Post the Path

Purpose

• To create a shared understanding of the steps needed to get to a final project.

Facilitation Instructions

• On a whiteboard or slide, draw a timeline with numbered steps. Label one end “start” or “today” or whatever makes sense, the other “finish” or “end of the year” or the project deadline.
• Instruct participants to think about a process from beginning to end. Then give them the task: write down each step in the process. They can use as many notes as they like, but each step must be a separate note.
• After the participants have brainstormed their version of the steps, ask them to come up to the wall and post them to compare.
• The group should place their steps above and below one another’s so that they can compare their versions of steps 1, 2, and so on.
• Prompt the group to find points of agreement and confusion. Look for terminology problems, where participants may be using different words to describe the same step. Points of confusion may surface where “something magical happens” or no one is really clear on a step.
• Some things may appear more than once or in different places. Come to an agreement on when these things should or do happen in a “Final path” that incorporates all of the steps involved

Products Generated

• A timeline with key stages in project development

Reference

Gamestorming

Additional Information

• Discussion prompts: What are the points of agreement and confusion? What steps can be consolidated?
• If you sense in advance that the group will get caught up in the details, ask them to produce a limited number of steps—try 10.
• For a larger group, you may want to avoid individual readouts and instead have people post up simultaneously.
• You can assign responsibility for each of the steps in a follow up game using graphic gameplan