Look Backward in Order to Move Forward
Whether you choose to call it a retrospective, post-mortem, project review, or lessons learned, the idea that we need to look back on past actions. Judging them in hindsight is a popular concept that exists in the dozens of project management methodologies.
Loren Walker, wrote a paper for the PMI Global Congress, that states lessons-learned discussions are one of the "most important 'value-added' aspects of a project".
But the article also states that they're the most ignored. Odd. If it's so necessary, why is it so easily overlooked?
Can lessons-learned be the greatest failure in project management?
Let me explain: in a previous post, we discussed how a project completed on time, on budget. and within scope can be a failure unless it provides some kind of value.
Most approaches to capturing learned information about issues and risks tend to be around time, budge, and scope with little regards to the project’s end results providing new business value.
Shall we let go of the guides, standards, and methods around learning from past experiences with time, cost, and scope?
Instead, should we craft lessons-learned actions that will create something valuable for future projects and their alignment with business value? Maybe this will set us on a path to continuous improvement with a purpose.
Retrospectives, project reviews and lessons learned may miss the mark on some level, but they also have a lot of strong points. In order to make this kind of exercise more valuable, I believe we need to combine a few key aspects of each one of them.
Don't wait until the end of the project
These meetings should happen all throughout the project's lifecycle as well as at the end of the project. In cooking, there's a basic rule that is ingrained in young chefs: taste as you go! Once your dish is complete, you can't un-salt or un-spice a dish. It's over.
We can draw the same parallel to project management: a successful project is about creating repeatable processes and optimizing them over the course of the project. That can only be done if you take the time to stop once in a while, gather data, ask questions and adjust. Once it's over, it's over.
In addition, by the end of a project most people can't even remember what went right or wrong unless it was a major source of frustration, so your feedback will be biased and incomplete.
Expand your learning scope
You can gain some valuable insight from so many resources outside of running meetings with your team. Approach players like stakeholders, clients, and external people that work in proximity to your team.
Those how have supporting roles and even similar projects done by other firms can provide new perspectives with eye-opening feedback.
Turn informal conversations into valuable lessons-learned opportunities. You don't need to isolate feedback to these meetings, all you need to do is ask the right questions in casual settings.
Highlight the positives and Look Forward
One of the biggest mistakes we fall into as human beings is that we tend to focus on what went wrong instead of what went right.
Too many times, retrospectives or lessons-learned sessions may turn into finger-pointing blame games that do more harm than good.
Although, as these sessions can turn into people venting while not offering solutions, it’s good to ask for their concerns about roadblocks and issues. Just take it to the next step to ask for their idea (in a positive way) on how to prevent these problems from happening again.
Then taking the past problems aside, use the other half of the meeting to engage in what what went really well. What provided great value for the end results. Ask them why it went so well and what did we do differently that brought such success.
Someone may bring up successes not known by the others. It’s a great way to share the positives for others to use on their own future projects.
Then look forward. Document these changes from past experience for your future projects. Consider of posting the changes in real-time in your project tool of choice, such as those designed for improving project results with repeatable process templates..
The key to these meetings is balance: a good mix of salt and sweet. It would be cool if negative was balanced with a positive. Even cooler is the team could leave feeling as though their frustrations were heard and their ideas for improvements will be implemented.
Document the lessons learned and ideas
Be precise
It's too easy to say that the team has "communication problems". Every team has communication problems. It's like saying this food doesn't taste good. That's ok, but what exactly makes it taste bad? Is it too salty? Is it too sweet? Is your mouth on fire?
Identifying issues in a general category is only the starting point of the diagnosis. Use this information to dig a little deeper and find the root cause for which you can actually suggest a solution.
Once you get to the root of the problem, a solution is much easier to find and has a better chance of being implement.
It’s hard to go back in time to recall all the details, so I recommend you set up a lessons-learned model that’s continuously reviewed in real time during the different project phases.
Which brings us to the final point...
Now, implement it!
Let's pretend running a retrospective meeting is like reviewing cookies made. We discuss the cookie batter and ingredients. We check for moist and crunch appeal.
We then throw up post-it sheets with improvements up on the board. Such as we ordered the cheap chocolate chips and should have opted for the richer variety.
What happens now? How dod we know the next batch will have better chocolate chips?
If nothing is documented for actionable change, your future cookies will be ok, but not great. The lessons learned meeting was a nice gesture, but we all forget and get back to our regular routines.
We need to make ideas for change be actionable. Here are some takeaways for turning lessons learned into real change for the future.
Get a good tool for your project processes. It can be PowerPoint, Word, Google Sheet, Excel, MS Project, Pie, or any other tool. Have something your teams can use as process templates for future projects.
Review issues as they happen and once solved, document what happened and what needs to be changed in real time during each phase. For example, Pie has a feature that allows your team members to post ideas along with issues during the project execution for future review.
At the end of the project, review all issues and new ideas and ensure they are added to the project tool of choice for your project “recipes” (templates).
We need to use this information to create value and we need to do this by optimizing our processes.
Do we need to spend all of our time on making sure we're on time, on scope, and on budget? Can we make equal room for driving processes, engaging people to solve issues and share ideas, and continuously improving for future projects?
What’s learned from your projects?
Written by Isabelle Blondin
Photo by Clem Onojeghuo