**Outcome Mapping** is a collaborative workshop or a conversation to help a group of stakeholders clarify value (i.e., their primary goal and direction):
- Does everyone clearly understand our target objective?
- If another issue disrupts our focus, is it clear how to prioritize?
Structure for one Outcome; Outcome maps would have multiple "rows", one per Outcome.
## Steps to create an outcome map
1. Outcome Discovery: _What is our target?_ (board not shown*)
2. Defining the Target Outcome: _What goal(s) do we want to achieve?_ Define a SMART goal.
3. Defining Benefits: _Why does this outcome matter?_ It should define the following 3 values:
- Value for customers
- Value for the organization
- Value for individual contributors
4. Defining Obstacles: _What could get in the way?_
5. Defining Next Steps: _How are we going to proceed?_
\* Outcome Discovery is a five-column board with Context, Goals, Pains, Questions, and Ideas that get rearranged into topics after a brain-storming session. Then, the team should decide which topic is the most important for the business to pursue, and finally converts that topic into the Target Outcome.
### Defining Benefits, Obstacles, and Next Steps
Follow these four steps:
1. Everyone should reflect silently on the column and gather their ideas on a piece of paper (1 min)
2. Break up into pairs and share their top ideas from the previous step (2 min)
3. Join pairs into groups of four, consolidate the ideas, and put at least the best ones onto the board (4 min)
4. Get the whole group back together and vote on the cards to sort them by priority (2 min)
### Tips and Traps
- Avoid few people to dominate the session by calling out people who have been silent.
- The facilitator should not contribute ideas to the board.
- Limit scope to the team's sphere of influence.
- Ensure the target outcome is high quality, e.g., by checking for SMART properties (specific to the business, measurable outcomes, actionable targets, relevant results, and time-bound).
- No need to worry about exactly what or how to improve, that will be part of the Value Stream Mapping sessions.
- Ensure you have a baseline measurement for the current state as the next step if your outcome includes a performance improvement target.
Ref: https://itrevolution.com/articles/the-five-maps-of-flow-engineering/#nav-2