Item
Summary/purpose
A scripted meditation to call attention to our collective purpose. Good for starting meetings.
An agenda for rapidly forming a team to tackle an action.
A pair of simple agendas to build learning and reflection into the regular life of a team.
A self-coaching tool to reflect on the health of your team and how to improve it.
Borrowed from the "6 Team Conditions" framework.
This agenda is useful when assembling a group of people who do not already constitute a formal team to accomplish a task together. It can take as little as 10 minutes, or as long as 90 minutes, depending on how much time you have and the scope of the task you're trying to accomplish.
A few rules for the meeting before you jump in:
Privacy: Hold the briefing in a place where others cannot overhear it.
Presence: Begin only when all participants are present.
Faces: Members are identifiable to each other, and making eye contact.
Fast: Each step (below) takes no more than 20% of the total time allotted for the meeting.
Facilitator: One person is responsible for facilitating and keeping time.
If one person is mainly responsible for convening the group, it may be appropriate for them to drive the conversation and prescribe some answers, especially if time is very short. Otherwise, each person should speak in rounds.
What is our primary objective?
Does anyone have questions or elaborations?
Each person gives his or her name (no need for pedigrees), and briefly describes any special training or experience that could help the team achieve its purposes.
What is each person’s role on the team?
What must we be sure to always do as we work together?
What should we be careful never to do?
Are there any special complexities or constraints we need to attend to?
How will we deal with them?
What remaining questions or concerns should we address before we begin?
Important: Each team member is asked in turn for any questions/concerns.
A scripted meditation to call attention to our collective purpose. Good for starting meetings. Adapted from Animal Think Tank
Shall we start with a minute of contemplation to remember why we’re here. I invite you to still your body, [pause] find a balanced posture [pause], and close your eyes if you feel comfortable doing so [pause] and we’ll take time in silence:
[slow pace, pausing frequently]
To remember all those animals who are born into captivity, where they suffer and are killed. To remember how they love, and how their families are torn apart. To remember how they resist everyday and fight back, everyday. To remember those who free themselves; and those who are freed by others. To remember all those whether big or small, on the land or in the sea; as well as all those who are invisible to us in our everyday, in our soils and in our homes. And to remember all those whose homes and habitats we invade and destroy. [long pause]
But also to remember all those who live free from human interference and oppression, and the possibility that this offers to all others.
BARs and AARs are meant to be conducted frequently, after small actions such as a single community event or even a canvassing shift. The point is to continually improve our processes in the midst of a campaign, rather than waiting until the end.
The primary goal of the BAR is to make sure that everyone is on the same page with regard to the goal of the collaboration, thinking actively about how to achieve that goal, and taking past lessons into account. It's also the time to ensure everyone knows there will be an AAR to reflect on results.
Try to go beyond the plan that exists on paper and ask “what else will it take?” and “what else can we try?”
A few rules before jumping in:
Participants: The BAR should involve everyone responsible for some part of the outcome, and only those people. 3-7 participants is typically ideal, though it can work with as many as 12. If larger than that, break into groups based on role.
Preparation: Any relevant planning documents, goals, or metrics that exist should be available to all participants. Otherwise, just be sure your ready to take notes. A flipchart or digital whiteboard will help.
Speak in rounds: It's crucial to ensure every voice is included in the BAR, because each participant may have information that is crucial to success. Every participant should speak on each question.
Discuss, take notes on, and generate next-actions for each of the following.
If the goal is already specified, simply review it. This doesn't need to take long.
The more concrete, the better.
Get real. Uncomfortable truths are encouraged.
If you've done this before, identify at least one concrete thing you can do to improve.
Frame this as scientific hypotheses: if we change X, Y will improve.
BARs and AARs are meant to be conducted frequently, after small actions such as a single community event or even a canvassing shift. The point is to continually improve our processes in the midst of a campaign, rather than waiting until the end.
The primary goal of the AAR is to work together to consciously test out and refine a group’s thinking and actions in a timely way within the work itself, while there is still an opportunity to correct course and improve the outcomes of a project or initiative.
A few rules before jumping in:
Participants: The AAR should involve everyone from the BAR. You are encouraged to invite the Historian as well. Other organizational leaders who did not participate in the activity may re- quest to participate in the AAR; if and how they participate should depend on the culture and level of trust in the group.
Preparation: Notes from the BAR, measurable results from the action, and a means to take new notes. Relevant roles should be prepared to provide specific answers based on the success metrics outlined in the BAR.
Speak in rounds: It's crucial to ensure every voice is included in the AAR because each participant made unique observations that may be crucial to learning.
Discuss, take notes on, and generate next-actions for each of the following.
If you conducted a BAR, this needn't take long. Questioning the intended result as stated in the BAR belongs in question 3.
Brief. Discussion of why should be saved for the next question. For now, just lay out the results on each measure of success.
The bulk of your time should be spent here. Explore whatever answers come up, and keep asking "Why?" to get to the root.
Seek to identify 1-3 (or more) concrete, powerful insights about how the group can change its approach in the future.
. Before-Action Reviews (BARs) should always be followed up with an .
. After-Action Reviews (AARs) should ideally always be preceded by a , but if you forgot, it's still worth doing the AAR.
A flexible meeting agenda for almost any occasion.
For a Google doc version of this agenda you can easily copy into a new doc, click here.
The Before-Action and After-Action Review agendas are designed for a single task, like hosting an event. This agenda is better suited for a fixed team that repeatedly collaborates on similar tasks, though such a team could still use BARs and AARs for a specific project.
Clarify the roles of each person present, including facilitator.
Silent meditation proportional to meeting length.
Check-in round.
Contemplation of why we are here (optional).
State purpose of meeting: [purpose]
Update on action items, projects, and metrics as needed.
Build agenda
[list agenda items, or use the table below]
Check-out round.
Agenda Item
Name & role bringing it
Time (best guess in minutes)
Type
1. Request of someone else to do something
2. Ask for information or help making a decision
3. Share information or give input into someone else’s decision
4. Governance
Priority
1. Mission critical: something really bad will happen if this isn’t processed today
2. There’s a good reason why this is urgent
3. Can go after mission critical & urgent stuff
4. Not time-sensitive
Example: Marketing strategy
Arjun
10
2
3