the critical thinking company building writing skills

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Inspiring christian moms in faith, life, and homeschool, review of the critical thinking co. - building writing skills.

When the Crew reviewed products from The Critical Thinking Co. last year, I was disappointed that our schedule didn’t allow us to participate. There were some awesome products I really wanted to try out with the girls! This year, I got a second chance. My twin daughters and I sat down and sorted through the options. One girl was excited to try out Building Writing Skills - Essential Tips & Techniques , while the other preferred Critical Thinking Detective - Vocabulary Book 2 . We agreed to review either of the two products.

The following week, the Crew made the final decision, and we received our digital copy of Building Writing Skills - Essential Tips & Techniques .

The digital edition (which only works on Windows systems) was perfect for us. Because it’s an instant download , we could start right away . I wouldn’t need to purchase an extra book for one of the girls because I could easily print multiple copies. After punching holes in the pages, I handed them over to for my twin 13-year-olds. They placed them in their 3-ring binders.

I printed one copy of the answer key pages, which are at the end of the book. After the girls finished a page, they could use them to check their work.

How We Used the Workbook

To fit in this supplement, we slowed down our regular writing program. Instead, I allowed the girls to pick and choose a few pages of the workbook to flex their writing muscles.

It was fascinating to witness their different approaches. The girl who had been eager to review Building Writing Skills started at the beginning and completed most of the pages in order.

“Miss Enthusiastic” enjoyed scouring the thesaurus for scintillating synonyms which could serve as vivid verbs. Along the way, interesting words like hysteria and tete a tete distracted her from the objective, but I was delighted at the increase in her vocabulary .

“I like using a dictionary and thesaurus by hand.” ~Miss Enthusiastic

She thrived while rewriting sentences and paragraphs to improve them even though her hand sometimes got tired out.

Meanwhile, “Miss Butterfly” flipped through the workbook pages to find the most appealing activities . She landed mainly on pages with one-word fill-ins or puzzles .

Crosswords, word scrambles, and matching exercises allowed her to painlessly practice a variety of skills which will improve her writing.

Crossword puzzles were a favorite for both twins.

Convenient Companion for IEW

I was delighted to discover that Building Writing Skills reinforces the Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW) skills we’ve been building this year. In IEW, the girls have been learning to add dress-ups such as strong verbs and quality adjectives to their writing.

“I like the variety of types of activities” ~Miss Butterfly

Building Writing Skills uses different terms while covering the same concepts : Vivid Verbs and Strong Adjectives . Several pages in the workbook touch on each of these topics.

Miss Butterfly completed a page which covers Clause Starters , another topic we first covered in IEW.

One workbook page corresponds to the Sentence Openers skill the girls recently learned.

There are also pages to cover advanced concepts we haven’t yet gotten to in IEW—like Alliteration, Repetition, Simile, and Metaphor.

With 70 pages of skill-building worksheets , Building Writing Skills is a super supplement to a writing program like IEW. Parents can assign the worksheets early in the IEW sequence to give an informal introduction to a topic. Alternately, they could introduce the concept first in IEW and then use the worksheets for extra reinforcement later on.

Other Positive Aspects

I love the flexibility of Building Writing Skills. It offered a smorgasbord of structured writing practice for my girls. Check out the variety of topics in the Table of Contents.

Concise explanations of each concept are followed by activities which make it practical . The variety of activity types throughout the book gives it a broad appeal . Students who thrive on pages with puzzles and short fill-ins will find plenty of those. Other pages will also appeal to kids who enjoy diving into dictionaries or dressing up drab sentences.

“I like how many different activities there are.” ~Miss Enthusiastic

My kids can become very emotionally attached to their own writing. Sometimes this makes it hard for them to make significant changes to improve their rough drafts. Editing and improving sentences in the Building Writing Skills workbook helped them practice the skill without the emotional element.

A Valuable Supplement

Building Writing Skills - Essential Tips & Techniques delivers what the title promises. It is full of tips to help students improve their writing and provides engaging exercises to helps them practice each technique.

At $12.99 for either the digital or print version of the book, it’s quite affordable and worth the investment.

The Critical Thinking Co. is offering free shipping and 15% off of any size order through the end of 2019. Use the code TOSCREW19 .

Would you like to peek inside other titles from The Critical Thinking Co. ? This time around, the Crew reviewed 8 of their products. Hop on over to the Crew website and read other reviews .

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Building Writing Skills Series

The Building Writing Skills series consists of three books. The first two books, subtitled Level 1 and Level 2 , help students learn particular forms of writing: narrative, opinion, informative, and argumentative. The third book, subtitled Essential Tips & Techniques , helps students hone their writing skills by using vivid verbs, adding details, varying sentence styles, using literary devices such as similes and alliteration, and other strategies. I received the first two books for review, so those are my focus.

Building Writing Skills: Level 1 is identified as appropriate for students in grades three through five, while Level 2  suits students in grades six and seven. Some third graders might not yet be ready for Level 1 . I also think that Level 2 can stretch to include students in grades five through eight.

These two books are very similar in many ways. They both teach a widely-used, five-step writing process and walk students through those steps with highly structured activities. The five steps are prewriting, writing the first draft, revising, editing, and publishing.

Both books provide graphic organizers, checklists, sample essays, and other resources to clarify and simplify the writing process. Some of the checklists are the same, although there are sometimes added elements in Level 2 . For instance, the Revising Checklist for the story narrative in Level 2 is identical to the one in Level 1 for the most part, but it adds three questions that have students check for their use of sensory words; their use of phrases, clauses, and transition words; and the use of expressive dialogue to show a character’s emotions.

Each book takes students through four complete writing projects with step-by-step help as students use the five-step writing process to write the different types of compositions. The lessons for all four projects walk students through the entire process (including the use of the checklists) with a sample project before having students begin to work on their own compositions. Rubrics are included so that both students and parents know the criteria for scoring the compositions in advance.

For Level 1 , students will write these four types of compositions:

• Personal narrative
• Story narrative
• Informative/explanatory

Level 2 has students write a personal narrative, a story narrative, and an informative/explanatory piece, similar to Level 1 . However, it replaces opinion writing with an argumentative/persuasive essay. In addition, the informative/explanatory assignment in Level 2 asks students to compare and contrast two historical figures while Level 1 has students write about just one person. So, while there is much repetition between the books, Level 2 steps up the level of difficulty in a number of ways.

Third and fourth graders will probably need assistance as they work through the lessons, but the instructions are so detailed and clearly structured that students in fifth grade and above should be able to work independently. Even so, parents should check students at each stage to ensure they are on track.

The Building Writing Skills books are available as paperback books or as ebooks (in a format that can be read only on Windows devices). The physical books have perforated pages for easy removal.

The Building Writing Skills series provides homeschooling families with an inexpensive, easy-to-use resource for developing composition skills. Even better, you are allowed to copy pages for the use of all students in one family or one classroom.

Pricing Information

When comparison prices appear, please keep in mind that they are subject to change. Click on links where available to verify price accuracy.

Building Writing Skills Level 2

• $14.99 at Christianbook.com
• $14.99 at ExodusBooks.com
• $14.94 at Amazon.com
• $4.28 Used at Amazon.com Marketplace
• $14.99 at Rainbowresource.com

Building Writing Skills Level 1, Grades 3-5

• $14.95 at Amazon.com
• $4.68 Used at Amazon.com Marketplace

Building Writing Skills Essential Tips and Techniques (2-10)

• $14.99 at Amazon.com
• $9.99 Used at Amazon.com Marketplace

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Building Writing Skills Level 1 Workbook - Using a 5-Step Writing Process to Teach Writing (Grades 3-5) Paperback – January 1, 2017

Additional details.

• Reading age 8 - 12 years
• Print length 96 pages
• Language English
• Publisher The Critical Thinking Co.
• Publication date January 1, 2017
• ISBN-10 1601448872
• ISBN-13 978-1601448873
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Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ The Critical Thinking Co. (January 1, 2017)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 96 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1601448872
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1601448873
• Reading age ‏ : ‎ 8 - 12 years
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 pounds
• #54,331 in Children's Books (Books)

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Customers find the writing quality of the book well-written and effective. They say it's a great resource for students and homeschooling. Readers also appreciate the easy-to-follow instructions and writing process steps.

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Customers find the writing quality of the book well-written and easy to understand. They say it's a great way to introduce more creative writing and an effective aid in composition. Readers also mention the book provides examples of initial drafts as well as revised drafts.

"...It was so gentle and offered interesting starting points , as well as steps to write decent 5 paragraph essays...." Read more

"...The book is well written and best of all, provides examples of initial drafts as well as revised drafts to show how writing can be improved through..." Read more

"If you are looking for a good writing curriculum this is very well done . Every step is well explained...." Read more

"Easy to follow step by step instructions. Three types of basic writing covered - narrative, opinion, informational...." Read more

Customers find the book content great, informative, and a tool to have. They mention it's a great resource for daily writing lessons and homeschooling.

"...you want your kids to write a paper using a formula, this is a great tool to have !..." Read more

"...Three types of basic writing covered - narrative, opinion, informational . Includes writing process steps, examples and editing steps worksheets...." Read more

" Such a great resource !! We love this for daily writing lessons." Read more

" Excellent book . Highly recommend...." Read more

Customers find the book easy to use. They mention it includes writing process steps, examples, and editing worksheets.

"... Every step is well explained . My recommendation is to use a notebook/notepad alongside this so you have this for future students!..." Read more

" Easy to follow step by step instructions . Three types of basic writing covered - narrative, opinion, informational...." Read more

"...The instructions are good and my child finally loves writing papers." Read more

"LOVE IT! Simple , well-written lessons that use easy to understand diagrams (concept maps) to teach narrative, opinion, and informative writing..." Read more

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How to develop critical thinking skills

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What are critical thinking skills?

How to develop critical thinking skills: 12 tips, how to practice critical thinking skills at work, become your own best critic.

A client requests a tight deadline on an intense project. Your childcare provider calls in sick on a day full of meetings. Payment from a contract gig is a month behind. 

Your day-to-day will always have challenges, big and small. And no matter the size and urgency, they all ask you to use critical thinking to analyze the situation and arrive at the right solution. 

Critical thinking includes a wide set of soft skills that encourage continuous learning, resilience , and self-reflection. The more you add to your professional toolbelt, the more equipped you’ll be to tackle whatever challenge presents itself. Here’s how to develop critical thinking, with examples explaining how to use it.

Critical thinking skills are the skills you use to analyze information, imagine scenarios holistically, and create rational solutions. It’s a type of emotional intelligence that stimulates effective problem-solving and decision-making . 

When you fine-tune your critical thinking skills, you seek beyond face-value observations and knee-jerk reactions. Instead, you harvest deeper insights and string together ideas and concepts in logical, sometimes out-of-the-box , ways. 

Imagine a team working on a marketing strategy for a new set of services. That team might use critical thinking to balance goals and key performance indicators , like new customer acquisition costs, average monthly sales, and net profit margins. They understand the connections between overlapping factors to build a strategy that stays within budget and attracts new sales. 

Looking for ways to improve critical thinking skills? Start by brushing up on the following soft skills that fall under this umbrella: 

• Analytical thinking: Approaching problems with an analytical eye includes breaking down complex issues into small chunks and examining their significance. An example could be organizing customer feedback to identify trends and improve your product offerings. 
• Open-mindedness: Push past cognitive biases and be receptive to different points of view and constructive feedback . Managers and team members who keep an open mind position themselves to hear new ideas that foster innovation . 
• Creative thinking: With creative thinking , you can develop several ideas to address a single problem, like brainstorming more efficient workflow best practices to boost productivity and employee morale . 
• Self-reflection: Self-reflection lets you examine your thinking and assumptions to stimulate healthier collaboration and thought processes. Maybe a bad first impression created a negative anchoring bias with a new coworker. Reflecting on your own behavior stirs up empathy and improves the relationship. 
• Evaluation: With evaluation skills, you tackle the pros and cons of a situation based on logic rather than emotion. When prioritizing tasks , you might be tempted to do the fun or easy ones first, but evaluating their urgency and importance can help you make better decisions. 

There’s no magic method to change your thinking processes. Improvement happens with small, intentional changes to your everyday habits until a more critical approach to thinking is automatic. 

Here are 12 tips for building stronger self-awareness and learning how to improve critical thinking: 

1. Be cautious

There’s nothing wrong with a little bit of skepticism. One of the core principles of critical thinking is asking questions and dissecting the available information. You might surprise yourself at what you find when you stop to think before taking action. 

Before making a decision, use evidence, logic, and deductive reasoning to support your own opinions or challenge ideas. It helps you and your team avoid falling prey to bad information or resistance to change .

2. Ask open-ended questions

“Yes” or “no” questions invite agreement rather than reflection. Instead, ask open-ended questions that force you to engage in analysis and rumination. Digging deeper can help you identify potential biases, uncover assumptions, and arrive at new hypotheses and possible solutions. 

3. Do your research

No matter your proficiency, you can always learn more. Turning to different points of view and information is a great way to develop a comprehensive understanding of a topic and make informed decisions. You’ll prioritize reliable information rather than fall into emotional or automatic decision-making. 

4. Consider several opinions

You might spend so much time on your work that it’s easy to get stuck in your own perspective, especially if you work independently on a remote team . Make an effort to reach out to colleagues to hear different ideas and thought patterns. Their input might surprise you.

If or when you disagree, remember that you and your team share a common goal. Divergent opinions are constructive, so shift the focus to finding solutions rather than defending disagreements. 

5. Learn to be quiet

Active listening is the intentional practice of concentrating on a conversation partner instead of your own thoughts. It’s about paying attention to detail and letting people know you value their opinions, which can open your mind to new perspectives and thought processes.

If you’re brainstorming with your team or having a 1:1 with a coworker , listen, ask clarifying questions, and work to understand other peoples’ viewpoints. Listening to your team will help you find fallacies in arguments to improve possible solutions.

6. Schedule reflection

Whether waking up at 5 am or using a procrastination hack, scheduling time to think puts you in a growth mindset . Your mind has natural cognitive biases to help you simplify decision-making, but squashing them is key to thinking critically and finding new solutions besides the ones you might gravitate toward. Creating time and calm space in your day gives you the chance to step back and visualize the biases that impact your decision-making. 

7. Cultivate curiosity

With so many demands and job responsibilities, it’s easy to seek solace in routine. But getting out of your comfort zone helps spark critical thinking and find more solutions than you usually might.

If curiosity doesn’t come naturally to you, cultivate a thirst for knowledge by reskilling and upskilling . Not only will you add a new skill to your resume , but expanding the limits of your professional knowledge might motivate you to ask more questions. 

You don’t have to develop critical thinking skills exclusively in the office. Whether on your break or finding a hobby to do after work, playing strategic games or filling out crosswords can prime your brain for problem-solving. 

9. Write it down

Recording your thoughts with pen and paper can lead to stronger brain activity than typing them out on a keyboard. If you’re stuck and want to think more critically about a problem, writing your ideas can help you process information more deeply.

The act of recording ideas on paper can also improve your memory . Ideas are more likely to linger in the background of your mind, leading to deeper thinking that informs your decision-making process. 

10. Speak up

Take opportunities to share your opinion, even if it intimidates you. Whether at a networking event with new people or a meeting with close colleagues, try to engage with people who challenge or help you develop your ideas. Having conversations that force you to support your position encourages you to refine your argument and think critically. 

11. Stay humble

Ideas and concepts aren’t the same as real-life actions. There may be such a thing as negative outcomes, but there’s no such thing as a bad idea. At the brainstorming stage , don’t be afraid to make mistakes.

Sometimes the best solutions come from off-the-wall, unorthodox decisions. Sit in your creativity , let ideas flow, and don’t be afraid to share them with your colleagues. Putting yourself in a creative mindset helps you see situations from new perspectives and arrive at innovative conclusions. 

12. Embrace discomfort

Get comfortable feeling uncomfortable . It isn’t easy when others challenge your ideas, but sometimes, it’s the only way to see new perspectives and think critically.

By willingly stepping into unfamiliar territory, you foster the resilience and flexibility you need to become a better thinker. You’ll learn how to pick yourself up from failure and approach problems from fresh angles. 

Thinking critically is easier said than done. To help you understand its impact (and how to use it), here are two scenarios that require critical thinking skills and provide teachable moments. 

Scenario #1: Unexpected delays and budget

Imagine your team is working on producing an event. Unexpectedly, a vendor explains they’ll be a week behind on delivering materials. Then another vendor sends a quote that’s more than you can afford. Unless you develop a creative solution, the team will have to push back deadlines and go over budget, potentially costing the client’s trust. 

Here’s how you could approach the situation with creative thinking:

• Analyze the situation holistically: Determine how the delayed materials and over-budget quote will impact the rest of your timeline and financial resources . That way, you can identify whether you need to build an entirely new plan with new vendors, or if it’s worth it to readjust time and resources. 
• Identify your alternative options: With careful assessment, your team decides that another vendor can’t provide the same materials in a quicker time frame. You’ll need to rearrange assignment schedules to complete everything on time. 
• Collaborate and adapt: Your team has an emergency meeting to rearrange your project schedule. You write down each deliverable and determine which ones you can and can’t complete by the deadline. To compensate for lost time, you rearrange your task schedule to complete everything that doesn’t need the delayed materials first, then advance as far as you can on the tasks that do. 
• Check different resources: In the meantime, you scour through your contact sheet to find alternative vendors that fit your budget. Accounting helps by providing old invoices to determine which vendors have quoted less for previous jobs. After pulling all your sources, you find a vendor that fits your budget. 
• Maintain open communication: You create a special Slack channel to keep everyone up to date on changes, challenges, and additional delays. Keeping an open line encourages transparency on the team’s progress and boosts everyone’s confidence. 

Scenario #2: Differing opinions 

A conflict arises between two team members on the best approach for a new strategy for a gaming app. One believes that small tweaks to the current content are necessary to maintain user engagement and stay within budget. The other believes a bold revamp is needed to encourage new followers and stronger sales revenue. 

Here’s how critical thinking could help this conflict:

• Listen actively: Give both team members the opportunity to present their ideas free of interruption. Encourage the entire team to ask open-ended questions to more fully understand and develop each argument. 
• Flex your analytical skills: After learning more about both ideas, everyone should objectively assess the benefits and drawbacks of each approach. Analyze each idea's risk, merits, and feasibility based on available data and the app’s goals and objectives. 
• Identify common ground: The team discusses similarities between each approach and brainstorms ways to integrate both idea s, like making small but eye-catching modifications to existing content or using the same visual design in new media formats. 
• Test new strategy: To test out the potential of a bolder strategy, the team decides to A/B test both approaches. You create a set of criteria to evenly distribute users by different demographics to analyze engagement, revenue, and customer turnover. 
• Monitor and adapt: After implementing the A/B test, the team closely monitors the results of each strategy. You regroup and optimize the changes that provide stronger results after the testing. That way, all team members understand why you’re making the changes you decide to make.

You can’t think your problems away. But you can equip yourself with skills that help you move through your biggest challenges and find innovative solutions. Learning how to develop critical thinking is the start of honing an adaptable growth mindset. 

Now that you have resources to increase critical thinking skills in your professional development, you can identify whether you embrace change or routine, are open or resistant to feedback, or turn to research or emotion will build self-awareness. From there, tweak and incorporate techniques to be a critical thinker when life presents you with a problem.

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Elizabeth Perry, ACC

Elizabeth Perry is a Coach Community Manager at BetterUp. She uses strategic engagement strategies to cultivate a learning community across a global network of Coaches through in-person and virtual experiences, technology-enabled platforms, and strategic coaching industry partnerships. With over 3 years of coaching experience and a certification in transformative leadership and life coaching from Sofia University, Elizabeth leverages transpersonal psychology expertise to help coaches and clients gain awareness of their behavioral and thought patterns, discover their purpose and passions, and elevate their potential. She is a lifelong student of psychology, personal growth, and human potential as well as an ICF-certified ACC transpersonal life and leadership Coach.

Building Writing Skills: Level 1 (Grades 3-5)

Critical Thinking Company

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Description

Grades 3 - 5

This highly-effective 96-page book teaches narrative (personal and story), opinion, and informative/explanatory writing as a 5-step process. The 5-step process is made up of Prewriting, Drafting, Revising, Editing, and Publishing. The step-by-step lessons use examples and easy-to-understand concept maps that teach brainstorming, planning, editing, and revising. Each lesson is followed by practice that includes a simple, time-saving scoring rubric.

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Critical Thinking Company Building Writing Skills Level 2

Critical Thinking Company Building Writing Skills Level 2 CO-OP Pre-Orders made before July 17, 2024 available for pickup or shipping starting 8/1. All orders placed after 7/21 will be available 2 weeks after order is placed. Call us for details: 813-316-8299

Description & Features

This highly-effective 104-page book teaches argumentative, narrative, and informative/explanatory writing as a 5-step process. The 5-step process is made up of Prewriting, Drafting, Revising, Editing, and Publishing. The step-by-step lessons use examples and easy-to-understand concept maps that teach brainstorming, planning, editing, and revising. Each lesson is followed by practice that includes a simple, time-saving scoring rubric.

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A Short Guide to Building Your Team’s Critical Thinking Skills

• Matt Plummer

Critical thinking isn’t an innate skill. It can be learned.

Most employers lack an effective way to objectively assess critical thinking skills and most managers don’t know how to provide specific instruction to team members in need of becoming better thinkers. Instead, most managers employ a sink-or-swim approach, ultimately creating work-arounds to keep those who can’t figure out how to “swim” from making important decisions. But it doesn’t have to be this way. To demystify what critical thinking is and how it is developed, the author’s team turned to three research-backed models: The Halpern Critical Thinking Assessment, Pearson’s RED Critical Thinking Model, and Bloom’s Taxonomy. Using these models, they developed the Critical Thinking Roadmap, a framework that breaks critical thinking down into four measurable phases: the ability to execute, synthesize, recommend, and generate.

With critical thinking ranking among the most in-demand skills for job candidates , you would think that educational institutions would prepare candidates well to be exceptional thinkers, and employers would be adept at developing such skills in existing employees. Unfortunately, both are largely untrue.

• Matt Plummer (@mtplummer) is the founder of Zarvana, which offers online programs and coaching services to help working professionals become more productive by developing time-saving habits. Before starting Zarvana, Matt spent six years at Bain & Company spin-out, The Bridgespan Group, a strategy and management consulting firm for nonprofits, foundations, and philanthropists.  

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• What is the MoSCoW prioritization method?

Last updated

17 April 2024

Reviewed by

Mary Mikhail

Several techniques are available to project managers to plan a team’s workload by ranking projects or tasks by significance. These prioritization techniques also help communicate to project teams and stakeholders where resources must be directed to accomplish goals. 

The MoSCoW method is one such popular prioritization technique. Learn what the MoSCoW method is and how to apply it. 

The MoSCoW method ranks the significance of a task by determining the requirements for a project's successful completion.

Some may be essential and must be included in the project’s deliverables. You may find other specifications are not required for a successful conclusion, but you might consider them to improve the result or business value.

This prioritization technique requires you to classify projects and tasks by their levels of necessity in reaching your goal.

• Where does the term MoSCoW come from?

MoSCoW is an acronym that signifies the names of the categories in which the requirements are placed:

M = Must-haves

S = Should-haves

C = Could-haves

W = Will not have at this time or wish for

The Os were added to make the acronym easier to pronounce. Using these categories makes projects more manageable, helps with better resource control, and increases the chances of meeting deadlines.

• Using MoSCoW prioritization categories

Requirements with the highest level of importance are must-haves. You'll place lesser-ranked requirements in the should-haves and could-haves categories. Anything in the will-not-have category defines the requirement as nice to have, but not a necessity, at least for now.

Deliverance of effective solutions

Because a project can't be accomplished without must-have initiatives, your team must be committed to completing these requirements.

Should-haves

These tasks or elements are important to completing the project or product, but they're not necessary. Although the product will still function without should-have requirements, you shouldn't disregard them or underestimate their importance because they can significantly increase the product's value.

Performance improvements and new functions are examples of should-have requirements.

Could-haves

These initiatives take a back seat to must-haves and should-haves. If left out, they will not significantly influence the completion of a product or project. A could-have element is desired but not necessary.

Will-not-haves (at this time)

The items in this category set realistic expectations for what the product will not include. A clear visual representation of these requirements communicates to the team and stakeholders items identified as out of scope.

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• When do you use the MoSCoW method for prioritization?

The idea behind Agile project management is to decrease the risk of missed goals and deadlines. It uses resources and time more efficiently by breaking the project into smaller sections and prioritizing tasks, requirements, products, and stories.

To prioritize these, you can use the MoSCoW method within the scope of an Agile project.

• What is an example of the MoSCoW technique?

Imagine you're building an e-commerce website that must launch by a specific date. You'll have to prioritize its features because you don't have unlimited time to work on the site.

The functionality you want to incorporate into the website could be:

Users can log onto the website

Users should have access to a "Forgot Password" solution

Users can change account details

Users can send an email to the system requesting a change to the account page

Here's how you might categorize these features based on how effective you want the website to be and the time constraints you face:

Must-haves:

Should-haves:

Could-haves:

Will-not-haves

Users can click on a phone number on the webpage, and a call will automatically be made from their desk phone to that number

• Benefits of using MoSCoW prioritization

MoSCoW prioritization offers several benefits in project management:

Clarity and focus: It helps teams identify and prioritize the most critical requirements, ensuring clarity on what needs to be delivered first.

Efficiency: By categorizing tasks into must-haves, should-haves, could-haves, and won't-haves, teams can allocate resources more efficiently and focus on delivering essential features first.

Stakeholder alignment: It facilitates stakeholder discussions by providing a common language to discuss and prioritize requirements, ensuring alignment on project goals and objectives.

Risk mitigation: MoSCoW prioritization helps mitigate project risks by addressing must-have requirements first, reducing the likelihood of critical features being overlooked or delayed.

Flexibility: It allows for flexibility in project planning and execution by accommodating changes in requirements throughout the project lifecycle while ensuring that essential features are prioritized.

Time and cost savings: By focusing on must-have requirements early in the project, teams can deliver value more quickly, potentially reducing project timelines and costs.

Overall, MoSCoW prioritization promotes a structured and systematic approach to project management, leading to more successful and efficient project outcomes.

• Disadvantages of using MoSCoW prioritization

The major disadvantage of the MoSCoW method is that it isn’t an objective or consistent scoring system. For this methodology to be effective, other scoring systems, like the weighted scoring or the Kano model, should be used in conjunction with it.

Not combining another scoring system with the MoSCoW method can exclude the organization's leadership from the decision-making process. Decisions would then be in danger of being made based on the project manager's personal preferences rather than adhering to business goals and values.

This method does not involve supporting reasoning on how you prioritize requirements within the same category or why one requirement is a must-have or should-have. The parameters of each category can be blurred. There is also uncertainty about whether will-not-haves are being left out of the tasks required now or out of the entire project.

• How can teams use MoSCoW to their advantage?

Resources, time, and skill sets are not unlimited in the business world. You must constantly strive to work around those constraints efficiently for a maximum return on investment (ROI). Using the MoSCoW method can help.

Use budgetary constraints to prioritize

Some projects have tight budgets. You can use the MoSCoW method by using the budget to determine which items must be and should be completed.

Use the team's skill sets to prioritize

Experience and expertise levels can help determine which tasks to prioritize. If a task requires skills that the team lacks, you must prioritize it accordingly.

Use the competing needs of the company to prioritize

While your team is working on a specific aspect of a project, the company's leaders may have added additional requirements for your team to complete within the same timeframe. You would then have to reshuffle the priorities to accommodate the additional requirements. The MoSCoW method can help you do this.

• Best practices for using MoSCoW prioritization

Include all stakeholders in using the MoSCoW method, from the executive level down to the different teams involved in the successful completion of the project. Get them to also use objective scoring systems like:

Opportunity scoring: uses data from market research to determine what customers expect from your product or service. Prioritization is done according to their wants and needs.

Priority poker: based on priorities that will provide the highest yields in a specific target market. The marketing team, executive team, and customers should be involved for accurate ranking of priorities.

Cost of delay: based on determining how much money the company is losing by waiting to work on a particular task, product, or feature.

100-point method: all stakeholders vote for what they think is the most important requirement. They each get 100 points to distribute among the requirements, ranking them from most important to least. If a stakeholder thinks four requirements are of equal value, they can allocate 25 points to each. If they feel strongly that one requirement overrides all others, they can put all 100 points on that requirement.

Incorporate the data you receive from these scoring systems when inserting the requirements in your MoSCoW categories. Share the results with stakeholders so that they can understand why you prioritized the criteria as you did. This exercise might even reveal a reason to expand a budget constraint or allocate more resources to a priority the stakeholders initially thought unimportant.

How the MoSCoW method differs from the 100-point method

While the 100-point method helps in general brainstorming sessions, the MoSCoW method focuses on working within budget and time constraints.

Once the teams and stakeholders reach an agreement (perhaps by using the 100-point method) on the importance level of each requirement, the product managers or owners will use the MoSCoW method to categorize requirements based on:

High customer value

An elevated benefit to the business

Simple implementation

Inflated costs, when not applied as soon as possible

Technical specifications that are interdependent 

This will help stakeholders and project teams visualize the intended direction.

• MoSCoW prioritization in Agile project management

In an ideal world, your business would have unlimited time and a limitless source of funds to become the most efficient revenue generator it could be. But in the real world, you've got budget and time constraints.

When deciding on projects that will help increase revenue, decrease operational costs, boost productivity, or heighten customer satisfaction, you must choose the projects and project requirements that will most impact the goals you find important. The MoSCoW method can help you do just that.

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What does MoSCoW stand for?

1. must have, 2. should have: , 3. could have, 4. won’t have, conducting the moscow analysis, pro #1: simple and accessible, pro #2: encourages stakeholder involvement, pro #3: flexible, pro #4: helps with scope creep, pro #5: effective resource distribution, con #1: oversimplifies priorities, con #2: no cost or effort considerations, con #3: risk of misalignment, con #4: neglects non-essential features (potentially), con #5: useless for long-term planning, how moscow compares to other prioritization techniques , the pm’s hot take, what is the moscow prioritization method (and how to use it).

While managing product development projects, you may find yourself asking repeatedly:

“Are we working on actually important features?!”

This lack of clear prioritization in your project can quickly backfire. It’s tough to manage a project where nobody really knows the direction you’re moving towards.

But don’t worry. Smart product management pros already came up with something extra for you. It’s called the MoSCoW prioritization method, and it’s a tool that helps any PM prioritize projects, tasks, and other initiatives.

In this article, we’ll share all the info to help you start using it and give you insights about its pros and cons.

MoSCoW is a prioritization technique that helps you communicate what you’re working on and why. It’s excellent for managing expectations across the organization about the upcoming product’s release. 

Dai Clegg, a software developer, created MoSCoW for the dynamic system development method (DSDM) to simplify organizing the work with a fixed deadline. This system lets the team understand what should be done and in which order to make progress and deliver the project on time.

You can apply MoSCoW prioritization in multiple scenarios – from User Stories to tasks, products, tests, etc. But it’s most commonly applied to User Stories – and we’ll focus on this application here, too.

MoSCoW is an acronym for “must-have,” “should-have,” “could-have,” and “won’t-have (this time).” The two “O’s” were added to simplify the acronym’s pronunciation. Each item is a prioritization category. MoSCoW sorts your tasks from the most crucial to ones you should put on hold for now.

Let’s take a closer look at each category:

What are the four categories of MoSCoW?

The MoSCoW prioritization method consists of four categorization rules for the projects:

Here, you put all the Minimum Usable SubseT (MUST) requirements, without which the launch would be a terrible idea. This could be for several reasons:

• Business-related: There’s no point deploying a solution lacking a critical feature.
• Legal-related: You probably don’t want to go to jail for launching a faulty product…
• Safety-related: …or pay a fine for putting your users’ data at risk.

For example, if you worked on a messaging app for product teams, you’d most likely not launch it without some form of end-to-end encryption that protects the users’ privacy.

Or if the marketing campaigns generated lots of buzz around a specific feature of your product, launching without it might feel a bit anticlimactic to your users.

When thinking about the “must-have” features, think of the worst-case scenario for not including it in the final release. If you just imagined an absolute horror, you found one!

High-priority features. They’d be a fantastic addition to the final release, but if you can’t deliver them before the deadline – you’re not destined for disaster.

Say you opened the top requests panel for your messaging app and saw that you should deliver two features by the end of the next sprint: support for sending images and voice recordings.

If they’re not the product’s core functionality, you might choose one and release the other in the upcoming sprint. 

Optional features. They’d be nice to include if you have the resources, but they aren’t necessary for success.

The difference between “could have” and “should have” may sometimes be thin. To clarify, consider how a specific feature will affect the user experience. 

For example, sending images and voice recordings are two features that might help users communicate better.

But will adding the ability to search Spotify songs and send the links to them directly from your app achieve the same?

Probably not. Unless your app is dedicated to musicians.

Features you won’t implement now. You should list them while defining the project’s scope for a specific timeframe. This way, no one can reintroduce them in the middle of the project (and annoy everyone).

It doesn’t mean the idea is trash and shouldn’t be implemented.

Instead, it’s a way to communicate with stakeholders about the lack of time or resources to deliver the feature in the current release.

But how do you exactly implement this method into your work?

Demonstrate how the MoSCoW analysis is done in Fibery.

First, you need to put some rules in place. 

While Must Have features are easy to explain and understand – communicating a difference between Should Haves and Could Haves might cause confusion, leading to heated discussions later.

To avoid throwing chairs during team standups, set rules for applying the lower-level priorities upfront and put them in an easily accessible space for everyone dealing with task prioritization:

Include things like:

• How to decide if a feature is a Should Have or a Could Have?
• When to raise or lower the priority of a task?
• Who makes the final decision about the priorities?

Once everyone’s on the same page about how to set MoSCoW priorities, you need to set the right balance between the Must Haves and any other types of tasks in the project. 

DSDM recommends setting a proportion of Must Haves at a level where the team’s confidence to deliver them is high.

Typically, Must Haves should include around 60% of all project tasks . This lets you avoid the overly positive approach to planning the work, leading to unfinished features on the release date.

To control the number of Must Haves, you can set up an automated report in Fibery:

That’s not the rule, though. The exact proportions of all three task categories will depend on your project circumstances. 

Plus, if your team is already familiar and comfortable with the MoSCoW model, you can crank up the Must Haves above 60%. Just make sure it doesn’t cause massive eye-rolls from your team members.

You should divide the remaining 40% in half between Should Haves and Could Haves. 

Keep in mind, though, that the main goal is to protect the Must Haves and Should Haves. If Could Haves interfere with more important features, you should put them off until the next iteration.

The key to effective MoSCoW prioritization is balancing risks and predictability for each project. Adding too many Could Haves can quickly dilute the sense of direction and lead to “meh” results. Your team’s productivity is crucial, but the quality of work delivered is non-negotiable.

The upsides and downsides of MoSCoW 

Okay, so should you or should you not use MoSCoW in your work? Well, it depends. It’s a handy tool in PM’s arsenal, but it has some drawbacks, too. Here are the most important pros and cons of MoSCoW you should consider:

The greatest strength of MoSCoW is its simplicity. You don’t need extensive training to understand or implement it. Your team members, regardless of their experience with project management methodologies, can grasp the concept pretty quickly, too. 

Also, MoSCoW simplifies explaining and justifying your decisions to stakeholders when you lack time or resources to deliver the feature in the current release. It’s excellent for managing expectations across the organization about the upcoming product’s release. 

MoSCoW prioritization works best when various stakeholders share their perspectives on the direction you should move towards. This encourages collaboration and ensures your project team isn’t working in isolation.

Say you’re working on AI voice note summaries: a feature everyone’s excited about as it’s supposed to differentiate your app from the competition. 

This also means everyone’s on their toes about all the deadlines involved in the feature’s launch. Here, you can use MoSCoW across various departments. Marketing or Sales might give you some insights into the customers’ expectations and clarify all the Must Haves and Won’t Haves.

Crazy projects need crazy flexibility. And MoSCoW’s categories let you do some gymnastics within the project schedule.

Especially in the startup world, there may be one customer insight that may suggest a feature or a task isn’t the Should Have you thought it to be.

For example, a survey you included inside your app suggested that Spotify integration within your messaging app doesn’t actually make your users go:

Your melomaniac heart is broken but what can we do? It’s time to move this task from Should Haves to Could Haves or Won’t Haves.

MoSCoW doesn’t rely on any internal system for gathering data about the task. As long as your team and you see it’s not worth pursuing it now, you can quickly reprioritize the tasks with this method.

MoSCoW lets you define clear boundaries for each iteration of the projects (the Won’t Haves).

Even if someone comes to your team with a brilliant feature idea or any other thing they saw in a LinkedIn post, you can tell them to hold their horses. 

And if they complain, you can just show them your project board with the MoSCoW prioritization implemented:

Now, this looks like something hard to argue with, right?

When you’re clear about the project’s Must Haves, you can allocate the budget and staff to them first.

There’s nothing more frustrating than an understaffed team working on a crucial feature. Especially when they see another overstaffed team working on something easy.

MoSCoW saves your team members’ nerves and helps you look like a responsible strategist – and who wouldn’t want that?!

Downsides of MoSCoW

Okay, but MoSCoW is not all fun and games. It has a few downsides, too:

While MoSCoW’s simplicity can be useful – it has a darker side as well.

The categories in this method are broad and may overlook certain nuances. 

For example, in your messaging app, you may categorize two features as Should Haves:

• Two-factor Authentication (2FA)
• Chat search capabilities

While these are definitely useful, the reason to include them is entirely different. The first one was added to prepare your app for the launch in the EU next year, where this feature is a must.

The second one is an effect of the competitive analysis your marketing team executed last month.

MoSCoW doesn’t inform you about this context. In cases like this, you must look at the bigger picture while prioritizing the tasks.

MoSCoW doesn’t depict the costs of the tasks within one category.

Coming back to our previous example. The 2FA may consume much more effort and time because of the external restrictions your team must obey.

Suppose you designated the same number of team members to the 2FA and to the chat search feature.

It may quickly turn out that the 2FA team requires much more resources to meet the project’s deadlines. 

When stakeholders aren’t 100% on the same page about your project’s task order, you immediately see one major problem with MoSCoW:

It’s subjective.

While Marketing may think integrating a GIF library into your app is a Must Have, your QA team will prioritize fixing a nasty bug over GIFs (boring!).

If you plan to implement MoSCoW in your work, you need to establish strong guidelines and rules for resolving conflicts like these. Otherwise, you may get stuck in the discussions and delay the project’s delivery.

Usually, the Could Haves and Won’t Haves include enhancements and innovations. You put here all the features your customers suggested or some genius “Eureka!” moments from one of your weekly standups.

But if a feature gets stuck in the Could Haves or Won’t Haves, your product may fail to evolve with customer needs and become stale.

Using the MoSCoW method, you need to review the backlog regularly. If you see a feature from 2008 there, it may be a good idea to either pick it up or remove it from the list entirely.

MoSCoW focuses on the immediate or next release cycle. Because its categories are so subjective and prone to change over time, you can’t plan long-term projects effectively with this method.

This highlights the most important aspect of the MoSCoW method – you can’t rely on it for your entire project.

While it’s a useful tool for organizing your features list quickly, it won’t do a good job with more extensive, strategic tasks.

But you can combine this method with other techniques and tools that fill the gaps MoSCoW leaves. 

One of them is setting clear definitions for each category to ensure stakeholder alignment and prevent heated discussions about priorities later on.

Also, a risk assessment or a complexity analysis framework could compensate for the MoSCoW’s lack of effort consideration.

When you know how to combine different methods, you get the full benefit of each one. But before that, you need to know how MoSCoW compares to other prioritization tools.

When you compare MoSCoW to other prioritization techniques, you’ll immediately notice its simplicity. And that’s its biggest strength. 

Models like the Value vs. Complexity matrix, the Kano model , or the Eisenhower Matrix require analytical skills and tons of data collection. If you immediately feel a migraine coming while thinking of those two, you might find MoSCoW a much better fit.

MoSCoW focuses on the consensus and negotiation within your team. No fancy charts and calculations – you sit with your team and get the prioritization done fast.

But this simplicity and speed may overlook the nuanced trade-offs between tasks and lead to knowledge gaps in your decision-making.

For instance, using the Value vs. Complexity matrix, you can differentiate tasks between quick wins (high value, low complexity) and major projects (high value, high complexity). 

The MoSCoW method could potentially categorize both as “Must haves” without acknowledging the difference in effort required.

The Kano model goes further and helps identify features that can delight customers or make them dissatisfied if missing. 

MoSCoW doesn’t consider customer satisfaction in its prioritization, which may cause your team to deliver features no one has requested. Or ones that are nice to have but don’t solve the real pains your customers experience. And not listening closely to your customers is a road straight to churn.

Lastly, the Eisenhower Matrix, or the Urgent-Important Matrix , helps prioritize tasks based on urgency and importance. 

Here, you get a more critical look at what needs immediate attention (“Do first”) versus what is important but not urgent (“Schedule”). This can be especially useful in projects with tight deadlines. MoSCoW, while addressing importance through its “Must” and “Should” categories, doesn’t directly account for urgency.

MoSCoW’s ease of use and clear communication make it excellent for projects requiring rapid alignment among everyone in the team and the stakeholders.

But for more complex and urgent projects, you might consider choosing an alternative. Or you can integrate MoSCoW with other methods. Keep it flexible, and always consider the context of your project.

Early-stage startups might focus more on ‘Must-Have’ features critical to getting the product to market and proving its value proposition. As the company matures and the product becomes more established, the focus might shift towards ‘Should-Have’ and ‘Could-Have’ features that enhance the product and provide additional value to users.

The MoSCoW method is a flexible tool, and its implementation can be adapted to each project’s specific needs and circumstances. Therefore, while the company lifecycle can influence the allocation of resources, it’s not the only factor.

MoSCoW is a solid method for prioritizing tasks in DSDM. But, just like most other methods, it won’t 100% replace the prioritization skills of any good PM. Use it as one of many other tools in your arsenal and apply it to your workflow when it makes sense.

And if that “when” happens to be now, you can quickly add it to Fibery’s free Product Management Template and become more productive with no extra caffeine involved.

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