Luma

Bulls Eye Diagramming

Bull's-eye Diagramming is a visual prioritization method from the LUMA collection. It uses concentric circles to represent levels of importance. The exercise forces teams to make tough choices by limiting what fits in the center circle. This drives debate about what truly matters for project success. Use it after Affinity Clustering, for feature planning, resource allocation, or strategic planning. It's also useful after voting to refine priorities.

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Duration
45 mins
Group Size
6-10
Category
Luma
Difficulty
Easy
The objectives are to force clear prioritization decisions, make importance levels visually obvious, build team consensus, guide resource allocation, create actionable priority plans, and facilitate productive trade-off discussions.
The tangible outcomes are a bull's-eye diagram with prioritized items, a clear core versus peripheral ranking, and a visual prioritization output.
Use output from previous methods like Affinity Clustering. The physical constraint of a small center circle is key to forcing real prioritization. Not everything can be critical; if everything is primary, nothing is. Tertiary items still matter, they're just less urgent. Consider dependencies; some secondary items enable primary ones. If the team gets stuck, use dot voting on disputed items.

  1. Setup (10 minutes): Draw 3-4 concentric circles on a large surface. Define the meaning of each ring: Center (Primary) is mission-critical, Middle (Secondary) is important but not essential, Outer (Tertiary) is nice-to-have. Make the center circle small to force choices. List all items to prioritize (e.g., themes from Affinity Clustering).

  2. Prioritization Session (30-45 minutes): Place items on the target, starting with obvious choices. Debate placement of items the team disagrees on. Apply criteria consistently. Move items as needed based on discussion. Ensure items in the same ring have similar priority. Time-box debates to keep things moving.

  3. Finalization (15 minutes): Review the final pattern. Does it feel right? Document the reasoning behind item placements. Plan next steps, focusing on primary items first. Set success metrics to measure the impact of primary items.

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  • Large target diagram (wall or floor)

  • Sticky notes or cards

  • Different colored markers

  • Timer

  • Criteria reference cards

  • Camera for documentation

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