Practicing Organizational Reflection in Business
Everyone’s familiar with things like performance reviews, giving feedback, and developing business strategies, but all these things (and much more) can be used in a more effective and synergistic way through organizational reflection. Even if your organization already has similar strategies in place, there’s a good chance they could be improved; organizational reflection practices like an after-action review or enhanced feedback have the potential to revolutionize the way a business operates.
Organizational reflection: the secret weapon of a robust business
First, what is organizational reflection? In a nutshell, it’s the practice of taking time away from the daily routine of business to evaluate past actions, generate knowledge based on those evaluations, and create action plans for implementing that knowledge. As such, it can take many different forms: performance reviews, regular opportunities to give and receive feedback, after-action reviews, and so on. When these strategies are thoroughly implemented, they can be powerful influences for driving positive change.
Why businesses need organizational reflection
Whether you’re hiring, trying to work more efficiently, or simply tired of seeing the same mistakes happen repeatedly across your business, organizational reflection could help.
Let’s take the issue of retaining talent, for instance. A major source of dissatisfaction among employees is the feeling that their voices aren’t valued within the organization; by extension, this makes them feel like they themselves aren’t valued. Instituting a continuous feedback loop for employees and managers provides everyone an equal chance to contribute their thoughts and ideas in an organized and productive way. For example, an annual “Stay Interview” with each employee could be a valuable tool. In the interview, you might ask questions that assess their job satisfaction, their feelings on their management and the company overall, and other recommendations they might have to make things better. This activity provides the dual benefit of allowing employees the chance to be heard and also gathers tailored feedback around what motivates each employee.
Then there’s the question of increasing efficiency; this could be addressed through many different approaches. Employees and managers could provide feedback on issues they’ve noticed, or improvements they had in mind. Performance reviews could be used to allocate talent more efficiently across projects. After-action review from previous projects or proposals your company has submitted could be applied to current ones, to take advantage of lessons learned.
What about learning from mistakes? Once again, organizational reflection in the form of an after-action review can provide key insights into areas that need improvement. This could then contribute to the action plan for future endeavors, ideally reducing the likelihood of errors.
Not all feedback strategies are created equal
One consistently under-utilized strategy is the use of continuous feedback loops. Unlike opportunities for conventional feedback, which can be few and far between, this model integrates the feedback process into regular work routines. The exact number varies depending on what study you’re looking at, but research clearly shows that the majority of employees believe that they aren’t getting enough feedback.
It goes the other way, too – it’s important that employees get the chance to offer feedback on their managers, workplace practices, office culture, etc. With a continuous feedback loop, they’ll have the chance to do exactly that.
Implementing this strategy will likely involve a learning curve for everyone in the organization, but the benefits are worth the extra effort. You could get improved lines of communication, faster insights, increased employee engagement, and higher productivity – all of which should boost your bottom line.
Feedback strategies for any business
How the continuous feedback loop is implemented will vary from one organization to the next. It could take the form of an online platform, face-to-face meetings, suggestion boxes, or just about anything else. Whatever your organization ends up doing, though, here are four strategies that should be included in your overall approach:
Pick one day per week to put extra focus on feedback sessions. This could take the form of reading anonymous submissions from a suggestion box or having face-to-face meetings where concerns and praise are discussed openly between peers. Keep in mind that receiving feedback can be difficult, so these sessions should be handled carefully. If appropriate, it might help to provide some training on productive ways to give feedback. For instance, instead of “your performance has been declining, so please work on that”, the feedback could be “I noticed you’ve been having trouble meeting the same goals as before, I’d be happy to work on an action plan with you to get those numbers back up”. In any scenario, trust is an essential component to quality feedback.
Don’t turn everything into a performance review. Performance reviews are just one aspect of giving feedback; without enough imagination and initiative, a continuous feedback loop could turn into a series of miniature performance reviews. Nobody wants that. Regardless of the format your feedback takes, make sure it allows every member of the organization to share their thoughts. Have meetings, conduct regular discussions online, or put up a community feedback board where people can add post-it notes, photos, or anything else that’s relevant. Elicit other’s opinions before providing your own.
Use feedback to foster connections. One of the end goals should be improved communication between every level of the organization. Even if various team members aren’t technically collaborating across departments or projects, they can still strengthen the organization by sharing knowledge and expertise among each other. Feedback should primarily be used to foster connections – not corrections.
Don’t forget about remote teams. Working from home is becoming increasingly common, so it’s important that feedback practices take this into account. If an organization has employees working from home, they could emphasize virtual meetings over in-person feedback sessions. The community feedback board could be made available through an online whiteboard tool, rather than in the office. There are all kinds of ways to stay connected with team members who aren’t physically present, which makes it easier than ever to include them in the process.
Why you should use AARs as part of your organizational reflection strategy
What if you could use every outcome – positive or otherwise – to your advantage, regardless of resources, manpower, or the strength of your leadership? If your organization learns how to use after-action reviews to their full potential, that’s a distinct possibility.
Just look at the example provided by the U.S. Army’s Opposing Force (OPFOR). They’re a brigade whose purpose is to train soldiers for combat duty, and they’ve learned both the art and the science of AARs. They don’t just use defeats and victories as learning opportunities; they use them to change the way they think. What’s more, they implement AARs at every stage of the process. Instead of making changes from one project to the next, they make changes from one decision to the next.
AARs aren’t just routine meetings
How do U.S. Army practices pertain to businesses, exactly? OPFOR’s approach to AARs has many real-world applications for just about any organization. For example, it’s typical to wait until the end of a project to conduct an AAR. By that point, many of the smaller details could have been forgotten, or simply not considered important anymore. With more frequent AARs, those details can be recorded, discussed, and used to form better decisions down the line.
Another example is to conduct a before-action review (BAR), which is the corporate version of a similar practice carried out by OPFOR. A BAR aids team members in outlining a concrete action plan, which they know will be reviewed during the AAR. This not only keeps everyone aligned in their goals, but it can also lead to a more productive AAR.
In other words, AARs should be a catalyst for change, not just another meeting to hold upon the completion of a project. They have a reputation for simply being discussions of what went wrong, but AARs can be so much more than postmortems of yesterday’s failure; they can be the starting points for tomorrow’s success.
How to effectively implement an after-action review
AARs can be used more effectively if they aren’t reserved for the very end of a project, but the frequency with which they’re conducted will depend on what works best for your organization. Whatever you decide, here are a few practical steps to take:
Make sure you’re consistent. Establish a frequency that feels like a good fit, and stick with it. This should apply equally to projects with positive or negative outcomes; the majority of AARs are reserved for projects that didn’t fulfill expectations, but successes deserve to be mentioned too.
Present data, not just opinions. Details like missed deadlines, ignored guidelines, or disregarded feedback should be called out, otherwise there’s a better chance of the same mistakes happening again.
Don’t make it personal. Even though specific individuals may be identified during an AAR, it’s counterproductive to make it sound like they’re the enemy. While the data should be shared among everyone, individual comments should be kept anonymous.
Include everyone. Even if they aren’t particularly interested in attending the AAR, everyone in the organization should be involved. Criticism could come from the leadership, as well as from the bottom rungs of the ladder – each voice should be heard equally.
Organizational reflection in business can be achieved in many ways. How will it be achieved by your organization?
Every business is unique, so every business will require a unique approach. Even so, there are certain organizational strategies that any company could benefit from, regardless of size, age, or industry.