The US Army designed the AAR (After Action Review) to help them to improve the effectiveness of its military operations. The Constellation has used the AAR methodology for many years.
If you want to read details of the 'standard' use of the AAR in the Constellation then visit this site where you will find a description the AAR as well as other learning tools that we use in the Constellation.
This note uses as an example of a SALT visit that took place during the Global Learning Festival that took place in Chennai. YOu can find more details of the Global Learning Festival and the SALT visits at the GLF site.
You can find the full documentation of the particular SALT visit discussed in this note on this page.
This note suggests some changes to the way that we use the AAR so that it fits more closely with the Constellation way of working. These adaptations are not new and some of them are already in wide use in the Constellation. I welcome other suggestions.
The changes and the thinking behind them
- The first question that we ask in an AAR is about strengths.
- When we come together for any event, but particularly for a SALT visit, the appreciation of strengths is a central part of our approach. The start of any reflection on the event should be a review of the strengths that we have seen. The first question that we should always ask in an AAR is, ‘What strengths have we seen?’ After a SALT visit, this seems perfectly natural, particularly when the community takes part in the visit. But, there is good reason to start with this question after any activity. This suggestion does no more than formalise what has become the normal practice in the Constellation.
- The second question that we ask in an AAR is about our recent experience.
- The reason that we carry out an AAR is to improve the next SALT visit. A SALT visit is an experience and we want to learn from that experience. We need a question that helps us to reflect on our recent experience. The opportunities to learn from the experience of our SALT visit arise in many ways that are not covered through the exploration of the questions ‘What was supposed to happen?’, ‘What actually happened?’ and ‘Why was there a difference?’ We need a more general question that allows us to think more widely. If we need to emphasise this context of the event, then we can ask a question like, ‘What did you notice about the way SALT visit worked that can help us to learn for our next SALT visit?’ If we understand the context, then the question can be simplified to, ‘What did you notice?’
- The third question is about actions We want to learn from the experience of the SALT visit.
- But ‘What happened at the SALT visit?’ is a different question from ‘What did we learn from the SALT visit?’ The example below will show that the link between the experience and the learning is often not obvious and requires thought and discussion. The third question is, ‘What do we do differently next time?
- Shorter lists and more doing
- The output of an AAR is often a long list of actions on a flip chart that is the final task at the end of a long day. Some of us often think that we have done our duty and there the matter can rest. Perhaps the challenge is to define ONE thing that we wish to do differently next time, to commit to do and then to act. If we have that outcome in mind throughout the AAR, then we will produce much shorter lists and more action.
- A different name for the AAR?
- This might be too much of a revolution but, here goes….
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- In the Constellation, we reflect on our experience in order to learn from our experience.
- We could keep the acronym AAR, but think of it as an After Action Reflection
- We are not the US army. We do not blow up bridges or fire shells.
- The Constellation has experience and it learns from its experience.
- How about AER for After Experience Reflection?
- I realise that the phrase AAR has become part of way of working and our way of thinking and the change to AER may be too difficult to contemplate. But just to let you know, that I think of the AAR as an After Experience Reflection.
A suggested process
In the updated version of the AAR, we are proposing the following steps
- First question: What strengths did we see in the community?
- Individual contributions followed by consensus view. We have found it useful to produce an agreed list of strengths and a single sentence that tries to capture the essence of the community that we have visited.
- Second question: What did you notice about the way that we conducted the SALT visit?
- These are observations about the SALT visit. They are observations that sit in the context of the next SALT visit. We make no distinction between good news and bad news as both offer the opportunity for improvement. Often the observations relate to issues that arose during the SALT visit and we want to prepare for that issue more effectively on the next visit. But they can also deal with innovations that happened during the visit that we would like to use in the future.
- These are individual observations. We collect them with a minimum of discussion with questions/debate limited to issues of clarification.
- From the set of observations, the group selects a small number of observations that will form the basis of the actions for improvement. The challenge is to select a set that will lead to action. It is our experience that AARs can produce a list of recommendations that lead to no specific action.
- The group discusses the action(s) for improvement related to each observation. We often find that it is not easy to arrive at a consensus for the action for improvement. It is worth keeping a record of the discussion for reference after related AARs..
- (The action that is taken will usually be related to the future activity of the SALT team. If the team moves forward as a unit to related visits, then it is straightforward to implement the agreed improvement. If the members of the SALT team go their separate ways after the visit, the responsibilities will probably relate to individuals within the team.
An example
This example comes from a SALT visit to Manamalai Panchayat in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu, India on Wednesday 21 November 2012. It took place during the Global Learning Festival that SIAAP organised in Chennai in November 2012.
The full AAR is contained in the file: ‘130226 The AAR of a SALT visit to Manamalai Panchayat in Tiruvannamalai.docx’
These were the strengths that we found in Manamalai Panchayat:
We found a dynamic community led by women who effectively used political changes to reduce poverty levels and to improve their social status in the community.
- We found a dynamic community making rapid progress.
- The community had created a large number of groups (26) that was dealing with a wide variety of issues.
- The community has gained political status and this has given them significant economic gains (that you can see).
- The women are strong. Women have taken advantage of increased prosperity to gain financial levers in the community. This had led to an increase in the social status of the women and a reduction in gender-based violence.
Here are our observations and the actions that we proposed:
During the SALT visit, the community was puzzled about why we were there.
- If visit organisers make it clearer why we are coming, then the problem will be reduced.
- If we prepare an explanation before we go, translate it carefully before we go and use it as part of the welcome and introduction, then the problem will be reduced.
At the start of the visit, we arranged ourselves on mats as 2 groups in a circle. This created a sense of US and THEM and it gave the visit the feeling of an interview.
- If we arrange ourselves randomly in a circle, this will help to create the feeling of a conversation.
Throughout the SALT visit, there was a 'communication gap' with the challenge of translation.
- If we think carefully about translation resources before the visit, we can reduce the 'communication gap'.
During the first half of the SALT visit, a large group of men and women made the visit noisy and chaotic. In the second half, we were with a smaller group of women and there was more engagement and order.
- If we can have a SALT visit with a smaller group, the problem will reduce.
It is not easy to go from the experience to the learning in ‘Learning from Experience’
I want to illustrate the issue with one of the experiences above. “At the start of the visit, we arranged ourselves on mats as 2 groups in a circle. This created a sense of US and THEM and it gave the visit the feeling of an interview.” There was consensus about this observation.
But what is the action that we should take as a result of this observation? Some of us suggested that the answer was to mix visitors randomly with the community. We had used this approach in other parts of the world and it had been very successful. But some members of the group were not happy with this proposed action. In this context, the community would not be happy with this arrangement, particularly when men and women were present. Some of us suggested that perhaps this problem could be solved by getting people to sit on chairs in a way that mixed visitors and community. We did not resolve the issue.
There was another suggestion that the action to take to resolve the sense of US and THEM was to break the SALT visit into smaller groups. But someone pointed out that when we had suggested this one woman in the community had said that they were a community and they did not wish to be divided.
We did not reach a conclusion to this discussion. It was the end of a very long and hard day and everybody was extremely tired. We were a group that had come together for a SALT visit during a Knowledge Fair so we would not work together again as a SALT team. But the point is clear: the action that we need to take following an experience often presents us with dilemmas. It is often not straightforward. It is part of a learning process.