Identify and consolidate what you have learned.

Dis­cuss with­in your team, and with key stake­hold­ers as appro­pri­ate, the key lessons that you have learned in the process of iden­ti­fy­ing chal­lenges and goals. Think about what kinds of evi­dence and knowl­edge will ben­e­fit the advance­ment of under­stand­ing and the work of oth­ers. Did your sit­u­a­tion analy­sis reveal any sur­pris­es that might apply in oth­er, sim­i­lar sit­u­a­tions? Did you cre­ate prod­ucts dur­ing the course of your work, whether they were tools that you used to cre­ate analy­ses or the results of your analy­sis that might be use­ful to oth­ers? Did you con­duct syn­the­ses or col­lect new infor­ma­tion that advance aca­d­e­m­ic science?

When you have under­tak­en a sig­nif­i­cant new ini­tia­tive, espe­cial­ly if it’s in rel­a­tive­ly unchart­ed ter­ri­to­ry, a “Lessons Learned” doc­u­ment can help oth­ers nav­i­gate sim­i­lar ter­rain in the future. This can be a con­sid­er­able under­tak­ing, so it’s impor­tant to ded­i­cate appro­pri­ate staff resources to the project — and to ensure that the project is worth the effort.