After Action Reviews
An after-action review (AAR) is a discussion of a project or an activity that enables
participants to learn for themselves what
happened, why did it happen, what went well, what needs improvement and what
lessons can be learned. The spirit is one of
openness and learning. Lessons learned are not only tacitly shared on the spot by the
individuals involved, but can be explicitly
documented and shared with a wider audience
Implementation
1. Call the meeting as soon as possible and invite the right people
2. Create the right climate: the ideal climate is one of trust, openness and
commitment to learning.
3. Appoint a facilitator for formal AARs (not necessary for informal ones)
4. Revisit the objectives and deliverables of the policy influence project
5. Ask ‘what went well?’ Find out why,and share learning advice for the future. It is
always a good idea to start with the positive points. Here you are looking to build
on best practice as well as learning from mistakes. For each point that is made
about what went well, keep asking a ‘why?’ question. This will allow you to get to
the root of the reason. Then press participants for specific, repeatable advice
that others could apply in similar situations. Also ask ‘what could have gone
better?’ The focus is not on failure, but on improvement.
6. Ensure that everyone feels fully heard before leaving the meeting
Identify and share best practices
Sharing practices is often one of the first things done in a KM initiative.
A ‘best practice’ is basically the most effective process or methodology to reach
a certain goal. Some prefer the term “good practice” and question the fact that
there may be only one ‘best’ practice. Approaches evolve and are constantly
updated.
In other words, a ‘best practice’ is one that has been proven to work and to
produce positive results, and can therefore be taken as a model.
Much of the knowledge about best practices in policy influence is tacit. Even
though this knowledge is found inside people’s heads, it is not always easy to
document. Most tools to identify and share best practices entail two fundamental
elements: explicit knowledge, such as a best practices database (connecting
people with information); and methods for sharing tacit knowledge, such as
Communities of Practice (connecting people with people).
These tools complement each other. A database could provide enough
information for a potential user to find a best practice and decide to implement it
or not. However, the best way to share best practices is “at work” with other
people and communities.
1. Identify users’ requirements.
2. Discover good practices
3. Document good practices.
4. Validate good practices.
5. Disseminate and apply.
6. Develop a supporting infrastructure
Communities of Practice (CoP)
Network of people who share a common interest in a specific area of knowledge (e.g.
M&E practitioners) and are willing to work and learn together over a period of time to
develop and share their knowledge.
Implementation
Check if there is an existing CoP in policy influence issues that you can join before
creating a new
one. If you don’t find anyone in that issue, go ahead and create it!
1. Defining the scope. For example: Policy influence. At the heart of every
community is a domain of knowledge that domain can be either based around a
particular issue of policy influence or on some specific problems or opportunities
2. Finding participants: Who can make a major contribution to this community?
Who are the subject experts, and possible coordinators, facilitators, and
knowledge managers? Will membership be open or by invitation only?
3. Clarifying the purpose and terms of reference: What are the specific needs
or problems that need to be addressed? What is the community setting out to
achieve? How will the community benefit the organization? What are its values
and ways of working? How will it be structured, organized and resourced?
4. Developing and sustaining:
5. Developing the body of knowledge: Creating knowledge maps; organizing
knowledge resources; identifying and seeking to fill knowledge gaps. The role of
knowledge managers will be particularly important here
