After Action Review
In the Army we would do what’s called an After Action Review (AAR), which was a way for us to debrief after a mission. We’d do it after every mission, even in training. We did this so we could learn what worked, what didn’t work, and what we can do to make next time better.
This is huge for any business.
Learning from past mistakes is never going to hurt you. And doing more of what worked, well that’s just common sense.
Want to do an AAR, but just aren’t sure where to start? Here’s a quick guide:
- Ask open ended questions. It is way more effective to ask open ended questions when trying to find out what happened. For example: Joe, what happened when you met with the client? Instead of Joe, you didn’t get the client to accept our proposal did you? Avoid asking “yes” or “no” questions, and definitely don’t point fingers. That’s a quick way to get people to stop participating in these reviews.
- What was supposed to happen? What actually happened? And what caused the variation between what actually happened and what was supposed to happen? In some cases the answers will be obvious, in others not so much. By defining these things, it helps everyone understand what is being reviewed. Ideally they would already know the answers to at least the first two questions, but if not it can flush out a communication issue. The last question will get different answers from different perspectives.
- What worked? What didn’t work? Why didn’t it work? Again, we want to make sure everyone understands what worked so they can do more of that in the future. We also want to understand what didn’t work so we do less of that in the future. But most importantly, we want to know why something didn’t work. This will help move something from the “didn’t work” column to the “worked” column in the future.
- What are some action items to change for next time? You want to specify exactly what your team will or won’t do next time. If it’s said out loud or even written down, your team will be more likely to remember what those action items are.
- Summary. Make sure to recap those action items, and anything that needs special attention. If there are follow-ups, make sure whoever is responsible for them knows what to do.
Even if you’re a solopreneur, it’s a great idea to do after action reviews. Give yourself the opportunity to slow down and reflect on the good, the bad, and the ugly. Use the time to improve your processes, or maybe come to the realization that you shouldn’t go it alone anymore.
In the military, we would debrief after every mission. We’d call this the after action review, or AAR, because in the military, there’s an acronym for everything. AARs are ways to review and reflect on what took place during and before the mission that you were just on. You talk about what went well, and things that did not go so well. The ultimate goal of these meetings is to identify what you can do to make next time better. The next time you do this type of mission, or this type of training, or whatever you’re doing. What can make it better? It’s also sort of a time to slow down and reflect on what happened. After you’re going 1,000 miles an hour, you kind of want to slow down and reflect on what just took place. It’s a good idea to do these kind of reviews in business too. But if you’re going to do it, you need to sort of keep a few things in mind. First, make sure that you aren’t using this time to point fingers and play the blame game when something goes wrong. That’s the last thing you want to do because then you’re going to end up losing people on this type of feedback. Where you want everyone, you want 100% participation on these types of things. Make sure that everyone who’s involved in the project is included in these meetings. That includes contractors if you use them. Because ultimately, you want everyone to know what went right, what went wrong, what can be done better, right? So if you have a contractor that was working with you on a project, and they’re going to be working with you on another project, you want to make sure that they understand why things maybe didn’t go so well. Maybe they didn’t know what your company culture’s like or whatever. And they need to know what they can do to work better with your team in the future. Next thing you want to make sure you keep in mind is to check your ego at the door, or in the military terms, you know, kind of, check your rank. In the military, we had that kind of rank structure, just like a lot of business do, with executives, senior management, junior staff, and things like that. And everyone has a different perspective, of what went on during these events and things like that. And they bring those perspectives into these reviews. So if you’re an executive, and you’re thumping your chest throughout the meeting about, this went wrong because this person did that and whatever, you may not know, you may not have the full picture. You don’t have all the knowledge of everything that went on. The purpose of the meeting really is to get feedback from everyone. It’s also to make sure that everyone’s on the same page. So you want to make sure that you have a culture where there’s no stupid questions. Sometimes, someone may not understand why something went wrong, or why it wasn’t quite the way it was supposed to be, because maybe they weren’t involved in the project from the beginning. So you want to allow everyone to have that opportunity to ask those questions, no matter where they are in the organizational chart, or the rank structure of your company, or whatever. So make sure that they all have a chance to ask the questions, and encourage questions, even if they may feel like it’s a stupid question. And finally, you want to reiterate on any of the issues that came up during the meeting. And if you come up with solutions, mention them during the meeting at the end too, kind of recap what went on during the meeting. If there’s issues that are still outstanding, that you don’t necessarily have a resolution for, or whatever, talk about who’s going to take the lead on figuring out what that solution’s going to be. An after action review, or debrief, or whatever you want to call it, is a great way to make sure that everyone on your team is able to grow together.