Playback & wrap-up

SO YOU’VE DONE IT

During an inception, we do regular playbacks to share insights, align and drive decisions. At the end, we do a final play back where we share our reponse to the inception brief (often a lightweight solution approach with a delivery and cost proposal).

After this, a decision will be made on how toproceed.We also take the opportunity to reflect, learn and improve for the future.

The final playback makesourultimate recommendation: this may have changed throughout an inception due to our agile approach.

Here are some key considerations for this phase:

• The final play back must be problem oriented. Ensure you address the problem and answer all questions via a ‘narrative’ that outlines clear recommendations and next steps, but also assumptions, risk and dependencies.

• Keep it brief and actionable. You want to leave the client with insightful answers to help them make a decision – not a shiny deck they can’t do much with.

• This is an ideal opportunity for all parties to assess whether this initiative is a good fit for all parties (i.e. not only the client).

• We take this as an opportunity to learn from our clients as well as our team, to optimise our ways of working with this particular client, as a team and as an organisation.

Pro tips

Give your team enough time to prepare the final playback. Don’t let yourselves be rushed into providing a cost and/or plan if you haven’t had the time to think it through.

Have a clear narrative from problem through to recommendation. Address desirability, viability and feasibility.

Ensure that you are doing the right thing by your client, but also respect your own organisational goals and values. Not all relationships are made to last beyond inception.

Be sure to answer the brief. Where you deviate from it, be very clear why you are doing so.

Don’t be arrogant: our clients have built successful businesses. Don’t think you know better than them about what they need. You can (perhaps should) challenge them, but always respectfully.