How to Use an After Action Review to Create More Effective Outcomes

Evaluations are essential tools for assessing the effectiveness and efficiency of programs, policies, interventions and individual performance across all fields and sectors. Through evaluations, organizations and individuals can gather valuable feedback and data that can inform future decision-making, improve performance, and drive innovation. ?

The value of evaluations lies in their ability to provide insights into the impact and outcomes of certain choices and actions, as well as their strengths and weaknesses, enabling stakeholders to make informed decisions about the path forward and maximize their impact.?

An After-Action Review (AAR) is an evaluation that enables work teams to specifically dissect a specific activity and learn from their experiences. The structured AAR debriefing process originated in the U.S. Army in the 1970s and was developed to help Soldiers learn from their experiences and improve their performance in future missions. The AAR was later adopted by other branches of the military and has since been widely used in both the public and private sectors.?

The AAR process typically involves a team of participants, including the people who were directly involved in the mission or project, as well as facilitators who guide the discussion. During the AAR, participants review what happened, what went well, what could have been done better, and what can be learned from the experience. The goal is to identify opportunities for improvement and develop strategies to enhance performance in future missions or projects.?

Today, the AAR is a widely recognized and widely used tool for organizational learning and continuous improvement, with applications across all professions in all sectors.?

Here are some tips to help you learn how to conduct an AAR and make yourself a more valuable contributor to the success of your team and broader organization.?

Four Fundamental Steps for Conducting an AAR

1.?????Reflect on your original plan. Start the session with a brief recap of the goals and objectives from the activity, with a specific focus on the outcomes you were all expecting to achieve. It serves as a useful reminder and helps to get people focused for the discussion ahead.

2.?????Determine the actual results. The facilitator should make it clear that this is a “no penalty zone” so that participants can confidently share their true thoughts and feelings without fear of punishment or retribution. The creation of this circle of trust is imperative if the leader wants to have a robust discussion to identify what actually happened. Ask open ended questions that don’t “lead the witnesses” to elicit more information. Listen carefully for comments that may need further attention and allow space and grace to let all thoughts and ideas be equally heard.

3.?????Analyze the underlying causes. Even the most successful activities that met 100 percent of its goals have room for improvement, so the group should identify and figure out why events unfolded the way they did. There may be a reason that the team may have met their goals easily or maybe they encountered the same barriers repeatedly, such as miscommunications or technology/equipment malfunctions.

4.?????Recommend future improvements. Once all the issues are identified and put on the table for all to see and absorb, focus on the areas that can be improved upon for future activities. You may need to revise and refine your goals, objectives, policies, or expectations or perhaps it’s a basic matter of following them more closely. In any event, the ultimate goal is to ensure that the team has moved in a positive direction of growth, learning, and understanding in order to create more efficiency and effectiveness in the future.

Additional Suggestions for Using an AAR?

1.?????Decide on the level of formality. Even though this process may sound technical, an AAR can be as simple as getting together for ten minutes over your morning coffee. There may also be times when you want longer sessions and a more detailed agenda. As the leader of the group, you may want to assign different process owners for each AAR over time to allow each team member to feel ownership and connectivity to the resulting team improvements.?

2.?????Consider human and technical factors. Look at the big picture. Relationships and attitudes matter just as much as technology and subject expertise. As a leader, get to know the capabilities and personalities of the individuals on your team to better understand how they may respond to direct or sometimes negative feedback relating to their performance during the activity. If their individual performance was lacking in a certain situation, then perhaps it is not the best idea to make them the facilitator of the AAR so that they don’t face public criticism and finger pointing from the rest of the team. ?

3.?????Know when to call in a facilitator. For significant activities and situations, there are many good reasons for engaging a professional facilitator for your AAR, since their third-party perspective often brings to light topics that people more familiar with the situation overlook. They can also help resolve conflicts and strengthen communications amongst the team who may disagree with why certain things happened when and the way they did.

4.?????Address serious personnel issues separately. Stick to the facts about what happened and focus generally on group performance rather than rating the negative performance issues of certain team members???? in front of their peers. Performance evaluations require a different approach and to truly correct the behaviors and decision making of the individual, one-on-one counseling is a requirement.

5.?????Respect confidentiality. Earn people’s trust by taking privacy and confidentiality seriously. What is said in the room stays in the room and should not be shared without the distinct approval of the individual. You have only one opportunity to break that trust since you will never have it again if you don’t adhere to this responsibility.?

6.?????Integrate reviews into your organizational calendar. Stick to a consistent schedule by making reviews automatic. Work them into your weekly staff meetings or annual strategic planning offsites. For large and/or very important events, you may want to plan to conduct the AAR on the spot while the experience is fresh in the minds of your team, which allows you to also thank the team publicly for a job well done – even if 100 percent of your goals weren’t accomplished. Remember that every situation is a learning opportunity, and, in most instances, there were more things that went right than wrong, which is a direct result of some great work by the team.

7.?????Invite program partners to participate. There may be times when you want to include the consultants who worked with you on the project or activity. The better they know your intentions and your pain points, the better they can help you reach your future goals. If you’re trying to evaluate the individual or collective performance of your team members, you may choose to conduct a separate AAR with your consultants to gather their candid feedback about what they saw or experienced.

8.?????Include your successes. There’s a natural tendency to go straight for the weaker areas that need to be changed, but it is extremely important to celebrate your wins, as well. Remember that you also learn a lot from the aspects that went well. Use this as an opportunity to reward key players for their contributions to the successful outcome. Coffee gift cards work wonders in these situations.

9.?????Welcome individual perspectives. Depending on their role, each person probably views the same facts differently. Appreciate the benefits of the diversity of thought you have on your team. Make this a forum where everyone is rewarded for speaking freely, particularly your more junior team members who may be reticent to speak outside of their pay grade. If you see members of your team responding negatively in any form towards your junior and less experienced individuals, be sure to correct that behavior immediately or risk losing their candid input forever due to fear.

10.?Refine your goals. One major benefit of an AAR is testing how realistic your goals are as related to your strategic objectives. You may need to scale back, take new risks or lean harder into unexpected challenges. If you’ve had to adjust your goals following the AAR, ensure that you find ways to continue to pressure test them over time to ensure they are right and relevant for future situations.

11.?Hand out written assignments. Promote concrete action by giving everyone on the team some homework to do related to the project or activity. Individual assignments make it clear that everyone’s contribution is valued, and everyone will walk away becoming more knowledgeable than they were on certain topics. Remember – what you knew yesterday is not what you’re going to need to know tomorrow to continue to be successful, so being intentional about constant learning for your team is helping to establishing their continued professional growth.

12.?Be patient. The quality of your AARs will get better as people gain more confidence in the process and in each other. Just like a sports team, you get better every time you practice together.?

Experience is always the best teacher. With an After Action Review, you can use your past performance to build a more successful future. The knowledge you gain will boost your skills and bolster your confidence. Incorporating AARs into your organization's processes can help foster a culture of continuous learning and improvement, leading to greater success and better outcomes.?

For leaders who are seeking to develop their confidence and experience in leading their teams through continuous improvement processes like an AAR, working with a career development coach can be a beneficial experience.?

Visit www.1988strategies.com for a FREE coaching consultation.?

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