BlogAs a retrospective facilitator I frequently see different parts of a team presenting different perceptions of the same event. In fact, this underlies a great many of the problems seen in teams.
This problem occurs no less frequently when there are conversations, often by phone, intended to clarify or analyse an issue but the participants leave with varying views of what has been decided or agreed. It is more frequent between team members with different roles (developers, business analysts, users, project managers, testers, etc).
The main reason this happens is that there is a lack of large scale feedback in the conversation.
The solution is usually to summarise the conversation at the end. The key is that the person who summarises it should be the person who initiated the conversation, i.e. the person who has been trying to find out the information. This now puts the questioner in the position of knowledgeable authority and gives the other party a chance to correct any misunderstandings or supply further information that they feel has been missed.
When I am the initiator of a discussion and I believe I have acquired all the information I need, I prefer to start the summary formally by making a statement such as ‘OK. Now let me summarise of all this and you can correct anything that I’ve got wrong’. This indicates to the other participants that you believe that the interrogative part of the conversation is finished, that the roles are changing, and that I am inviting corrections and won’t be offended if they are given. It also gives the other person a chance to indicate that they do not think they’ve finished giving you all the information you need.
The key part of this, as with any good summary, is that the information is presented much more concisely than it has in the preceding conversation and without any extraneous side paths. Remember to include decisions about what must be done, what is not going to be done and what still needs some decisions and who is going to do these things. If necessary, follow up with written notes about what has been discussed.
By following this simple protocol, I have seen extraordinary improvements in the effectiveness of several teams and their working relationships.