Define an Action Plan

Plan the main steps to reach a vision with the Action Plan

Get a deeper understanding of the vision, success factors, challenges, resources and phases that will be needed for your project. The Action Plan shows how you’ll achieve your project vision.

It helps you and the team with the following:

  • Visualize the tasks and track outcomes
  • Get a deeper understanding into the vision, success factors, challenges, resources, and phases that will be needed for the project
  • Get consensus around specific tasks required to complete the project

GOAL

Define an action plan for your project

PARTICIPANTS

Designers, Business Leads, Customer

TIME NEEDED

60 minutes

PHASE

Explore

Before You Start

Define a Vision for Your Project
To set up a vision of success for the use case and milestones that will help you achieve that vision, we recommend you to conduct a Remember the Future exercise with the following method:

Remember the Future

Know the Use Case You Want to Have the Action Plan For
We recommend you have identified use-case ideas with business impact, using the following method:

Use-Case Exploration Workshop

Materials You Will Need

Resources for Download

Download All Resources

Templates for Virtual Collaboration

(Registration to MURAL is required)

Steps

Defining an action plan includes several steps. We recommend completing them in one session.
  • 10 Minutes

Define the Vision to Complete the Objectives for the Project

Start with the vision for your project. You can use your results from the Remember the Future exercise as input. Formulate a vision statement stating the team’s vision for the project.

Try to formulate the vision statement as your project’s final future achievement and the impact of that achievement. The vision statement should give a clear direction to your project going forward.

See Example

  • 10 Minutes

Describe the Objectives and Deliverables of the Action Plan

Conduct a brainstorming and capture deliverables on sticky notes. Use one sticky note per objective or deliverable. Review, discuss, and align the objectives and deliverables with the team.

See Example

  • 5 Minutes

Capture What Is Out of Scope

Conduct a quick brainstorming and capture what is out of scope on sticky notes. Use one sticky note per item.

See Example

  • 20 Minutes

Write Down All the Steps and Related Activities to Complete the Objectives

Write down all steps and related activities (and, if needed, the deliverables for individual steps) on sticky notes. Use one sticky note per activity. You may afterwards cluster the activities according to the different phases of your project. Discuss and align with the team.

See Example

  • 5 Minutes

Identify the Individuals and Teams as Responsibles in Charge of the Tasks

Write down the individuals and teams in charge of the tasks. Use one sticky note per individual or team. Review, discuss, and align on who is going to be responsible for the outcome of individual steps.

See Example

  • 10 Minutes

Identify the Criteria of Success and Challenges to Overcome

Conduct a brainstorming and identify the criteria of success and challenges to overcome in order to accomplish the vision through all the activities. Use one sticky note per idea.

See Completed Example

You’re Done!

Throughout the project, refer to the Action Plan. It is useful to track follow-up action items on a regular basis.