Starting a workshop

The Impact Explorer™ software works on the basis of a "current workshop". A workshop file is where information about a set of activities is stored. You will typically create a new workshop for each interaction with a group. The workshop file is used to organise the lists of items to be evaluated, the activities that have been completed, and perhaps some pre-prepared activities (called presets).

The software does not mind if you start a new workshop file four times a day, or whether you use the same one for a week. You should decide what the logical divisions are, and apply them for yourself. Give each workshop a meaningful name, so it is a good reminder of what the workshop was, and when, for later recall.



When you start the software, it prompts you with the welcome screen and allows you to create a new workshop, or to continue a previous one (the last one will be automatically selected). This screen also allows you to rename a prior meeting. Right click on the selected workshop to rename it.

After selecting the workshop, either new or existing, you will be asked what the next step should be. You can choose to review previous results or agenda (if opening an existing workshop), start a new activity either from agenda or manually, or just return to the main screen.



If you do not want to be prompted like this each time, you can clear the check on the ask prompt. Should you wish to restore this question, either hold Shift while clicking the Open button, or use the preferences dialog (available from the Workshop menu Preferences item).



When creating a new workshop, you can either create a completely empty workshop file, or you can use a template which contains lists and presets that have been saved earlier. These may be provided with the software, by your facilitator, or you can create them yourself using the Save as template menu item.

See also Workshop menu Workshop selector.