Very few projects go as planned.  Many projects encounter problems that must be corrected and a few lucky projects go smoother than planned.  Regardless of how successful or disastrous a project is, it is important to review the project in detail once the project is over.  This allows your team to figure out what things were done well and to document the things that need improvement.  It also aids in building a knowledge base that teams coming behind you can review to ensure they get the most out of their upcoming projects.

The key to a successful projects is to learn from past mistakes.  Below is a list of 5 Tips for conducting successful Post Mortem reviews:

1. Plan Your Post Mortem Review - Upon completion of a project, the Project Manager should conduct a "Post Mortem" review.  This is where the Project Manager invites all the major players of the team (Analysts, Lead Programmers, Quality Assurance Leaders, Production Support Leaders, etc) to a meeting to review the successes and failures of the project.

2. Require Team Participation - Ask the attendees to bring a list of 2 items that were done well during the project and 2 things that could be improved upon.  

3. Hold the Post Mortem Review Meeting - Go around the table and have each person to discuss the 4 items they brought to the meeting.  Keep track of how many duplicate items you get from each team member.  At the end of the round table discussion of items, you should have a count of the most popular items that were done well and the most agreed upon items that need improvement.  Discuss the top 10 success items and the top 10 items that need improvement. 

4. List Items Done Well and Things Needing Improvement - Upon listing of the 10 success and improvement items, discuss specific things that can be done to avoid the items that need improvement upon the next release.  If some items need more investigation, assign specific individuals to finding solutions.

5. Create a Post Mortem Report - The best way to keep this information organized is to create a "Post Mortem" report, where you document your findings.  Send the Post Mortem report to all team members. Before team members embark on their next project, make sure they review the Post Mortem report from the prior project to gain insight from the prior project.  We have created a template that you can use for the document, download it by clicking here.