A workshop is an event attended by key stakeholders for a particular period of time. They are used by business analysts to bring stakeholders together and work together to achieve a preset goal.
A workshop can be held for different reasons including planning, analysis, design, scoping, requirements elicitation and modelling. It may also be used to produce ideas for new features or products, to reach an agreement on a topic, or to analyse requirements or designs.
Workshops usually includes the following:
- Stakeholders.
- Established goal.
- Associated and collaborative work.
- Described work product.
- Facilitator.
Workshops can encourage trust, mutual understanding, and strong communication among the stakeholders and create deliverables that shape and guide future work efforts.
The workshop should be supported by an experienced, neutral facilitator. A scribe should also be available to record any the decisions and pending issues.
A business analyst may act as the facilitator, scribe or subject matter expert in these workshops but they should never take on more than one role at the same time.
Workshops have some components, which include:
1 Prepare for the workshop: When preparing for a workshop, the business analysts should do the following:
- Describe the aim and desired outcomes.
- Identify key stakeholders who would participate.
- Identify the facilitator and scribe.
- Develop the agenda.
- Decide how the outputs will be recorded.
- Plan the session and invite the participants.
- Organize the room logistics and equipment,
- Send the agenda and other materials to the participants in advance.
- If necessary, perform pre-workshop interviews with participants.
2 Workshop roles: There are some roles involved in a successful workshop amd they are:
- Sponsor: this person is usually not a workshop participant but is does accountable for its outcome.
- Facilitator: this person institutes the goals and agenda for the workshop, imposes structure and ground rules, keeps activities focused on the purpose and desired outcomes, supports decision making and conflict resolution, and makes sure that all the participants have an opportunity to be heard.
- Scribe: this person records the decisions in the format decided prior to the workshop and keeps track of any items or issues that are postponed during the session.
- Timekeeper: this person keeps track of the time spent on each agenda item.
- Participants: these include the key stakeholders and subject matter experts. They are in charge of providing their input and views, listening to other participant views, and analyzing any issues without prejudice.
3 Conduct the workshop: To make sure that all the participants have a common understanding, the facilitators usually starts the workshop with a statement of its purpose and the desired outcomes.
Establishing agreed-upon ground rules can be a productive way of
initiating an environment for collaboration.
Ground rules can include the following:
- Respect the opinions of others.
- Everyone is expected to contribute.
- Discussions that are unimportant should be limited.
- Discuss the issues, not the people.
- An agreement on how decisions are made.
- Side discussions should be avoided.
Throughout the workshop, the facilitator should keep it focused by regularly confirming the session’s activities against the workshop’s purpose and outcomes.
4 Post workshop wrap-up: After the workshop, the facilitator should follow up on any open action items that were documented at the workshop, complete the documentation, and send it to the workshop attendees and any stakeholders who need to be kept informed of the work effort.
Workshops have their strengths and limitations, which include:
Strengths
• It can be a means to achieve agreement in a comparatively short period of time.
• It provides a means for stakeholders to cooperate, make decisions, and provide a mutual understanding.
• The cost of conducting a workshop are often lower than the cost of conducting multiple interviews.
• The workshop participants can provide immediate feedback on the issues or decisions.
Limitations
• It may be difficult to schedule all of the stakeholder participants for the workshop.
• The facilitator and the participants need to be very experienced and knowledgeable.
• Inviting too few or too many participants can lead to the missed needs or issues that are important to some stakeholders, or to the arrival at decisions that don’t represent the needs of the majority of the stakeholders.