Why Workshops? Because They Work!
I’m just going to say it: I hate lame meetings. I’m a social bug who thrives on interaction. I really enjoy working with groups. Yet I’ve found myself dreading certain meetings and loving others.?
The question is, why? What makes some meetings awesome? What makes others lame?
That line of questioning set me on a mission to meet my meeting methodology (I never apologize for alliteration :)). I performed my due diligence, and the answers to my queries led to a new passion project: Creating productive, engaging and fun meetings.?
So how does one make a match with a magnificent meeting? (No apologies!) I was first inspired by Switch. In the book, I learned the importance of finding highlights—what already works—and replicating them. Someone has to have discovered the secret sauce, that magical moment in meeting memory. (None!)
There’s a reason we follow methods, templates, and recipes. For one thing, all the hard work of failing and learning has already been done. For another, they’re proven, they instill confidence, and they get results. Otherwise, why would we follow:
Yet we often don't apply the same approach to collaboration. If there’s a proven method, why not use it??
Enter workshops!?
According to one of my favorite workshoppers, Jonathan Courteney, a workshop is, “a step by step, systematized session that allows groups of people to make decisions and solve problems.” You may have heard of some workshop methods and systems like Design Sprints, Lightning Decision Jams, Event Storming, Game Storming, and a host of other workshop systems with cool branding. Heck, even brainstorming is a workshop of sorts (usually done wrong, but anyway…). Regardless of name, the core idea is the same: Use structured activities and processes to create awesome outcomes as a group.
Here’s what I love about workshops: I can make HUGE promises. For example, I can help you pick a meaningful, well-thought-out goal quickly with 100% buy-in. Or how about this: I have a proven methodology that can be infinitely adapted to accomplish your purposes. Yup, I make huge promises, then I generally bring home the bacon (And in the cases that I don’t, blame me, not the workshops!).
So Why Workshops?
They Constrain Decisions and Kill Analysis Paralysis
I think Theodore Roosevelt said it best: “In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.”
Based on my experience, workshops usually bring you to the right thing. However, ‘tis true: Workshops sometimes bring groups to the wrong thing–but at least they bring you there. You always leave workshops with clear decisions and action items (i.e. prototypes that you can test) and it’s those tests that allow you to learn and grow quickly. Workshops are thus the antidote to all-too-common and dreaded analysis paralysis, which, in my opinion, is the absolute worst outcome any meeting can produce.?
Workshops are all about progress, not perfection. They model Agile software development in that they create an imperfect version of an idea quickly and add value over time as groups learn. This approach allows you to test ideas in continuous cycles and avoid the waste of time and resources that comes from not having anything to test.
In short, workshops are like Agile. Regular meetings are like Waterfall. The former, if used often, provides quick delivery, continuous improvement, and value that accumulates over time. The latter produces too little value, at too great a cost, and way too late.?
As David Schonthal, professor at the Kellogg School of Management, says, “Why not toss [an idea] out into the world and see what happens to it? Take the minimum viable version and get real reactions from real people. Some of the earliest examples of Twitter and Airbnb products were literally just sketches. But they were good enough concepts to put in front of people for reactions. Yes, there’s the danger of falling on your face, but you don’t want to spend $50 million making the same mistake that you could have made much sooner for less money.”
Sheryl Sandberg, former COO of Facebook, states it more succinctly: “Done is better than perfect.”?
Workshops take groups to DONE, and they do so faster–and with better results–than regular meetings.
They Foster Positive Group Dynamics
I’m sure you’ve experienced many meetings of this ilk: Two to three people do most of the talking, a couple of others occasionally chip in, and everyone else stays mostly silent. The person with the most energy or decision-making authority often ends up influencing everybody else. Multiple issues surface but are not prioritized, and solutions are discussed randomly without any real understanding of core issues. Finally, the meeting ends with the need for another meeting or, on rare occasions, decisions that don’t work.
Kurt Lewin, a social psychologist and change expert, coined the term "group dynamics," which describes the common roles and behaviors adopted by groups. Typical roles include the Withdrawer, the Aggressor, the Dominator and the Joker (I bet you can guess, based on name and personal experience alone, the makeup of those roles). He describes the negative behaviors of these group roles as groupthink, and it is characterized by such things as:?
Workshops apply proven methodology to suppress groupthink and amplify positive dynamics. When you do that, you can make group members “nearly twice as creative as an average group” (Mind Tools).?
They’re Faster but Tend to Produce Better Results
Another favorite workshopper, Jake Knapp, asserted that, when it comes to meetings, “longer hours don’t equal better results. By getting the right people together, structuring the activities, and eliminating distraction, we’ve found that it’s possible to make rapid progress while working a reasonable schedule.”
I’ve seen “rapid progress” on a “reasonable schedule” for myself! My consultancy, Software Technology Group, once struggled to create annual goals for its Technology Groups that would be challenging, achievable, and meaningful. The leadership team and Tech Group leaders called meeting after meeting, and they wrestled with the issues for months, but they still couldn’t arrive at a decision. Knowing of my love of workshops, they turned to me for help.?
I designed a workshop based on Game Storming activities and the Lightning Decision Jam framework, and I ran the workshop with all of our Technology Groups. After six, one-hour workshops run over the course of a few weeks, I helped all of our Tech Groups set strong annual goals that served as meaningful drivers throughout the upcoming year.?
They’re More Fun
Where is it written that meetings can’t be fun? Not only can meetings be enjoyable, but the fun can actually boost productivity. Look at this amazing social experiment referenced on Science of People’s website:
“Harvard Business School professor Michael Norton gathered 221 participants and had them form groups of two to four people. Then, he asked them to do a campus scavenger hunt where they had to run around taking selfies in front of specific locations. They had precisely forty-five minutes to complete the hunt, and the winners received a cash prize. There was a catch. Half of the teams were asked to do a pre-scavenger hunt icebreaker together, and the other half were simply asked to read an article together. The icebreaker groups had to form a circle, perform a series of rhythmic claps and foot stomps, and yell, ‘Let’s go!’ The results were clear. The teams that did the icebreaker before the scavenger hunt got the most selfies, had the shortest completion times, and reported liking each other more in the post-event survey.”
Workshops do just that: They leverage fun, group bonding, and mutual trust to create the ideal environment for productivity.
Workshop FAQs FTW
If you’re anything like me, you’ll experience a surprising amount of resistance to workshops at first. In my case, I suppose some of this may have been my own poor change management (I should have done a better job applying what I’d learned in Switch), but let’s face it: Workshops represent a huge departure from social norms for a lot of people.?
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Fortunately, I’ve encountered enough frequently-asked questions that I can at least send you into battle armed with some answers.
How do I even know that workshops work?
If your company likes quotes, here’s a good one: “Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” (Paul J Meyer, pioneer of the self-improvement industry)
If your company craves some proof, you could mention that these companies regularly use workshop exercises as part of their workflow:
Or you could mention Xander Pollock. When Xander was a product & design consultant at Palo Alto Design Company, he ran Design Sprints (perhaps my favorite workshop methodology) with several companies. While doing so, he collected some rather compelling data that can be applied to Design Sprints in particular or (in my opinion) workshops as a whole:?
“In my last 60 surveys across 8 companies, 99% of participants said that the Design Sprint helped them accelerate progress, and the average amount of time employees said this saved them was 2.9 months. 86% of participants said that the Design Sprint helped de-risk the project. 93% of participants said that the Design Sprint helped align their team.”
Finally, if all else fails, you could always overwhelm your stakeholders with data :). Try some of these sources on them:
Are the roles of leaders completely ignored in workshops?
No! In workshops, the final decisions are often made by one or two leaders, and after the workshop, leaders always get to decide what the next steps will be (Said leaders would, of course, be wise to consider all of the data gathered during the workshop, but still…).
Why the time constraints?
“To achieve great things, two things are needed, a plan and not quite enough time.” (Leonard Bernstein, composer and conductor). We all know that deadlines challenge us, but properly applied and managed, they can drive innovation, creativity and focus. The same is true of time constraints in workshops.
David Schonthal said, “Constraint, properly harnessed, can be one of the most powerful forces behind ingenuity. And no constraint is more powerful than time…When you take a resource and constrain it, it forces people to do more with less, and oftentimes they come up with unexpectedly creative solutions”?
I’ve seen this effect during many workshops. For example, I love Crazy 8s sketching from Design Sprints. By forcing participants to draw eight sketches in eight minutes, I can practically see the neurons in their brains firing faster, and when all is said and done, they often generate surprising ideas that they couldn’t have generated otherwise.
That doesn’t mean that time constraints always create greater results. Introduce too much constraint, and cognition and psychological safety run screaming from the room. It’s important for workshop facilitators not to push participants too hard with any constraint and to be flexible with plans when necessary.
Should all meetings be workshops?
No. While I strongly advocate for greater workshop usage, that doesn’t always have to be the default. Workshops are great for:
Unstructured conversations are good for:
As in all things, be wise.
Can there be unstructured conversation in a workshop?
Yes. As a general rule, I still feel like the facilitator should design when those unstructured conversations should happen. I also think that the facilitator should recognize when the conversation is meandering, becoming unproductive, or flirting with groupthink. And I strongly believe that even unstructured conversation should be time-bound (I’m looking at you, end-of-meeting non-observers!). As I’ve noted, time constraints typically produce much better results.
Are all decisions from workshops final?
No! The intended end result of most workshops include:
Not a final solution! So rest easy. You’re committing yourself to a prototype—not selling your soul to the workshop gods.?
So Yeah…Let’s Workshop!
Now you know why. No matter your job or team role or anything else, workshops really can revolutionize the way your team works together and help you deliver results you never thought possible. Join my crusade to banish lame meetings forever. Apply a proven workshop template, have some fun for heaven's sake, and kick some productivity butt.
And let me know how it’s going! I’d love to geek out with you about all-things workshops, give you my two cents, celebrate your successes, lament languishing in lingering lameness (Last alliteration! I promise!), and even collaborate on a workshop with you. Drop me a line via:
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