Workspace and projects

A workspace holds your team’s projects. A project holds the map for one piece of work.

Create a workspace

1. Open doweneedthis.com/app.
2. Select Sign in or create an account.
3. Open the workspace menu in the sidebar and select Create a workspace.
4. Enter a Workspace name and create it.
5. Open Billing and select Start 14-day trial · card required. Writing to a workspace needs an active subscription. See Team and billing.

Create a project

1. In the sidebar, next to Projects, select New project.
2. Enter a Project name, for example Monthly sales reporting.

Create one project for each piece of work you assess.

Start the map

A new project asks What are you looking at? Choose the level that fits.

You can also fill the map from your AI tool. See Connect your AI tool.

Assess an item

The assessment dialog has these steps. Select Next after each one.

1. Item. Name, type, and owner. Leave the owner empty if you do not know it.
2. Purpose. What the work is said to achieve.
3. Scope. Where it starts and ends, and who performs, uses, maintains, or depends on it.
4. Size. How often it runs, how many people it touches, how long it takes elapsed, and how much working time it takes.
5. Parts. For a process, the steps, approvals, meetings, reports, and systems it contains.
6. About this item. The questions for its type.
7. Signals. Follow-up questions for what your answers revealed.
8. Judgement. Where people use their own judgement, and whether that is still needed.
9. Keeping it. Reasons to keep the work.

On the last step, select Save and summarize. The summary lists what the answers show and the open questions. Select Done to return to the map.

To add another item at any time, select Add item on the map.

Use the map

The map shows one level of the work at a time, with the steps from left to right in the order they happen. Select an item to open its panel on the right. The panel has five tabs:

Move between levels

An item that contains other items shows how many, for example 3 inside. Select that label, or double-click the item, to open its level. The path at the top of the map leads back to the levels above.

Read the map

• An arrow runs from each step to the step that comes after it. An arrow back to an earlier step is dashed and runs beneath the items, or above them when something sits directly beneath.
• An arrow leaving a decision shows its condition.
• Depends on is not drawn. An item lists what it depends on under its name. Select an item to outline the items it depends on or that depend on it.

Arrange the map

Drag items to place them. The positions are saved with the project and everyone sees the same arrangement. Select Auto layout to return to the automatic arrangement.

Draw the order

Point at a step and drag the dot on its right edge onto the step that comes next. From a decision or an inclusive split, enter the Condition and select Add link.

An end has no dot, and nothing can be drawn into a start. A link that already exists is not added twice.

Add decisions, starts, and ends

Select Add flow and choose a shape. It is added to the level you are viewing.

Select a shape to name it, change its kind, link it, or delete it. Name a decision by the question it asks, for example Approved by the manager?. For each path out of it, draw a link to the next step and enter the condition. You can also add the link with Comes before on the Links tab and enter the condition in Description.

Decisions, starts, and ends describe the order of the work. They are not assessed and have no evidence, questions, or proposals.

Add evidence

1. Open the item and select the Evidence tab.
2. Select Add evidence.
3. Choose the Kind:
   • Documented: what a source says.
   • Reported: someone’s account.
   • Observed: recorded behavior or outcomes, such as logs, timestamps, or tickets.
4. Enter the Source and location, an optional Link, and a Quote or summary.

Add evidence that supports keeping the work as well as evidence against it. Add contradicting accounts as separate records.

Add a question

1. Open the item and select the Questions tab.
2. Select Add question.
3. Enter the Question.
4. To use the question in a live vote, enter 2 to 8 Voting options, one per line. Leave it empty for interviews and written feedback.
5. Under Who can answer, select the stakeholders who could answer it.
6. Set the Status: Open, Answered, or No one to ask. Use No one to ask when everyone who could answer has left or cannot be identified.
7. Link the evidence that helps people answer. Linked evidence is shown to participants when the question is used in a workshop or feedback form, so check that it suits that audience.

Link items

Open the Links tab and select Add link. Choose the Relationship and the other item:

• Contains: a process contains its steps.
• Comes after or Comes before: the order of steps.
• Depends on: one item cannot work without the other.

Stakeholders

Open the Stakeholders view at the top of the project. A stakeholder is one holder of an interest in the work: a person in a role, or a group such as a works council or a supplier.

1. Select New stakeholder.
2. Enter the Role. Use roles, not names, for example Regional sales manager.
3. Set Side (Inside or Outside) and Status (Here, Left, or Unknown). A holder who left stays in the record, because the work may have been built for them.
4. Add a version for each period in which the role, goals, or measures differed. A version has From, Until, Role at the time, Goals, Measured by, Constraints, Basis, and Source.
5. Add stakes. For each item, choose the Stake and describe what it gives, protects, or costs this holder. The choices are: Asked for it, Decides, Does it, Uses the result, Maintains or pays, Affected, Must agree to changes, and No stake.

Use this to find work that continued after the people it was built for left or changed their goals.

Software

The Software view appears after a codebase map is saved to the project. See Map a codebase.

Next

Run feedback or a workshop on the questions people disagree about.