# The benefits check and a blameless retrospective > Check the result weeks after launch against the success criteria, run a retrospective on facts and decisions, turn lessons into owned actions and close with a one-page report. - Course: [Project Management Without the Bureaucracy: Run One Project from Brief to Closure](https://productovi.com/courses/project-management-without-bureaucracy.md) - Module: Closing and learning - Lesson 31/32, ~23 min - Source: https://productovi.com/courses/project-management-without-bureaucracy/benefits-check-and-retrospective ## Not on launch day **Alex Tutor:** Still at Klasna, mid-February: physics has been running for two weeks, and Leo already wants to call the launch a success. **Leo:** We opened on 1 February, within budget, with nine tutors. Can we announce the project as done and successful? **Alex Tutor:** Delivery, yes: that half of the success criteria can be checked today. The result half can't: 120 bookings by 28 February and three in four learners still attending in week four. **Alex Tutor:** That's why the **benefits check** comes weeks after launch, against the criteria in the brief. Launch day shows the team delivered; it can't show whether families came and stayed. **Sofia:** We set the check for 1 March. But a learner who buys on 20 February won't reach week four until mid-March. **Alex Tutor:** Right. So check bookings on 1 March, and week-four attendance twice: early for the first buyers, then on 28 March for everyone. And say which number is early. > **Exercise:** The physics brief has two halves of success criteria. Delivery: open on 1 February, within the 600,000 UAH ceiling, with the agreed scope (physics opened on time, within budget, with nine tutors). Result: 120 learners buying a package by 28 February, and three in four still attending in week four. It's 15 February. Which part can you honestly check today? **Alex Tutor:** A quick check on that early number. > **Exercise:** **True or false:** week-four attendance measured on 1 March already shows how all February buyers stay with their lessons. ## What the check decides **Hanna:** And if bookings come in under target? We've already spent most of the 600,000. **Alex Tutor:** What's spent is spent: it argues neither for nor against anything. The check compares the result with the criteria and decides what to fix, keep or stop, looking only at the road ahead. **Vira:** And it feeds the next launch. Our 120 was a guess. Next time we'll start from a real number. **Alex Tutor:** Yes: the check turns this project's assumptions into reference data for the next one. > **Exercise:** **True or false:** because most of the 600,000 UAH is already spent, a weak result is a reason to keep spending until the project pays off. **Alex Tutor:** So what exactly does the next launch get from this check? > **Exercise:** Vira says the target of 120 learners was a guess. What does the benefits check give the next subject launch? ## A retrospective without blame **Sofia:** And the retrospective? Danylo is already tense about the test problem we found three days before opening. **Danylo:** Let's be honest: it was my test. Just say I should have caught it. **Alex Tutor:** That's what a **blameless retrospective** avoids. It looks at facts and decisions, not people: what we knew, what we chose, and what the plan made likely. **Alex Tutor:** Fact: the phone check with a dropped connection ran on 28 January. Decision: in November we put acceptance in the last week. So the question is why the plan placed that check so late. **Vira:** Because in November nobody wrote outages down as a test condition. Not Danylo, not me, not the plan. **Alex Tutor:** There's the lesson, and it's about the plan. Blame teaches people to hide problems; this teaches the next project to test earlier. > **Exercise:** On 28 January, three days before opening, a phone check with a dropped connection showed that the diagnostic test Danylo's team built loses progress. In November the plan had put all acceptance checks in the last week. Which question fits a **blameless retrospective** about this problem? ## Every action has an owner and a date **Sofia:** So the action is "test earlier"? **Alex Tutor:** Too vague: nobody will do it. Write what changes, who owns it, by when. "The launch checklist adds a phone check with a dropped connection at the first demo. Owner: Danylo. By 15 March." **Danylo:** That I can do. It's a change to the checklist, not a promise to try harder. **Alex Tutor:** Exactly. Lessons left on a slide get forgotten. Lessons put into a template or a checklist are used by the next project without anyone remembering them. **Vira:** Then three actions at most. Twelve actions means none. > **Exercise:** Put the steps of a project retrospective in order. **Alex Tutor:** Spot the action that will actually happen. > **Exercise:** Which retrospective action is written well enough to happen? ## The closing report on one page **Leo:** And what do I get at the end? A thirty-page document? **Alex Tutor:** One page. The closing report: delivery against the criteria, the result against the criteria with the dates checked, what was handed over to whom, money spent against the ceiling, three actions, and your recommendation. **Hanna:** And the money in numbers, please, not "roughly within budget". **Sofia:** So the project closes when Leo signs that page. > **Exercise:** What belongs in the one-page closing report? Choose all that apply. ## Your turn: notes into actions **Alex Tutor:** Here are three notes from a first retrospective draft: "Communication should be better." "Danylo should test more carefully." "We need more time next time." **Danylo:** The second one is about me, not about anything we can change. **Vira:** And the other two could go into any retrospective of any project. **Sofia:** So: facts, not names; what changes, who, by when; and where it gets written down. > **Exercise:** Rewrite the three draft notes ("Communication should be better", "Danylo should test more carefully", "We need more time next time") as **at most three blameless retrospective actions**. Each: what changes (in a template, checklist or plan), the owner and the date. > **Key points** > > - On launch day you can check **delivery**; the **result** needs a **benefits check** weeks later, against the criteria in the brief. > - Check each number when it can exist: bookings on 1 March, week-four attendance early for the first buyers and again on 28 March for everyone; label early numbers. > - Money already spent doesn't decide what happens next; the check decides what to fix, keep or stop. > - A **blameless retrospective** looks at facts and decisions, not people: what we knew, what we chose, what the plan made likely. > - At most three actions, each with what changes, an owner and a date; lessons go into templates and checklists. > - The closing report fits on one page, and the project closes when the sponsor signs it. **Alex Tutor:** Next is the last case: it's 1 March, the February numbers are in, and you write the closing report. - Previous lesson: [Acceptance and handover to operations](https://productovi.com/courses/project-management-without-bureaucracy/acceptance-and-handover.md) - Next lesson: [Case: the first month against the success criteria](https://productovi.com/courses/project-management-without-bureaucracy/first-month-case.md) --- Productovi Learning. 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