After Action Review

An After-action review (AAR) is a discussion of an event that enables the individuals involved to learn for themselves what happened, why it happened, what went well, what needs improvement and the lessons learnt. The spirit of an AAR is one of openness and learning - it is not about problem fixing or allocating blame. After-action reviews were originally developed and are extensively used by the US Army.

The Army's After Action Review (AAR) is arguably one of the most successful organizational learning methods yet devised. Yet, most every corporate effort to graft this truly innovative practices into their culture has failed because, again and again, people reduce the living practice of AAR's to a sterile technique.

Peter Senge