In short: No. Pre-workshop exercises often lead to unprepared participants and wasted time. Instead for big workshops or sprints, an introduction meeting 1-2 weeks before can be a good alternative.

The Problem with Pre-Workshop Exercises

I'm not a big fan of having people do exercises at home or at work before a workshop. Why? There will always be someone who hasn't done the exercise. Then, during the workshop, we need to give that person time to catch up. This either delays the group or leaves some folks underprepared.

Intro meeting instead of exercices

Instead of asking people to prepare in advance, I prefer an introduction meeting. This works well for big sprints that last two days or even week-long sprints. We can hold such a 30-60 minutes meeting one or two weeks before the main event. No one has to prepare anything before coming to the meeting.

What Happens in the Intro Meeting?

During this meeting, I run through the basics:

• why we do the workshop,

• the process of the workshop,

• the rules of collaboration

This way, when the main workshop happens, everyone is already onboarded. It allows me to cut down on introductory time significantly. I might remind folks about core elements but leave out deeper explanations since we covered those earlier.

Exceptions to the Rule

This isn't a fixed rule for every workshop type.

For longer workshops like design sprints, I might ask participants to prepare a few things. This is especially true if I know they're engaged and motivated.

But if I'm unsure about the participants, I skip preparatory tasks. In my experience there's always a good percentage who won't do them, leading to disappointment and wasted time.

Written with AI help
This article is based on audio note that I registered and then transcribed and cleaned using Audiopen. I then review the text by hand.