A market leading London based company working in the demanding world of market research for Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG’s) had initiated a software development program. The objective was to enhance its offering by building a smartphone data collection application. The development was complex and involved several small teams working on different aspects of the project.
Work was going well and was on schedule but the project manager and the MD of the company wanted to undertake a road mapping exercise to validate progress, secure agreement from across the full team as to what work remained to be completed and in what timescales and finally to look for ‘quick win’ commercial opportunities. Via our relationship with technology road mapping specialists RTL, Stash was asked to bid to provide facilitation input (planning, setup, delivery and reporting) for the workshop; this was a new client so a bidding exercise was not unexpected. After a written proposal was submitted and a couple of clarification telephone calls had taken place we were delighted to be awarded the work.
The scope comprised three main phases, planning, delivery and reporting. Planning began with a face to face meeting in London, as this was the first time we had worked together a face to face kick off was preferable, generally for follow on work telephone / video calls and email can suffice if geography makes physical meetings a problem. Delivery took place over two days in the Paddington Sports Club in Maida Vale, a very interesting venue; London is full of unique and often quirky places offering event spaces. We had a great couple of days, very useful for the team, or so they advised, and fascinating for us.
We spend a lot of time working in the energy sector so a workshop in a completely different area is always interesting and this one was especially so as FMCG market research is relevant to us all, it is amazing how much the big supermarkets know about us and our behavior! Reporting involved preparing a typed up summary of the discussions. We offer this service but often clients will prepare their own report using the facilitation board output as stating point. Always our deliverable is a full photographic report of all the workshop output captured on the boards, on occasions and as in this case we are contracted to prepare a typed up report including action tables etc.