Pathfinder Workshop
What is the Pathfinder Workshop?
The Pathfinder Workshop is designed to guide the participants in exploring and identifying a clear intervention area within a problem theme. Through understanding the wider system of the theme, mapping out the relevant stakeholders, and then looking towards the future with a solution, the goal is to end up with not only a better understanding of the theme you are exploring but with a narrowed down next step to follow. Inspired by principles from the domain of Strategic design, the workshop blends methods from System mapping, Futures thinking, and Storytelling into one combined workshop.
Why do you need it?
Deriving clear opportunity and intervention areas for a wide problem theme can be overwhelming. This workshop helps you to map out the system surrounding the problem, which can then be used to narrow down and formulate a clear intervention area to pursue further, as well as avoiding that your chosen intervention area don’t any have unintended negative consequences on the wider system.
Who can use it?
The workshop is initially designed for Venture Development Managers at NEEW Ventures, as a part of their early-stage in the venture building process. It can however be used by anyone that is going through an innovation process - whether you are an strategic designer, venture builder or aspiring impact entrepreneur. This template is designed for the perspective of the facilitator, so it can be a workshop that you either do with yourself and a selected few team members if you are going through the process yourself - or you facilitate it for the participants that you want to help through the early stages of the innovation process.
When can you use it?
Designed for the early stages of the venture building process, this workshop is meant to be done in the initial "fuzzy front-end" phase of the innovation process. In design especially, you often start with a wide problem area or theme, which gets narrowed down as you progress in the process. This workshop fits perfectly in that transition from theme to concept, as you try to identify the intervention area that you want to further focus on in the project.
FAQ about the workshop
How long does the Pathfinder Workshop typically take?
The workshop is designed to last for 3 hours, with a break of 15 minutes in between.
What materials and tools are needed to conduct the workshop, and is it meant to be done online or in person?
The workshop can be done both in person and online, although doing it in a real space is most of the time more fun! It does however require a space with whiteboards, markers and a screen, which is not required if you do it online. How many participants are ideal for this workshop?
1-3 in addition to the facilitator is ideal in this workshop, as it in the example of NEEW Ventures is meant to guide the main Venture Development Manager in narrowing down from their wider problem theme into a clear intervention area. In that case, only two people are in the workshop - the trained facilitator and the Venture developer. What are the specific steps or phases of the workshop?
The steps are described in detail in the workshop template, but the general outline of the tool used are as following:
Introduction
Cluster Map
Stakeholder Map
Three Horizons
Storytelling
What kind of follow-up actions or steps are recommended after the workshop?
The results should be documented, and hopefully also help in defining what the next steps should be for your innovation process. If you were unsure about which direction to pursue, the end result should help you in getting the answers to right questions.
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