Lessons Learned - Six tips
to make them "Stick"
--
Any
team leader or project manager worth his/her
salt knows that periodically, teams need to stop
the action and conduct "after action reviews " -
or Lessons Learned. But, all too often,
these meetings end up turning into
complaint sessions that yield little benefit to
the team moving forward. The whole point
is team learning - and your reputation
is at stake if the team repeats the
same mistakes, or doesn't resolve problems
already identified. Next time you
conduct a Lessons Learned session, here's how to
ensure ROI:
1.
Give them control.
Direct the team's attention to issues
they have direct influence over. The idea is
to action plan around what the team can do
differently next time. Drill
down into activities within the team's span of
control.
2. Go for depth over
breadth. Don't
take a "shotgun"
approach. Unless you
focus the team's efforts on specific aspects of
the milestone, you'll end up with broad,
nonspecific information you can't take action
on. Go deep in a few meaningful places.
Decide on a few areas to target, ahead of
time.
3. Make it
safe. While
pointing fingers helps vent frustration, it
won't move your team along,
and it's not the
point. As much as possible, make it safe
for everyone in the
room. Set the ground rule early for
participants to focus on the situation, not a
particular
person.
4. Acknowlege the
positive. Neglecting to recognize team
accomplishments and successes is a
mistake. Your team also needs to relect on
what went well.
Balance the session
by acknowledging the postive,as well as
negative.
5.
Timing. Timing
matters. A lot. It's best to capture ideas
while they are fresh on everyone's mind.
Conduct Lessons Learned as close to the
end of the milestone as you
can.
6. Learn
and
improve. Don't let your Lessons
Learned results just fall into
obscurity. Capturing a laundry list of
issues that will never see the light of day is
a waste of everyone's time. Build
plenty of room in the agenda for action
planning. Commit to
actions, and follow through.
Getting
ready....
You
need to prepare.
Decide on a few "buckets" of issues where
you want to focus the team's efforts. Keep it
down to just a few - again, you don't want to
look an inch deep and a mile wide. You're
going deeply into a few issues, you're not
skimming the surface.
Invite
the right people. Obviously, you need
the right team members, and also those external
to the team who were closely involved.
Ultimately, you want the entire "system" of
people in the room - including decision makers
and management -- so that you can jointly
reflect on what happened, and plan the
appropriate next moves.
Participate, don't
facilitate. If possible, have someone
outside the team facilitate the session for
you. It helps you focus on the content,
and ensure you get the most out of the
day. Build
a network of skilled facilitators internally so
that you can help each other. Consider
hiring me to help you! Here's
what my clients say about working with
me: Testimonials
Remember...
The very best
teams review lessons-learned results
before
starting their next
project
The
very best project Sponsors and Executive Leaders
hold teams accountable
to leverage learnings from other
projects
