--- title: "Sudden Survey: Workshop Opener" description: "Participants form four teams, each taking one workshop question. After planning, they circulate to gather rapid answers from peers across the room, tally their findings, and give a one-minute report." last_updated: "2026-09-07" canonical: "https://unitedwetransform.com/exercises/tgl-january-2009/" --- # Sudden Survey: Workshop Opener Participants form four teams, each taking one workshop question. After planning, they circulate to gather rapid answers from peers across the room, tally their findings, and give a one-minute report. **Time:** 20 minutes. Thiagi source lists 30 to 50 minutes for up to 52 people with 3-minute collection; UWT allocates 20 minutes with a realistic 6-minute interview phase for groups up to 24. **People:** 8 to 24. Four teams (2 to 6 people each) circulating individually for peer interviews, then regrouping at home tables ## Choose this exercise **Purpose:** Collect and summarize baseline expectations, relevant experience, burning questions, and anticipated challenges across the whole room within twenty minutes. **Use it when:** Use at the launch of an interactive workshop or training session to surface what participants know, expect, and need without slow round-robin introductions. **Skip it when:** Skip when participants require complete anonymity to answer honestly, or when the room has fewer than eight people. ## Materials and tools - Deck of standard playing cards or prepared color cards to assign four teams - 4 large flip chart sheets or poster boards - 4 bold felt-tip markers - 1 copy of the Sudden Survey Response Sheet per participant - 1 timer ## Before participants arrive 1. Select playing cards equal to the number of participants using four suits (Spades, Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs). For uneven counts, distribute extra cards across suits in order. 2. Place one flip chart sheet and marker at each of four team stations. 3. Write the four assigned questions visibly on a central board. ## Say this to open Welcome. Rather than doing slow round-robin introductions, we will run a rapid peer survey. You will divide into four teams. Each team owns one specific question about our work today. You will have two minutes to plan, six minutes to interview colleagues around the room, four minutes to compile your team poster, and one minute per team to brief us on what you learned. ## How to run it ### 1. Form teams and assign questions (3 minutes) Hand each person a playing card. Group into four teams by suit: Clubs take Expectations, Hearts take Experience, Spades take Key Questions, Diamonds take Workplace Challenges. Direct teams to their designated station. Distribute the Sudden Survey Response Sheet to everyone. ### 2. Plan the collection strategy (2 minutes) Teams spend two minutes agreeing on how to capture notes quickly and divide coverage. For example, half the team moves clockwise and half moves counterclockwise so they reach all other participants. Announce the one-minute mark and end promptly at two minutes. ### 3. Conduct rapid interviews (6 minutes) Participants disperse across the room to interview members of other teams one-on-one. Each person asks their assigned question, records brief notes on their sheet, and answers their partner's question in return. Remind participants to keep answers concise. Call time at three minutes for a halfway reminder, and end at six minutes. ### 4. Tally and build team poster (4 minutes) Everyone returns to their home team station. Team members pool their interview notes, count recurring ideas, and record three to four major bullet points on their flip chart sheet. Teams select one person to deliver the summary report. ### 5. Present rapid team reports (4 minutes) Each team presents its findings to the whole room in order: Clubs, Hearts, Spades, Diamonds. Enforce a strict one-minute timer per team. Post the sheets on the room wall for reference during the workshop. ### 6. Facilitator debrief and alignment (1 minutes) Facilitator connects the reported expectations, experience levels, questions, and challenges directly to today's agenda, noting which participant items will be addressed and which fall outside scope. ## Debrief questions - What unexpected insight or pattern emerged across the room? - Which participant questions match our planned agenda, and which need extra parking lot tracking? **Finished output:** Four wall posters summarizing group baseline data across workshop expectations, prior experience, core questions, and workplace challenges. ## Remote Create four breakout rooms named by suit and question. Distribute a shared digital whiteboard with four labeled quadrant frames. Participants review their question in home breakouts for two minutes. Facilitator then mixes participants into cross-functional breakout pairs for six minutes to interview each other. Participants return to home breakouts for four minutes to synthesize sticky notes, followed by one-minute room presentations in the main room. ## Hybrid Form four mixed teams where each team has both in-person and remote participants, or keep remote participants as team four (Diamonds). Remote interviewers pair with remote colleagues via video breakout rooms while in-person participants circulate in the physical room. Both groups log findings directly into a shared cloud document so the remote and in-person data merge during the tally phase. ## Access and participation choices - Participants with mobility constraints may remain seated at their home station while mobile interviewers rotate to visit them. - Anyone may decline to share personal history and instead note observations of broad team trends. - A participant may choose to act as the home team recorder and summarizer during the collection step instead of walking the room. ## If the session gets stuck **Uneven numbers leave some teams with one more person than others.** Assign the extra person to any team. They interview as an individual contributor; team size differences do not affect the tally or report. **Participants get stuck having extended conversations and only interview one person.** Call out time warnings every two minutes during the collection step and remind everyone to capture one short bullet point and switch partners. ## Terms used here - Framegame: A reusable training activity structure whose core rules remain the same while the content questions change. ## Participant material: Sudden Survey Response Sheet SUDDEN SURVEY LOG SHEET Your Team Question (Circle one): [Clubs] Expectations: What do you hope to gain from today's workshop? [Hearts] Experience: What direct experience do you bring to this topic? [Spades] Key Questions: What specific question do you want answered today? [Diamonds] Workplace Challenges: What is your biggest practical hurdle applying this at work? RAPID INTERVIEW RESPONSES (Capture 3 to 6 peer answers): 1. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: 2. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: 3. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: 4. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: 5. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: 6. Partner Name: ______________ | Team Suit: _____ Response Notes: HOME TEAM CONSOLIDATION: Top 3 recurring patterns or distinct points to place on our flip chart: ## Sources and adaptation Observed in Thiagi GameLetter (January 2009), published by The Thiagi Group, where Sivasailam Thiagarajan describes the Sudden Survey framegame opener 'Hello'. Retains the defining four-team card allocation, assigned survey questions, planning, rapid data collection, poster compilation, and one-minute team reporting sequence from Sivasailam Thiagarajan's 'Hello' opener in Thiagi GameLetter (January 2009). UWT adjusted the collection timing from 3 minutes to 6 minutes to allow realistic peer exchanges in groups up to 24, provided a reproducible response log sheet, formulated generic UWT workshop opener questions, and added explicit hybrid, remote, and uneven-team rules. [The Thiagi Group](http://thiagi.net/archive/www/pfp/IE4H/january2009.html) [The Thiagi Group](https://thiagi.net/archive/www/pfp/IE4H/january2009.html) [The Thiagi Group](https://thiagi.net/archive/www/pfp/january2009.pfp) Current run sheet: https://unitedwetransform.com/exercises/tgl-january-2009/