Meeting vs. Workshops
What’s a meeting?
We all have business meetings. They are usually passive in nature and we can listen and learn during business meetings. As an UXer at PVX, I would write script for sprint review & prototype demo for core stakeholders. The main purpose of meetings is to share and exchange information.
Then How is a workshop different from a meeting?
A workshop is a method to collaboratively solve a problem. It’s best for deep-focused coverage of one issue with active participation from all parties involved.
That’s great, then how is a workshop conducted?
Process of a Workshop
Step 1: Opening: Divergent activity that generates information and ideas.
in affinity diagram workshop, this step is when everyone collectively writes down post-its and puts them on the wall/screen.
Step 2: Exploration: This is the emergent step where everyone explores the ideas and identifies themes. In affinity diagram workshop, this is the step when everyone would group and name similar topics together.
Step3: Closing Convergent. Conclusion of the exercise that generates a tangible next step.
Affinity diagram is a common UX workshop done by a scrum team to contribute and generate ideas with everyone’s collective experience and knowledge, then work together as a group to find common connections and themes.
Constraints of a workshop
Rules: rules of engagement explained prior to an exercise. It’s the process of the exercise explained prior to the engagement.
Boundaries: Boundaries in space and time. A good example of a boundary is a timebox that limits the time period of the activity. It’s usually there to encourage creative thinking and enable setting a reasonable scope.
Artifacts: They are the information from the activity.
Goal: An end result the workshop that all the participants are trying to obtain
Types of workshop
There are varying types of workshops that achieve different business goals.
Discovery workshop is there to help the team gather research and insights.
Empathy workshop helps with user needs before jumping into design
Every project and sprint cycle is different and requires different collaborative work that helps the product move forward.
Some of the workshop exercises I have intrroduced to PVX product team
There are varying type of workshops that are there to achieve different goals.
