Insight

Stakeholder workshops are collaborative research activities that bring together key people from the organisation and research team. Focused on discovery, investigation, and definition they can be incredibly valuable at the start of a new user research project.

Stakeholder workshops are not a substitute for user research. They are an important stage in understanding the organisational context in which the user research will take place, the decisions the research needs to support, and the internal perspectives and priorities that must be represented.

Facilitated effectively, stakeholder workshops can achieve many positive outcomes, including:

• The opportunity to revisit and interrogate the research brief. A great question to ask in these workshops is ‘Has anything changed since the brief was written?’ In fast-paced business environments, it is possible that the organisation will have evolved, new products or services will have been introduced, innovations in the sector will have presented new opportunities and challenges etc. The user research should be as current and relevant as possible and stakeholder workshops are a great way to reveal and discuss important developments.
• A nuanced understanding of organisational objectives and research aims. Organisational objectives can be found on the company website and the aims of the research will be detailed in the research brief. However, these documents can become outdated quickly and are often written in professional, public-facing language that requires interpretation. Inviting key stakeholders to speak about their aims and objectives in the collaborative, supportive space of a workshop can reveal a much more frank and nuanced understanding of what the user research is intended to achieve.
• Creating alignment across teams. User research typically involves bringing together diverse groups of stakeholders and researchers. Early stakeholder workshops present the ideal opportunity to create alignment across all teams. With an opportunity to share priorities, insight, and frustrations, everyone should leave the sessions with a much stronger sense of purpose. The workshops also present the opportunity to start building rapport that can prove very valuable in later phases of the research.

The ways in which stakeholder workshops are structured can also have a significant impact upon how effective they are. To reveal the most valuable insight, the following two approaches are recommended:

• Workshops structured around specific teams and disciplines, such as marketing, IT, and customer success. These sessions can tackle opportunities and challenges associated with each area of work, drawing upon the in-depth expertise in the room.
• Cross-cutting and interdisciplinary workshops, with representation from across the organisation. These sessions serve to break down silos, create shared understandings, and challenge misconceptions.

In combination, these two approaches deliver the best of both worlds: in-depth thinking and analysis, coupled with interdisciplinary collaboration and exploration.

It is also important to carefully consider who should be invited to stakeholder workshops. The following recommendations can prove very effective:

• Include people from as many different teams as possible. The core teams directly involved with digital products and services, including marketing, communications, digital, and IT, should always be included but a wealth of valuable insight can be offered by people in less immediately visible areas of the organisation. HR, legal, compliance, finance, and operational teams often understand user needs and frustrations as well as anyone, so include them too.
• Ensure different levels of seniority are represented. ‘Key stakeholders’ should not just mean the most senior managers. Some of the most valuable user insight often comes from people who are not seen as strategic leaders. Senior managers will represent the organisation’s priorities and constraints but frontline, operational, and more junior colleagues often contribute very valuable insight generated through their work in close contact with users.
• Identify and invite those people who have an intimate understanding of your target audiences. Working with a museum? Invite tour guides. Working with a university? Invite student ambassadors. Working with a charity? Invite volunteers. People working in roles such as these spend every day speaking with users in an informal context and are likely to have heard every enquiry, wish, and complaint imaginable! This intimate, ‘boots on the ground’ experience can be invaluable in understanding user needs and frustrations.

To make stakeholder workshops as inclusive as possible, online collaborative whiteboards can prove very effective. For practical guidance on how to use them effectively, please read this related article: Using Online Collaborative Whiteboards to Facilitate Inclusive Stakeholder Workshops