One of the techniques I picked up from the agile software development world that I apply to many things outside of software development is the concept of start, stop, and continue. Generally, the idea is to evaluate what happened and ask these three questions:
- What should we start doing?
What’s something new we should add? - What should we stop doing?
What’s something we’re doing that we don’t need to do anymore? - What should we continue doing?
What are we already doing that’s going well?
The next time you have a meeting, event, or program, ask the start, stop, and continue questions at the end. This is a great process to aid with continual improvement.
What else? What are some thoughts on using the start, stop, and continue model for improvement?
Great. I’ve added this to the Audit resources for the IDEMA page.
I’m facinated at how those 3 simple questions apply in all aspects of life whether it be your business, health, community, finances, relationships, etc. Agile principles encourage practical reasoning just in time while helping us avoid repeating the same activities and expecting different results. I ask myself those 3 questions multiple times a day across a variety of interests and pursuits!