Creating the perfect UX workshop bag
Running a UX Workshop can be a daunting task to take on. There are calendars to organise, invites to send, activities to plan, travel to book and materials to prep… and that’s before you’ve even arrived on the day to host the workshop.
In this post, I’ll show you how you can remove some of the headaches in planning your workshop by prepping your very own ‘UX Workshop’ bag, leaving you more time to focus on the most important thing… your workshop agenda.
Creation
In 2016, after running numerous workshops and getting annoyed at the last-minute scramble to pull together workshop materials, I started to put together our very own ‘UX Workshop Bag’.
The team was growing in size, which meant I had less time to pick up materials throughout the week and I wanted to create something any member of the team could pick up should they need to run a workshop.
3 years later our UX Workshop bag is still going strong, it’s been used to deliver over 50 workshops in over 8 countries, and I’ve had numerous bits of feedback from clients who want to know where I got the bag from and what we have packed in it.
Here’s our current UX Workshop bag in all its glory… Now let’s explore what we keep inside it.
The Bag
First let’s start with the obvious, the bag. When doing some online research, I started to primarily look at cable bags. Cable bags are great as they’re always crammed full of neat little pockets, zips and compartments.
There were a few suitable cable bags I came across, however I decided to opt for the BUMB Travel Cable Bag. This bag is perfect for running workshops as it can be stowed away in your backpack or added to your suitcase and you can pick it up from Amazon for £16.99.
As with any decent cable bag, the BUMB bag has lots of compartments to store all your post it’s, sharpies and Blu Tak. The zips are good quality, and the bottom section has a Velcro divider so you can create your perfect layout.
We’ve had the bag for around 3 years now, its travelled to over 8 different countries and been used to deliver over 50 workshops where we’ve never had any issues.
Contents
Ok, now let’s take a look at what we keep inside the workshop bag, here’s a bit of a flat lay.
Now let’s break this down a little into the most important items:
🖊 Pens
I like to keep a mixture of different pens and always carry more than I need, just incase we run low on ink throughout the session.
- Sharpies = Sharpies are great for post it notes and sketching exercises. I like to keep both a black and coloured set. The black set can be viewed from a distance on any coloured post it note from across the room. Meanwhile, the coloured set can be used for Dot Voting exercises should you be short on dot stickers. A black set and coloured set can be picked up for around £19.
- Biros = Sometimes sharpies can be a bit too heavy handed for exercises such as detailing out Personas or writing User Stories. It’s for this reason I keep a selection of biros also. Your standard Bic Ballpoint will do here, a set of 20 can be purchased for around £7.
- Flip chart markers = I always carry a couple of flip chart markers. Most of the time when we go out to visit clients the rooms typically always feature a flip chart, however having the flip charts pens in another story. As such, I always carry a couple in the bag for instances where I want to use the flip chart. A set of Staedtller flip-chart markers can be purchased for around £10.
📝 Post-it Notes
Now, a workshop bag wouldn’t be completed without any Post-it Notes now would it? I always carry two kinds of post-it notes in a variety of colours.
- Rectangle = Rectangle post-it notes can be used to Swim Lane titles within a User Flow, create clusters within Affinity Maps and more. You can pick a set of rectangle Post-it notes up for around £15.
- Square = Square post it notes meanwhile are better for the details of what you’re capturing i.e. success metrics, pain points, features etc. You can pick a set of square Post-it notes up for around £20.
I’ll only buy the original Post-it notes now; we’ve used cheaper alternatives in the past however they don’t tend to remain sticky throughout the day. Also, always remember to tear your post it notes from the side and not the bottom to prevent that upward curl.
🗳 Prioritisation Tools
In most workshops there will be a need for some kind of prioritisation exercise, I keep some specific workshop items for these type of activities.
- Play Money = Play Money can be used for exercises such as ‘Buy a Feature’ where participants must select which features, they feel are worth the most investment. You can pick up a set of Play Money for £6.
- Dot Stickers = are great for exercises such as Dot Voting. This task usually proceeds some kind of idea generation session such as Crazy 8’s and focuses on users voting on the best ideas. A set of Dot Stickers can be picked up for around £4.
🏷 User Stories / Job Stories
In some workshops, you’ll want to explore the scope of a project. User Stories or Job Stories are a great way to do this. When conducting exercises such as User Story Mapping, I use the following.
- Index Cards = Index Cards are great for capturing a lot of detailed. They’re also lined which helps your writing stay neat and tidy. However, in my experience they can be overly bulky if you want to map out a lot of user stories and place them up on the wall. Nevertheless, you can pick up a set of Index Cards for £4.
- Because of this, I decided to make some branded User Story Cards. Our user story cards are roughly half the size of an Index Card which means you can fit two User Story Cards in the. Space you could for a single Index Card, meaning you can get a lot more on the wall. We created this as a branded sketch template so the team can print new ones as and when required.
✂️ 📏 Cutting and Sticking
Throughout the workshop, you’ll most likely want to stick work up on the walls and get your attendees collaborating therefore you’ll need.
- Scissors = Scissors are essential of course, to cut up sheets of brown roll, index cards, workshop sheets etc. A decent set can be picked up for £5.
- Blu Tak & Tape = To stick artefacts up on the wall. I always carry both. I use tape to stick up sheets of brown roll. I’ll then use Blu Tak to attach any pre workshop work (Mood Boards, Design Concepts, or a proposed Sitemap) or artefacts produced in the session (Personas, Sketches, User Stories) to the brown roll. A 12 pack of Blu Tak can be picked up for around £8, meanwhile 6 rolls of Parcel Tape can be picked up for around £7.50
- Ruler (non slip) = Used for both drawing and cutting straight lines. A metal none slip ruler can be picked up for around £8
📌 Showcasing
Rather than sticking workshop materials directly to the client’s office walls, I like to carry the following.
- Brown Butcher Paper =I’ll use the scissors to cut this down and attach it this directly to the wall using my tape. The benefits of this are that when the workshop is complete, you can take down the roll, roll it up and take everything you produced back to the office. You can pick up a roll of Butcher Paper for around £17
- Drawing Tube = The plastic telescoping drawing tube is used to carry the butcher paper and ruler to and from the workshop location to ensure the papers don’t get scuffed, marked or wet. I purchased ours for £12, it’s ok… however if you shop around, you’ll no doubt find better versions.
🔌 Adaptors
There’s nothing worse than getting to the session and not having the right adaptor. To try and combat this, I keep the following stowed in the bag at all times.
- Travel Adaptor = For any workshops we do outside of the UK. Working at an international agency this happens a lot more than you may think.
- USB Adaptor & Cables = I like to keep an iOS and Android cable stowed in the bag should anyone forget their phone charger.
- HDMI Adaptor = Because… well… we’re all on 🍎
- Memory Stick = We use this rarely these days, but it can be useful where you need a backup of the workshop deck and your internet connection is not on your side.
Over to you…
Do you have a UX Workshop bag? Or are you just looking to get started. If you need any practical tips or advice you can reach me here or on Twitter @kyecass
