Website projects are exciting. Website projects are exhausting.
The last thing anyone wants to do after a successful site launch is look back, but that’s where the important stuff happened. Our team is always looking to learn from previous projects, not just to celebrate the good, but to remember what went wrong. It’s a critical step towards improving our process and bettering the experience for our clients. It’s why we put importance on our post-mortem meetings – or in Peaktwo parlance, “The Repel”.
Unfortunately, many teams have a resistance to reliving the project, as they can easily become a finger-pointing session leaving individuals deflated instead of inspired, and there is nothing to be learned from that. Here are a few suggestions to frame your meeting and keep it moving in the right direction for both you and your team.
1. Designate one person as the moderator of the meeting to keep it constructive and on point.
2. Have a short, timed agenda – this isn’t a board meeting. Providing a list of questions to the team prior to the meeting allows them to come prepared and not burn time fishing for answers.
3. Use both project wins and loses as discussion topics.
4. Keep your comments positive and constructive.
Remember, a post-mortem meeting is a learning tool and should be used that way. Roadblocks are common with every project no matter how hard we try to avoid them. Facing them, and having a healthy conversation is the only way to grow as a team. So embrace the post-mortem and better yourself for your team and for your clients.