What is it?
A Retrospect is a process launched immediately after large projects conclude to capture lessons learnt over the life of the entire project including key success factors and recommendations for improvements that can be turned into a knowledge resource for future projects. There are two main approaches for a retrospect : “the 4 L’s” and “the Sailboat exercise.”
HOW
Step 1: Prepare for the Retrospect
- Several months before the end of a long term project, schedule a 1 to 2 hour meeting to occur soon after the end of the project
- Inform the team as to how the retrospect will run so that they can prepare. Choose from the two primary options of “the 4 L’s” or “the sailboat exercise.” The 4 L’s are “liked, learned, lacked, and longed for.” The sailboat exercise includes sections for mountains (vision), risks (glaciers), held us back (anchor), supported us (wind), and deliverables (islands).
- Setup any technology that might support the retrospect
Step 2: Conduct the Retrospect
- Remind everyone of the approach (e.g. 4 L’s or Sailboat) and begin with any area of the framework. For example, if you’ve chosen the Sailboat Exercise, then you could begin with the vision area, which is the mountains drawn in the back of the graphic. Ask everyone to share their recollection of the vision for the project throughout the lifespan of the project. Repeat for each area of the graphic.
- Facilitate conversations for all areas of the framework and document all feedback
Step 3: Share the documentation
- At the conclusion of the meeting, share the results and potential actions as broadly as appropriate.
Variations & Tips for success
- An After Action Review (AAR) is similar to a retrospect. The main difference is that an after action review is intended to review a short term task as opposed to a review of an entire project at the end of the project. In an AAR, most of the team members can remember the details from the recently completed task, but in a retrospect, it can be more challenging to remember details from throughout the entire life of the project. In fact, some team members may have changed throughout the life of the project, and it is very likely that different people remember different things from throughout the project.
- Dot voting is another variation of a retrospect. This is where you choose a set of questions or answers and give everyone 3 dots to vote for their favorites. For example, you could ask “what was your highlight of this entire project”, then have everyone write their responses on separate sticky notes, then have everyone vote with their dots as to the overall favorite of the entire group. This also works well for determining future actions and next steps after the end of the project.
- Past quarter map – this is a variation where instead of trying to remember the details from the life of the entire project, you facilitate a retrospect that is only focusing on the past 3 months of the project. This can be helpful if you have a project that is scheduled to last for longer than 3 years and you’d like to incorporate some mid-term learning and continuous improvement throughout the middle of the project.
- Stop, Start, Continue is another variation of a retrospect. In this variation, you simply ask the group three questions. The first question is “what do you think should stop happening around here?”, have each person share their perspectives on the question, encourage a group conversation, and document the key points. The second question is “what ideas do you have for starting something new and effective around here?” and again ask for each person’s perspective and a group conversation. Document the key points. The third and final question is “we can’t promise that any of the stop or start ideas will happen, but if they do, what do you want to make sure continues happening around here, and doesn’t inadvertently get affected by changes?” Yet again, ask for each person’s perspective, encourage a group conversation and document the key findings.
- Video retrospect – ask each person to record a short video describing their feedback for the entire project. Ask for their permission to share their video with the team. Gather the team together, play the videos, and engage in conversation based on the feedback in the videos.