Steal the agile concept of a backlog for your workshop agenda. It’s a great way to visualise the topics to cover during the session. Doing so you can easily respond to feedback or changes and gain a sense of achievement and progress throughout the session.

Also, if you are working towards more agility in your organisation, it can be a nice way to introduce people to the concept of backlogs.

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Steps

1. Prepare by clarifying the purpose, goal or the intended outcomes of the session. It might even be worth writing down, keeping visible during the workshop and referring back to if you start to feel like the workshop is going off the rails.
2. Write down each agenda item on an index card.
3. Put up the cards in your intended order on a wall easily viewed by all participants.
4. At the beginning of the session, validate your purpose/goal, and go through the agenda items. Change the order topics if you get relevant feedback that may help you achieve the goal of the session.
5. If it is a long session, put up cards for coffee/lunch breaks. Knowing that they are coming helps to keep people motivated.
6. During the session, move completed items into a column called Done.

Extra tips

What you need