Designing and Facilitating JAD Workshops

I. Introduction to Facilitation

Facilitation is a skill beyond writing with markers on flipcharts or white boards. It includes an array of subtle techniques that should be invisible to participants. The workshop runs smoothly because of effective techniques, but they shouldn't be obvious to anyone except the facilitator. By avoiding the pitfalls and the "ditch," you can ensure such sessions are successful.

• The importance of creating the climate
• The difference between process and content
• Facilitation skills vs. presentation skills
• Active listening skills
• Tools of the trade
• Tricks of the trade

Practice Session

Participants practice the initial skills as demonstrated and receive feedback on their performance from the instructor and fellow students.

II. The Dynamics of JAD Workshops

Creating an atmosphere is important, but being able to deftly handle people problems is key.

• People motivators
• People principles
• Problem people and how to deal with them
• The group life cycle

III. Key Techniques: Brainstorming/Cardstorming/Creativity Techniques

Acquiring the information needed to understand a business system and its customers' requirements normally occurs through different versions of brainstorming. Brainstorming is just part of the journey - clarifying, combining and prioritizing are the rest of the journey. Learn subtle techniques for generating ideas, identifying themes, reaching consensus and summarizing the process. Apply the techniques demonstrated to a variety of situations.

• Rules
• Process
• Creativity methods
• Clarifying, combining, evaluating, categorizing
• Prioritizing
• Problem solving
• Exercises

Practice Session

Participants are assigned situations to which they must apply one or more of the various techniques in order to demonstrate a working knowledge of the methodology. Participants receive feedback from the instructor and fellow participants.

IV. Preparing for the Workshop

Planning is everything. You must build an agenda and the mechanics of how to conduct each topic in the agenda. It's another ditch-avoidance mechanism. Organizing the topics is a key step, but planning how each topic is handled must integrate the tool mechanics, group dynamics and creativity techniques. Learn how to orchestrate all these factors to create a successful meeting environment.

• Building the agenda
• Integrating the tools
• Considering the mechanics
• Setting up the room

Practice Session

Participants learn how to orchestrate mechanics, group dynamics, and creativity techniques to create a successful meeting environment. Participants construct detailed agendas based on the desired outcome of the meeting assigned to them.

V. Facilitating the JAD Workshop - Demonstration and Class Exercises

Teaching participants how to facilitate workshops is a "show and tell" process - first the instructor demonstrates it and then "you do it". During some of these exercises, the instructor will start the process, and then the participants will complete it. In others, the instructor demonstrates the complete process, and participants then use a hypothetical but realistic case project to apply the technique on their own, with other class participants portraying the facilitated group.

• Starting the Workshop
• Identifying Business and Systems Role
  1. Identifying roles
  2. Clarifying expectation
  3. Comparing and resolving differences

• Scope Identification
  1. Brainstorming candidate items
  2. Narrowing the scope

• Identifying the Context and Actors
  1. Identifying and documenting the components
  2. Drawing the model

• Chunking for Further Analysis (Functional Decomposition)
  1. Identifying the functions
  2. Defining the functions
  3. Identifying the processes
  4. Developing the data flows

• Brainstorming Requirements
  1. Identifying requirements by function
  2. Listing, clarifying, combining, and prioritizing
  3. Identifying requirements gaps
  4. Identifying possible solutions

• Identifying Business Objects, data, and relationships (Entity Relationship Diagram)
  1. Identifying“things” - the entities/objects
  2. Defining the entities/objects
  3. Identifying relationships and drawing models
  4. Identifying the attributes and data elements
  5. UML and Use Cases
  6. Creating use cases

• Agile/Scrum Facilitated Workshops
  1. Techniques for identifying the product backlog in Sprint Zero
  2. Categorizing stories into Themes
  3. Writing user stories and high level acceptance criteria Deriving requirements
  4. User story prioritization via MoSCoW
  5. Identifying Sprints and Releases
  6. Grooming stories within Sprint backlogs with lower level user stories and/or detailed acceptance criteria

• Planning for Success
  1. Resolving overlapping roles and responsibilities
  2. Identifying, evaluating, and mitigating risks
  3. Developing a high level plans
  4. Developing detailed project plans/business analyst plans
  5. Conducting lessons-learned sessions

• Ending the JAD Workshop
  1. Reviewing and assigning issues
  2. Identifying next steps, who, and when
  3. Closing the workshop

Practice Session

In a highly interactive real-world environment, participants will conduct various sections of the process taught, and receive feedback from the instructor and class participants.

VI. Additional Uses of the Tools

All of the techniques used in the class are applicable to a variety of situations. An overview of actual uses of these tools is provided for future use.

• Learn techniques for skillful facilitation.
• Effectively coordinate and organize meetings for maximum productivity.
• Extract information in a variety of ways - brainstorming, categorization, prioritization, etc.
• Apply the techniques to improve a variety of other types of meetings.
• Learn different methods for prioritizing requirements in a group setting.
• Learn the simple, mechanical techniques of capturing information easily and correctly.
• Avoid pitfalls to ensure active participation of all parties in a session.
• Appreciate the flexibility and usability of Post-It™ notes in solving problems.
• Understand how to assist the business in relevant activities beyond requirements.
• Keep energy and interest high during meetings that last several hours or days

This Designing and Facilitating JAD Workshops training course is valuable to all those interested in collapsing calendar time in developing requirements, other system-related topics, and learning powerful meeting facilitation skills. This project management training class is for you if you are a...

• Business Systems Analyst
• Business Analyst
• Business Customer or Partner
• Systems Analyst
• Designer or Developer
• Project Manager or Team Leader
• IT Manager/Director
• Scrum Master
• Product Owner