Project stories: Capturing our impact

We deliver high-quality work for our clients, but that work only carries its full weight if we can tell the story of how we did it. Project Stories are structured narratives that document the work we have done. They transform day-to-day project activity into compelling accounts that communicate the value we deliver, both to our own people and to prospective clients.

A Project Story captures the context of the work, the specific contributions made, and the outcomes achieved. Done well, they become powerful assets: they sharpen our collective memory of what happened, help us articulate our capabilities, and give us detailed case studies to draw on in bids and sales responses.

Why we are doing this #

The goal is to make sure your work gets the recognition it deserves, inside the company and beyond. By documenting what we do as we go, we ensure:

Your contributions are on record: We capture the “how” while it is still fresh, so the detail and craft of your work is never lost.
Your team’s work becomes reusable: We build a library of detailed case studies that means future bids reflect the real depth of what we have delivered.
Everyone can see what is happening: We make it easier for teams across the company to understand and celebrate the breadth of our work.

How we build a story #

We have two distinct approaches to building a Project Story. Which approach we use depends on one thing: whether weeknotes exist for the project.

Approach 1: Weeknotes-led stories #

For projects where weeknotes have been maintained, this is our primary approach. It works in four stages:

Weeknotes are written throughout the life of the project, capturing ongoing activity, decisions, and progress.
At a quarterly cadence (or at the end of shorter projects) the weeknotes are used as source material to generate a first draft of the project story using AI tools.
That draft is then supplemented with interviews. These help fill any gaps in the weeknotes and allow us to add depth to the most interesting aspects of the work.
We validate the drafted story with the people we have interviewed to make sure we are accurately representing the work.

Approach 2: Interview-led stories #

For capability contracts or other work where weeknotes do not exist, we rely entirely on structured interviews with team members. This approach is also used in parallel with Approach 1 when we need to capture individual contributions in more detail.

Interviews follow a consistent structure. We begin with contextual questions to orient the person:

When did you join the project?: To establish the person’s timeline on the work.
What team did you join?: To understand the structure they were part of.
What was your specific role?: To pin down their function and responsibilities.

We then use the STAR framework to draw out the detail of their work:

Situation (S): What was the context? What problem or challenge existed?
Task (T): What was this person specifically responsible for delivering?
Action (A): What did they actually do? What decisions did they make?
Result (R): What was the outcome? What impact did their contribution have?

The individual STAR accounts are then woven together into a single project-level narrative. This helps us articulate not just what a project achieved overall, but how different people contributed to that success, which is especially valuable in bids where we need to evidence individual capability. Rather than a list of roles, the result is a story where every person’s contribution is visible and connected to the outcome.

Who and when #

Kevin and Liam track stories on a quarterly basis, maintaining a record of which projects have been documented and which still need attention. The quarterly rhythm ensures that stories are captured while the work is still fresh, and that we build a growing library over time.

While we proactively track projects, we really welcome it when people reach out to us! If you feel your project has a unique angle or a great story to share, please let us know.

See it in action #

You can find all of our project stories in the dxw project stories folder on drive. Here are some recent project stories to give you a sense of what the finished product looks like:

Let’s tell your story #

If you are working on something you are proud of, do not wait for the end of the quarter or end of the project. Reach out to Liam or Kevin to start the conversation. Your day-to-day work is exactly what we need to showcase the strength of our team.

Last updated: 30 June 2026