<aside> ℹ️ Borrowing a play from Org Design for Design Orgs, this workshop will define our design team's charter - our Purpose, Values, Behaviours, and Norms. Our goal is to align on our unique ‘why’ - who we are, how we work, what matters most to us. The outputs of this effort will provide a valuable resource for our own team, as well as a reference point as we engage more deeply with other teams, continue hiring and growing.

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Overview

• Structure: 4x 3-hour sessions
• Participants: Design team

Agenda

Session 1: Foundations

• A journey of discovery
• Who we are, how we work, what matters most to us
• A reference point for ourselves and our teams
• While also helping shape the next steps we take together

Ground rules

• Turn off notifications on your devices (including your laptop!)
• Use the largest display you can connect to (remote)
• Go with the flow and have fun! | | 10 mins | Warm up | Pick a fun, creative way to warm up together | | 30 mins | Roses, buds & thorns | Brainstorming solo (10 mins)
• What’s working
• What could be working better
• What’s not working

Upvote, 5 votes each (5 mins)

• Upvote to promote future discussion, attention

Discuss (10 mins)

• What patterns do you see?
• Are there any surprises?

Prompts:

• Roles & responsibilities
• Doing the work
• Relationships & communication
• Time Activity Description
• Team culture | | 30 mins | Design team, personified | Next, we imagine if our Design Team was a person that represents the team’s best self, who would it be? It could be real or fictional.

Brainstorming solo (5 mins)

• Who represents our team’s best self?
• Add your image
• 3-5 words or phrases this person represents

Share out & discussion (25 mins)

• Lightning share outs
• Upvote anything you’d like
• What things stood out? Any patterns? | | 15 mins | Break | | | 45 mins | Work experience bliss | Digging into past experience to define the ideal conditions for our future selves.

Solo brainstorm (5 mins)

• Your favourite work experience(s)
• What did you accomplish?
• What made it so great?

Share out (35 mins)

• Emoji map?

Recap

• Wrap up the day |

Session 2: Our purpose - The why

• Draft purpose statements (solo)
• Share out and group
• Topic area voting
• Discussion

Intro (8 mins)

• Intro to today’s session
• Agenda

Brainstorming solo (5 mins)

• Who do we work for? What do we do for them?
• What problems do we solve, what are our goals?
• How would we want other teams to describe us and what we do?

Draft purpose statements solo (5 mins)

• Share some inspiration from other company’s purpose statements
• Write up a statement
• Use visuals, emojis, GIFs

Share with the group (15 mins) One by one, walk through, group asked to react with emojis

Vote & Organize (5 mins)

• Dot voting
• Facilitator organizes by number of votes

Drafting and wordsmithing (15 mins) As a group, start drafting and wordsmithing/curating our purpose (including visuals).

Conclusion & Next steps (5 mins) 15 minute break, then we’ll build on the purpose and define our team values. | | 15 mins | Break | | | 60 mins | Defining our Values | What are the values of our design team? What makes us distinct or unique? What do we stand for? What things matter most to us? Things we would not be willing to bend on?

• Draft values (solo)
• Share and group
• Voting
• Discussion

Intro (3 mins)

• Welcome back, let’s talk about values
• Agenda for the next 40 minutes

Brainstorming solo (5 mins)

• Capture words or ideas that represent the best of our team; both actual and aspirational. One word/idea per sticky, as many as possible
• What makes us distinct or unique? What do we stand for? What things matter most to us? Things we would not be willing to bend on?

Refine solo (5 mins) Pick your favourite ones and use the This, not that format to refine them. Alternatively, write them out in the We do, we don't format.

Share with the group (15 mins) One by one, walk through, group asked to cluster as the sharing goes.

Dot voting & sorting (5 mins)

• Dot voting
• Facilitator organizes by number of votes

Review (10 mins) Review the top 5 and the 5 runner-ups: What’s missing, what’s redundant? Are there balancing values?

Conclusion & Next steps (2 mins) At the end of the workshop (Thursday or Friday), we’ll ask folks to form a working group to

• Refine wording
• Visualize purpose and values |

Session 3: Our work - The what

<aside> 📄 Homework for today: Complete survey answering “What are the things that we’d like to be doing that we’re currently doing too little of or not at all [inputs and outcomes]”

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Intro (5 mins)

• Intro to today’s session
• Recap yesterday
• Agenda

Unpacking responsibilities - solo (5 mins) Individually list out design/team/triad/other/all responsibilities individually (on paper)

Share (10 mins)

• Ask for volunteer to share what is on their list
• Ask group to help fill in the gaps
• Facilitator will compile shared list

Vote and discuss (15 mins)

• VOTE: What should be [ejected into space], [redesigned in the lab], [packaged up to take with us as is]
• DISCUSS: What is surprising? Any disagreements [add some disagreement badge] | | 30 mins | What we want to do | Homework question: What are the things that we’d like to be doing that we’re currently doing too little of or not at all. [inputs and outcomes]

Sort answers (8 mins) Individually designers will sort their list (compiled from the homework), and add anything they think is missing

Order (2 mins) Facilitator will tally the top 3-6 items

“A day in the life” part 1 (20 mins)

• Pull the “what we do” and “what we want to do” together.
• DISCUSS: Obstacles… what is standing in our way of this being realistic? | | 15 mins | Break | | | 60 mins | What we want to do | Intro (2 mins)
• Welcome back, let’s talk about values
• Agenda for the next 50 minutes

“A day in the life” part 2, a focus on growth (15 mins)

• [Battery life for each capability imagery]
• Look at the capabilities alongside our overview of “what we do” and “what we want to do”
• Considering the spectrum of growth opportunities that exist for our design team, what else do we wish was part of our routine?
• Discuss freely, and record all ideas shared

TRANSITION → how can our design team rituals support what we want to accomplish?

Current ritual roll-up (5 mins)

• Facilitator walks through a timeline (or a venn diagram) of all of our current rituals
• Anything missing?

Voting (8 mins) VOTE: What should be [ejected into space], [redesigned in the lab], [packaged up to take with us as is]

Open discussion (18 minutes)

• What should go, and why
• What should stay, and why
• What needs work, and why

Conclusion & Next steps (2 mins) |

Session 4: Collaboration - The how

For the following set of topics, answer the questions -- What should we KEEP doing? What should we START doing? What should we STOP doing?

• Working with each other?
• With our cross-functional teams?
• With the rest of our organization?

Brainstorming solo (15 mins)

• What should we KEEP doing?
• What should we START doing?
• What should we STOP doing?

Upvote, 20 votes each (10 mins)

• Upvote to promote future discussion, attention

Discuss (25 mins) Big themes & patterns

Prompts:

• Collaboration
• Planning our work
• Supporting and helping others
• Advocate for design / what we need to succeed | | 15 mins | Break | | | 60 mins | Measuring success | To identify measures of success, we will refer to the prior sessions, specifically around Purpose, Norms, and The Work, and come up with metrics that encourage us to deliver in those areas. These measures can help us prioritize what we work on, how we hire, and initiatives within the team.

Draft success metrics (10 mins)

• 3-5 measures of success each

Place, read, group (20 mins)

• Shared board
• Affinity diagram as we go

Upvote (10 mins)

• Topic areas first
• Individual items | | 15 mins | Wrap up and next steps | We’ll discuss how people feel about where we ended up, what they feel strongly about, and what may be missing. We’ll then identify next steps and owners of those items. |