I personally don’t survey attendees ahead of time—not because it’s not valuable. My experience has just shown few people actually do the pre-work, and it becomes another PM nag that sets the wrong tone. That’s why I suggest a low-effort approach.
Ask each person to throw 15 minutes on their calendar ahead of the meeting to think about the good and bad of the project, looking over the questions you’ll cover.
It may be a bit of extra work, but it’s effective. Feel free to list a few themes that have already been mentioned to get folks thinking.
All of this prep work will go a long way toward helping your post-mortem review go smoothly on meeting day. Remember to keep this meeting focused by following these simple rules.
A good moderator drives the conversation and makes sure the post-mortem meeting stays on track. While the project manager often wears this hat, this role doesn’t have to default to you.
Look for someone who was actively involved in the project with up-close knowledge of the ins and outs of what happened. The right moderator should be able to:
If you do end up moderating the meeting, be sure to designate a separate notetaker. That way, you can focus on the big picture without missing key action items or lessons learned.
It’s important to outline what you expect from each attendee, so kick off the meeting with a few ground rules. Here are a few guidelines you might consider:
There are all kinds of formats for post-mortem meetings—some of which can get very lengthy and specific to the project. In my experience, simple is always better because it keeps people engaged in the process and leaves space for discussion to flow more freely.
Essentially, your goals are to uncover project wins and losses, lift up team celebrations or frustrations, and brainstorm solutions that ultimately lead to action.
Here’s a simple structure to follow:
Collaborative board apps enable you to visually process and organize comments as a team. It’s also an easy way to get people involved in the process by letting them add their own feedback and suggestions to the board.
Use an online whiteboard like Figjam or TeamGantt’s project boards to capture key points. Create columns that fit the format of your meeting, color-code notes by topic or type, and rearrange issues and ideas by priority.
Here’s a post-mortem review meeting board we built in TeamGantt.
In this example, we used custom labels to tag ideas by team and next steps by priority. You can also assign people and deadlines to action items for instant accountability and tracking.
You may be in charge of the post-mortem meeting, but that doesn’t mean you’re responsible for solving all the issues. Your job is to craft an action plan, then share it with the right people and ask them to execute it.
The point of capturing action items and owners in a plan is to spread the information and work around. Sure, there will be project management items you need to address, but you don’t have to fix it all—and shouldn’t.
That’s where a post-mortem report comes in. Let’s walk through what goes into a good project post-mortem report.
A post-mortem report enables you to document important findings and put issues and ideas into accountable action. Download our free post-mortem report template, then follow these simple steps for writing a post-mortem report for your projects.
Provide a brief recap of the basics so it’s easy to tie your report to the right project and people. These details should include the project name, post-mortem meeting date, and attendees. You may also want to add the project timeframe, budget, and team members.
Your post-mortem report should be framed around opportunities for improvement. Create a new line item for any issue identified in your post-mortem meeting.
Log all the solutions proposed for the issues outlined in your report. Some ideas may not be the direction you want to head in, but keep them for reference, just in case.
Now you need to turn those ideas into action. Give every solution your team decides to pursue an actionable next step, and be sure to note what done looks like.
Clearly state who’s responsible for each action item. Otherwise, those well-intentioned next steps may not make it past the page.
Use the notes section to add any relevant project context or background information. For example, maybe your team tried Scrum for the first time or used a new communication tool to collaborate on the project.
It’s a group effort to roll out changes as you take on new projects. So find a way to share your project post-mortem report with others—especially if you work in a larger organization. The more you can socialize the changes, the better your whole organization will evolve its process and practices.
TeamGantt makes it easy to smooth out process kinks and get your team in sync. Use an interactive board to capture feedback during your post-mortem meeting, and instantly turn action items into a collaborative plan that’s easy to schedule, track, and share.
You’ll have everything you need to ensure projects finish on time and budget—from drag and drop simplicity and team collaboration to customizable views and resource management. Best of all, it’s wrapped in a simple and intuitive interface your whole team will love. 😍
About the author: Lynn Winter
