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A hackathon is a fun way to engage people in your organization around a digital culture of change. The main goal is to create sample apps and generate ideas to drive digital transformation. Teams from different roles and departments come together at the line of business or global scale to compete and create apps that solve an organizational need.
The greater the variety of skills and roles represented, the better. One or more facilitators should be involved in organizing the hackathon and defining the teams and the rules. Consider starting the day with a review and demo of Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI, Copilot Studio, AI Builder, and Dataverse.
A successful hackathon often includes team colors, prizes, food, music, laughter, and competition.
Tip
In addition to this guidance, you'll find practical step-by-step guidance and templates for running a hackathon in the Microsoft Power Platform Hackathon Workbook. You can find this workbook and other resources on the Microsoft Power Platform Adoption website.
Plan
Preparation is key to a successful hackathon. Follow these steps:
- Secure an executive sponsor to add credibility to the event.
- Set the dates and give attendees as much notice as possible.
- Choose judges from the business, IT, and executive teams to form a panel.
- For an in-person event, find a venue with sufficient seating, whiteboards, power sockets, reliable Wi-Fi, and projectors for presenting solutions. For a virtual event, set up Teams with private channels for each team to collaborate and a bridge for dialing in.
- Source prizes as incentives for people to participate.
- Set up a registration mechanism, such as Microsoft Forms, a SharePoint site, or a custom app.
- Determine your communication strategy, such as a newsletter, intranet, or Viva Engage/Teams.
Prepare participants
Ensure participants are ready before the hackathon.
- Provide training sessions for participants. The more they know before the event, the better the apps they submit. Suggest they sign up to the Power Up program, register for a Power Platform in a Day workshop, or complete a Power Platform learning path.
- Set up a call before the hackathon so teams and individuals can bring their ideas and questions, discuss feasibility, and unblock knowledge gaps.
- Find out what data sources teams want to connect to, ensure test data is available, and confirm that teams have the right access. Alternatively, provide sample data in an Excel spreadsheet that teams can use to mock up their solutions.
- Build confidence, as it's key to maximizing the productivity of the hackathon.
Identify use cases
Ask attendees to think about the use case they want to solve before the hackathon. Asking them to provide information on a signup form helps them start thinking about what they want to achieve.
Ask the following questions:
- What is the current process?
- What should the future process be?
- What are the pain points in the current process?
- What data sources are needed to solve the problem?
Consider running a solution envisioning workshop before the hackathon to identify the most valuable ideas.
Ask senior stakeholders to vote on the submitted ideas, and during the hackathon, have teams work only on the top-voted ideas. This strategy increases senior leadership buy-in and ensures that important solutions are addressed.
If attendees want to connect to third-party data sources for their solutions, ensure data is available to them. This can be as simple as preparing test data in an Excel file or populating a Dataverse entity with sample data for attendees to use.
Assemble teams
Ask attendees to form their own teams or assign teams for them. Ensure team members know each other and communicate before the event to prepare. Create a Microsoft Teams channel for the hackathon and private channels for each team to support collaboration.
Get ready on the day
Make the day enjoyable by offering snacks and coffee. Design a hackathon logo and create T-shirts, stickers, or buttons to inspire attendees. Arrange for Power Platform champions to assist attendees with technical questions and for facilitators to manage logistics, such as providing supplies or resolving access issues. ("Are there more post-its?" "We need a purple marker!" "We don't have access to xyz." "How do I share my whiteboard with other members on the team?")
Your hackathon can last one day or more. Plan the agenda in advance and share it clearly with attendees so they know how much time to allocate.
Here's a sample agenda:
| Time interval | Activity |
|---|---|
| 15 mins | Introduction and Welcome Start the hackathon with an executive sponsor sharing the organization's vision. This introduction helps participants understand how to build solutions that align with the organization's vision, which is a key judging criterion. |
| 30 mins | Microsoft Power Platform introduction Play videos from recent Microsoft conferences or highlight customer stories to inspire attendees, especially if a public case study features a customer in a similar industry. |
| 30 mins | Microsoft Power Platform demonstration Demo Microsoft Power Platform using Plan designer to create a comprehensive solution by describing your business problem in natural language. A hands-on presentation is a great way to introduce attendees to the power of the platform. |
| 30 mins | Rules of engagement, how to work, questions. |
| x hours | Hackathon This is the main part of the day and might last 4 to 5 hours on Day 1 or span multiple days. |
| 30-60 mins | Team presentations, discussions, and judging. |
Prepare for team presentations and judging
Prepare a template that teams can use for the presentation. The template should include team name, solution benefits, technical considerations, and vision, in addition to screenshots or process diagrams.
Prepare evaluation criteria for judges to use when judging the solutions. The criteria should range from business to technical to design categories, and take into consideration the innovation level, short- and long-term vision, and completeness. Award bonus points for live demos during the presentation.
Plan next steps after the event
Don't stop at the hackathon. Create short- and long-term plans:
- What's the pipeline of apps that are going to be built?
- Will any of the apps built during the hackathon go into production, and how can your makers get support on that journey?
- Build enthusiasm for Power Platform after the event by sharing stories in internal newsletters or on your intranet. Get creative—ask attendees for quotes or interview them.
Share success stories to foster engagement, inspire innovation, and drive adoption.