Name the business outcome
Examples include reducing invoice re-entry, improving referral response time or giving customers a clearer service journey.
Octopus Builder docs
Bring what you know.
We'll help shape the rest.
Learn how to begin with a business outcome, add useful context and turn it into a project your team can keep improving.
Getting started
Begin with the outcome, not the solution.
A strong first description explains what should improve, who is involved, what happens today and how the team will know the change worked.
Describe the people
Say who does the work, who receives the service and who needs to make important decisions.
Explain today's flow
List the main steps, hand-offs, delays and systems involved. A rough description is enough to begin.
Define a useful result
Share what better looks like: less manual work, faster service, clearer ownership or fewer mistakes.
Ways to begin
Start from the evidence your business already has.
You do not need to prepare everything before starting. Choose the source that best explains the work today and add more context when it becomes useful.
Describe the change
Use a sentence or short brief when the outcome is clear but the details still need to be explored.
Answer one question at a time
Use a structured interview when the people, rules, data and exceptions still need to be discovered.
Bring files and interfaces
Use spreadsheets, API descriptions, database structures, forms, procedures and business documents.
Understand what is already working
Use a code repository or working system as context for modernisation and extension.
What to bring
Useful context comes in many forms.
Bring only material you are authorised to use. Remove unnecessary sensitive information before uploading it to a preview environment.
ExcelCSVOpenAPISwaggerSQLDatabase schemaERDJSONXMLWordPDFSOPREADMEGitHubGitLabPostmanGraphQLFHIRHL7
What happens next
Your first description becomes a guided project.
After the initial requirement is captured, create or sign in to your account, confirm the organisation and project details, then continue inside a private workspace.
Clarify the requirement
Answer focused questions about the people, information, systems and important exceptions involved.
Bring your team
Keep the business owner involved and add technical or operational specialists when their knowledge is needed.
Confirm before moving on
Check that the shared project brief reflects the business before implementation decisions are made.
Keep improving
Return to the project as needs change, new systems appear and real-world use reveals the next priority.
Ready to begin?