How do you adapt and customize your co-creative workshop design to different contexts and goals?

1 Know your purpose

Before you plan your workshop, you need to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve with it. What is the main question or challenge you want to explore? What are the expected outcomes and deliverables? How will they inform your next steps in the service design process? Having a clear purpose will help you define the scope, duration, format, and agenda of your workshop.

2 Choose your participants

The success of your workshop depends largely on who you invite and how you engage them. You want to have a diverse and representative group of participants who can contribute different perspectives, experiences, and skills to your workshop. Depending on your purpose, you may want to include users, customers, frontline staff, managers, experts, partners, or other stakeholders. You also need to consider how many participants you can effectively facilitate, how you will recruit them, and how you will motivate them to participate.

3 Select your methods

There are many methods and tools you can use in your co-creative workshop, depending on your purpose and participants. You may want to use some methods to warm up the group, some to gather insights and data, some to generate and evaluate ideas, and some to prototype and test solutions. You can also mix and match different methods to create your own custom workshop. Some examples of methods are: brainstorming, affinity mapping, personas, journey mapping, service blueprinting, storyboarding, role-playing, prototyping, and feedback loops.

4 Prepare your materials

Once you have selected your methods, you need to prepare the materials you will use in your workshop. These may include: worksheets, templates, cards, stickers, pens, markers, scissors, glue, paper, cardboard, or other prototyping materials. You also need to think about how you will document and capture the results of your workshop, such as: photos, videos, audio recordings, notes, sketches, or digital files. You may want to use some tools or platforms to facilitate online or hybrid workshops, such as: Zoom, Miro, Mural, or Google Docs.

5 Test your workshop

Before you run your workshop, you need to test it to make sure it works as intended. You can do this by: running a pilot workshop with a small group of participants or colleagues, asking for feedback and suggestions, observing how the participants interact with the methods and materials, timing the activities and transitions, and adjusting the workshop design accordingly. Testing your workshop will help you identify and fix any issues or gaps in your workshop design.

6 Facilitate your workshop

Finally, you need to facilitate your workshop with confidence and flexibility. You need to: set the tone and expectations for the workshop, introduce the purpose and agenda, guide the participants through the activities and methods, encourage participation and collaboration, manage the time and energy of the group, handle any conflicts or challenges, and wrap up the workshop with a summary and next steps. You also need to be ready to adapt and improvise if something unexpected happens or if the participants have different needs or interests.