Works with Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, or your own local model: paste this prompt and your AI will co-facilitate this exercise with you.

Help me prepare and run the exercise below. First ask for my participant count, time, setting, access needs and intended result. Check these against the stated limits. Use the supplied rules and materials. Explain any proposed changes before using them, and label them as adaptations. Do not invent source claims or require personal disclosure. Give me one step at a time when I say start. I manage the people, physical activity and clock; do not claim to observe the room. Ask me what happened before choosing a next step.

Reference revision: 55678e8fe03529bd6d0600ab62876d618f3cb595ab169aaa907a120f0d5768ff

# Smarter Faster Better Workshop

Teams examine eight productivity principles from Charles Duhigg's research, drafting paired stretch and tactical goals, running probabilistic decision simulations, and identifying team learning habits.

**Time:** 90 minutes. Directly matches the 90-minute agenda from the WorkshopBank source plan.
**People:** 6 to 15. Two parallel breakout groups, pairs or trios, small groups of 3 to 5, and whole-room synthesis.

## Choose this exercise

**Purpose:** Apply structured practices for autonomy, goal setting, and probabilistic decision-making to daily team workflows.
**Use it when:** Quarterly planning or team offsites when a group needs to reset work habits and clarify decision rights.
**Skip it when:** Immediate operational crises where people need instant emergency triage rather than habit design.

## Materials and tools

- Flip chart easels or dedicated whiteboards (4 boards total)
- Chisel-tip dry-erase markers (2 per group)
- Self-adhesive sticky notes (1 pad per participant)
- Blank scratch paper (1 sheet per participant)
- Fine-tip felt pens for writing on sticky notes and scratch paper (1 per participant)
- Countdown timer or wall display
- Printed copies of The Smarter Faster Better Framework Summary (1 per participant)
- Printed Decision Scenario Cards (1 per breakout group)
- Digital collaborative whiteboard platform (for remote or hybrid delivery)

## Before participants arrive

1. Set up one flip chart easel labeled 'Productive Engagement Themes'.
2. Set up two flip chart easels labeled 'Motivation' and 'Teams'.
3. Set up a fourth flip chart easel labeled 'Ways to Learn Faster'.
4. Arrange seating into small breakout tables of 3 to 5 people.
5. Place sticky notes, scratch paper, fine-tip felt pens, dry-erase markers, and framework handouts on each table.

## Say this to open

Welcome. Today we will explore how high-performing teams work using principles from Charles Duhigg's research. We are not here to talk about working longer hours. We will test practical models for motivation, goal setting, probabilistic choices, and team learning. Let us start with what already works.

## How to run it

### 1. Introduce Productivity Concepts (10 minutes)

Deliver opening script and distribute framework summaries. Ask the room: 'When do you feel most productive and engaged at work?' Capture recurring points on the 'Productive Engagement Themes' flip chart. Outline Duhigg's premise that productivity stems from deliberate mental models and habits, not brute force. Hear 2 brief reflections from volunteers on the difference between working harder and working smarter.

### 2. Analyze Motivation and Team Safety (20 minutes)

Divide participants into two groups. Group 1 charts motivation drivers and blockers on the 'Motivation' flip chart. Group 2 charts psychological safety factors and trust conditions on the 'Teams' flip chart. Give groups 10 minutes to write. Reassemble for 5 minutes of highlights, with each group presenting their board. Summarize the role of autonomy, purpose, safety, and trust. Spend the final 5 minutes discussing one team habit that makes taking calculated risks safer.

### 3. Pair Stretch and SMART Goals (20 minutes)

Explain mental models and goal pairing: link an ambitious stretch goal to granular sub-goals. Give participants 7 minutes of silent time to write one ambitious stretch goal plus two SMART sub-goals on blank scratch paper. Form pairs (or one trio if numbers are odd) for 8 minutes to test feasibility and clear metrics. Spend the remaining 5 minutes hearing 2 volunteer examples across the room.

### 4. Simulate Probabilistic Decisions (20 minutes)

Present key points: effective managers push choices to those closest to the work, and smart choices weigh probabilities rather than assuming certainty. Divide into small teams of 3 to 5 and distribute scenario cards. Give teams 10 minutes to map Best, Worst, and Most Likely outcomes, then choose a concrete mitigation for the Most Likely case. Spend 10 minutes having each group present their chosen action and rationale.

### 5. Harvest Data and Team Insights (15 minutes)

Frame innovation as connecting ideas across boundaries and testing underused data. Ask: 'What sources of information or experience do we underuse?' In small groups of 3 to 5, give 3 minutes for silent individual writing on sticky notes about cross-team sharing and safe experiments. Post notes on the 'Ways to Learn Faster' flip chart. Spend 10 minutes clustering themes and selecting one concrete experiment to run next week.

### 6. Record Commitments (5 minutes)

Ask each person to complete two silent prompts on sticky notes: 'One personal habit I will change to work smarter is...' and 'One thing our team will do differently starting this week is...' Invite up to 3 volunteers to read one note aloud. Close by posing: 'Which principle explored today addresses our most immediate operational bottleneck?' Collect notes to post in the shared team workspace.


## Debrief questions

- Which principle explored today addresses our most immediate operational bottleneck?
- How will our team know if our shared experiment is succeeding over the next two weeks?

**Finished output:** A wall board of actionable team learning ideas, individual stretch-and-SMART goal pairs, and sticky notes with individual and collective commitments.

## Remote

Run via main video call with breakout rooms. Use a digital collaborative whiteboard with frames for Step 1 themes, Step 2 flip charts, Step 4 scenario matrices, Step 5 sticky clusters, and Step 6 commitments. Use breakout rooms for the 2-group and paired discussions.

## Hybrid

In-person groups write on physical flip charts while remote participants work in a mirrored digital workspace. Assign a dedicated co-facilitator or audio feed to bridge remote shares during plenary debriefs. Remote participants post to the same digital canvas that in-person participants project on the room screen.

## Access and participation choices

- Participants may draft goals and personal commitments privately without reading them aloud.
- Provide large-print copies of the framework handout and scenario card.
- Anyone may choose a scribe role during breakout exercises.

## If the session gets stuck

**Participants write vague SMART goals that are merely rephrased stretch goals.**

Intervene during the pair share. Remind them that a SMART goal must include a calendar trigger and a binary metric, such as 'Draft outline by Tuesday at 2 PM'.

**Groups turn the probability simulation into a debate about who is to blame for the hypothetical delay.**

Refocus the room on response planning: assume the delay is fixed and unchangeable, then evaluate only the probability of recovery actions.


## Terms used here

- Mental Model: An internal visualization of how a process or event is expected to unfold, helping people anticipate disruptions.
- Stretch Goal: An ambitious, high-level objective that defines a desired future state but lacks step-by-step instructions.
- SMART Goal: A short-term, tactical objective that is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.

## Participant material: The Smarter Faster Better Framework Summary

Core Principles from Charles Duhigg's Research:

1. MOTIVATION: Generate drive by making choices that express autonomy and link everyday tasks to a larger self-determined purpose.
2. TEAMS: Establish psychological safety where team members feel respected, speak in roughly equal measure, and take intellectual risks without fear of retribution.
3. FOCUS: Construct active mental models by telling yourself stories about what you expect to happen, which prevents tunnel vision and distraction.
4. GOAL SETTING: Pair a big stretch goal (ambition) with sub-divided SMART goals (immediate operational steps) to make ambition actionable.
5. MANAGING OTHERS: Push decision-making authority to the people closest to the work; distribute ownership rather than dictating steps.
6. DECISION MAKING: Envision multiple potential outcomes and assign probabilistic likelihoods rather than betting on binary certainty.
7. INNOVATION: Act as an intellectual broker by taking established concepts from one domain and combining them in another.
8. ABSORBING DATA: Force yourself to interact with information (graphing it, explaining it, testing it) rather than passively collecting it.

## Participant material: Decision Scenario Card

SCENARIO: Delayed Component Delivery

Your core vendor notifies you that a critical software integration module or physical component will be delayed by six weeks due to unforeseen supply chain constraints. Your leadership expects a public demonstration in eight weeks.

GROUP TASK:
1. Best Case (10-20% chance): What happens if the vendor recovers early or a workaround works instantly?
2. Worst Case (10-20% chance): What happens if the vendor slips further and the demonstration fails?
3. Most Likely Case (60-80% chance): What is the realistic delivery timeline and quality?

DECISION: What concrete mitigation action will your team take today based on the Most Likely Case?

## Sources and adaptation

Observed on WorkshopBank as 'Smarter Faster Better Workshop', applying organizational concepts from Charles Duhigg's 2016 book 'Smarter Faster Better'.

Retained the six-step sequence, core questions, group splits, and 90-minute structure from the WorkshopBank workshop outline. UWT added a dedicated fourth flip chart for opening themes, clarified whole-room vs small-group formats, clarified facilitator talking points in steps 4 and 5, specified the Step 6 debrief question, removed the signing requirement on commitments, and supplied a concrete supplier delay scenario card.

[WorkshopBank](https://workshopbank.com/tools/smarter-faster-better-workshop)

Current run sheet: https://unitedwetransform.com/exercises/smarter-faster-better-workshop-workshopbank/