Part One

In the preparation of the workshop you can follow this checklist of aspects to consider:

• General information (title, place and time)


• Purpose


• Scope


• Subjects


• Controversy


• Strategy


• Result


• Participants


• Roles


• Tools


• Feedback/follow-up


• Agenda

In the remainder of this section the aspects will be treated in more detail. With these points you cover the basics for a successful workshop.

General information

Starting off with some general information, your workshop's got to have a title, a name to call the beast by. Make it short, clear and not a novel… "workshop on order entry" is a good one. Pick a date and place.

Concerning "time", I just want to mention that the unit of duration for a workshop should be a part of the day (two parts make one day, so morning and afternoon). Don't drag people out for one hour. That's not a workshop, that's a discussion.

Purpose

What is the workshop all about? Purpose, scope and subjects, that's what defines the actual workshop. The purpose is important to inform the workshop participants correctly up front, so that they have no wrong expectations, or at least make the chance on that a little smaller. By the way: you don't have to yank all info into one sentence. It's ok to make a paragraph out of it. "Partial requirements in the preliminary decision making phase" is a sentence, but it tells nothing. If the requirements coming out of the workshop are not final, but will be reviewed and approved by some hot shots afterwards, write it like that! It won't give you the Nobel prize for literature, but it sure will save your workshop.

Scope

The purpose will place the workshop within the context of the project, the scope tells us all about the actual content, e.g. "order entry for 24 hour delivery". The scope should determine the field that will be covered, including a good definition of it's borders. "How a new information system will have to support our order entry activities for 24 hour deliveries. Current activities may be subject to change." The second ("..may be subject to…") sentence is very important. If things may be altered, make them explicit, try to avoid that people have to read between the lines, or have to be sensitive to the words chosen. The opposite holds also, of course. If it's not allowed, state it. "How a new information system will have to support our order entry activities for 24 hour deliveries. The new order entry activities as described in Large Document X and approved by Big Guy Y have to be considered."

Subjects

To create a good list of subjects to cover, some homework has to be done. A good preparation would be joining stakeholders in their work for a short time, mentioned earlier in this section. In addition to this, you should talk with someone with knowledge about the scope. A good starting point, if possible, is to take the tasks that fall into the scope. Like, for order entry…

• Getting the order


• Finding the customer


• Checking for stock


• Placing the order


• Tracking the delivery

Another way is to make a distinction in categories of the subject at hand. If you order an ad in a newspaper, you have the little public announcements and the larger display ads. You can discuss about large customers and small customers. Blue balls and yellow balls. Take your pick.

So, there are a thousand ways to organize your subjects. They should be clear, logical, "feel good" and make immediate sense to the participants.