Workshops don't need to be these long processes that take weeks of planning and require extensive resources and commitment from loads of people. They can still be short, spur of the moment things, where you think on your feet and get things done fast with the people you have on hand.
In short, you can replace even a pointless quick-call with a workshop and get great results.
The shortest workshop I ever facilitated was under 45 minutes and required no planning. It consisted of just three exercises and at the end we had what we wanted without pointless discussions.
All you need to get there is a problem you want to tackle. Something like:
- How might we integrate accessibility testing into our SDLC
- How might we find time to fix accessibility issues every sprint
- How might we improve the experience for people who are blind on our website
(Yes, I like to phrase problems with How might we)
Here are the exercises, in order.
Sailboat
The purpose of this exercise is to generate loads of ideas for improvement on a product. You draw a sailboat on a whiteboard or flip chart and arm everyone with post-it notes. You tell them they have five minutes to write down as many things they already like about the about the product, related to your problem. What's pushing your sailboat forward?
Then spend 10 minutes writing down as many things you can do to fix the problem. What's dragging your sailboat down?
Awesome! In 15 minutes, you've created a long list of things you can do to improve accessibility.
Focus Finder
I've talked about Focus Finder before. In short, the point of this exercise is to narrow down the list of ideas from the previous exercise to just a few you want to try.
Looking at post it notes with things you can improve from before, give everyone five dots and have them vote on their favourite ideas by sticking one or more of their dots on any of the post it notes. After five minutes, re-arrange the post it notes so that the ones with the most votes are first.
Great! Now you have a short-list of the best ideas to work on.
Effort impact scale
Next, draw a chart consisting of two perpendicular lines, resulting in four quadrants. Label each quadrant:
- High effort, low impact
- Low effort, low impact
- High effort, high impact
- Low effort, high impact
Pick the first 5-10 ideas from the previous game and starting with the first one, ask your team members to place it in one of the quadrants. It should take you about 10 minutes to do this.
Once you're done, you will have the best ideas ranked in terms of effort and impact and you can figure out what you can do next.
- Start working on the ideas that are low effort and have a high impact
- Plan the ideas that are high effort and have a high impact
- Reconsider the ideas that are low effort and low impact
- Scrap the ideas that are high effort and low impact
All in all, under 45 minutes and you're way ahead of the game. Much faster and much better than a "quick call" (we both know that's never quick).