Unplanned changes can frustrate the team.
Even planned scope changes can be costly, particularly during the MVP phase. The need to re-evaluate timelines, costs, and resources adds complexity to the project. This is why Scoping Workshops are invaluable.
“Based on our past experience, investing time in these workshops has been shown to reduce overall project time and costs by approximately 20-30%.”
The primary purpose of the MVP scoping workshop is to reduce risk as much as possible, ensuring that product development remains on track, within budget and aligns with business objectives.
What happens during an MVP scoping workshop?
The ins and outs of a scoping workshop often vary from project to project, and a good development team will tailor the workshop and strategy session to individual clients and their projects. However, there are some fundamentals that tend to happen in all scoping workshops.
At VeryCreatives, our scoping workshops are built around a framework we’ve perfected over time, adapting it as needed for specific clients. We cover a lot of ground during these workshops—depending on the size and scope of your project, this session might take a few hours or even span a couple of days.
Here’s a look at what a typical scoping workshop at VeryCreatives involves:
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Gathering the right people. On the customer side, it should be the Founder, the Product Owner (if you have one) and anyone who can contribute to the product with industry-specific insights. On the agency side, we recommend that a Product Strategist (or Project Manager), a Tech Lead, and a Product Design Expert attend.
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Getting to know each other. A scoping workshop gives both sides a chance to test the waters with respect to how well they’ll work together. You don’t want to wait until you’re knee-deep in a project to find out there’s a major personality conflict that threatens to derail the whole project.
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Understanding the goal. What are you trying to achieve? What problem are you attempting to solve? What’s your USP? The scoping workshop gives you a chance to explain your goals and even create a project scope statement to get everyone on the same page. From there, the development team can help you brainstorm the best way to meet those goals.
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Brainstorming. It’s pretty rare for a development idea to follow a single straight line. Instead, there are usually several possible ways to approach a project. A scoping workshop lets both sides brainstorm and come up with the best option. Clients can ask questions and the development team can provide answers and solutions.
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Prioritizing. We use the scoping workshop to identify the project’s priorities. This is where we gather the information we need to eventually create a report that includes a product roadmap, timing, costs, and everything else pertinent to the project.
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Scheduling. Creating a work timeline with milestones and check-in points is one of the most important parts of a scoping workshop. This sets the agenda for the whole project and ensures that all the moving parts eventually come together for the finished project.
It’s worth mentioning that we also make sure to schedule plenty of breaks, keep things informal, and use the time to get to know each other. We also like to steer clear of a no-PC-and-no-phone rule (it sets the wrong tone and can even be counterproductive).
Every VeryCreatives scoping workshop results in:
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A realistic MVP scope
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A timeline
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A budget
We generally take a few days to process all the materials gleaned during the workshop. This lets the client get a proper understanding of how the collaboration will work and what they can expect.
VeryCreatives does charge for our Scoping Workshop, ensuring that senior team members are always present. This investment benefits both you and us, streamlining the entire process.
Here’s our commitment: If you opt to continue with us for the development phase after the workshop, we’ll offset the cost of the workshop against your first monthly bill.
We never ask clients to commit to us, you’re free to take the report to another development team if you wish to explore other options.
That said, the majority choose to continue with us, which speaks to the quality and dedication our team brings to each project.
Are scoping workshops for me?
If you are a non-tech founder of a startup or running a company that wants to launch its digital product to the market, attending an MVP scoping workshop is the first step you should take.
We helped several founders build great products from an idea to acquisition. Book a discovery call and let’s discuss how we can help you, too.
