Capturing Lessons Learned: A Work Management Best Practice

 

Albert Einstein said, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." 

I sometimes wonder if he was talking about project managers.  The increasing pace of change in the workplace causes me to wonder, do we take enough time to learn from experience as processes and personnel are constantly changing.  In my opinion, to successfully learn from experience requires a regular and consistent approach that can be incorporated into any work management methodology.

Here are a few suggestions to help any project team learn from experience:

1. Establish a venue for sharing lessons learned: It doesn't matter whether you call it a post-mortem, a project review, or a project retrospective, most organizations don't do them—but they should.
2. Share what has been learned: Although most organizations don't bother with a project retrospective, those that do don't always create an environment that encourages real learning—and even fewer share what was learned.
3. Don't make learning the next corporate initiative: It's natural for organizations to try to formalize the learning process into the next corporate project.  Although the natural learning process should be encouraged, "corporate" is all too often the same as "bureaucratic," which employees will be more likely to avoid.
4. Don't make learning a one-time activity: Project learning should be ongoing and interactive—don't let it become an isolated activity that happens rarely.

No two organizations are exactly the same.  There are some that rely on project management software to facilitate project learning.  I think that's good, but even organizations that don't use a specific project management tool can create an environment where project learning can take place.  What does your company do to capture best practices and learn from experience?