How can you improve your project post-mortem process?

1 Plan ahead

Don't wait until the end of the project to think about the post-mortem. Plan it as part of your project closure and evaluation phase, and schedule it as soon as possible after the project delivery. Invite the relevant stakeholders, including your team members, sponsors, clients, and other key contributors. Prepare an agenda that covers the main objectives, scope, outcomes, and challenges of the project, and share it with the participants in advance. Ask them to provide feedback, suggestions, and questions before the meeting.

2 Use a structured framework

A structured framework can help you organize and facilitate the post-mortem discussion, and ensure that you cover all the important aspects of the project. You can use a simple SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats), or a more specific model such as the 4Ls (what did we like, learn, lack, and long for), or the STAR method (situation, task, action, and result). The framework should help you identify what went well, what went wrong, what can be improved, and what can be replicated or avoided in the future.

3 Encourage participation and honesty

A project post-mortem is not a blame game or a praise session. It is a collaborative and constructive exercise to learn from your collective experience and improve your project management skills. Therefore, you should encourage everyone to participate and share their honest opinions and feedback, without fear of judgment or criticism. You should also acknowledge your own mistakes and successes, and thank your team for their contributions and efforts. Use open-ended questions, active listening, and positive language to foster a respectful and supportive environment.

5 Review and improve

Finally, you should also evaluate your own post-mortem process, and look for ways to improve it. You can ask for feedback from the participants, or use a survey or a rating system to measure their satisfaction and engagement. You can also compare your post-mortem results with your project objectives, metrics, and expectations, and see how well they align. You can also look for trends, patterns, and gaps in your post-mortem data, and use them to inform your project planning and execution.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?