The Case for Regular, Structured Reflection

Research & Sources / Mentorship & Sounding Boards

After every match, professional football teams sit down and watch the replay. They pause, rewind, point at the screen: here we lost the ball, here the gap opened, here it worked. Then they train on exactly those moments. Most leaders never watch their replay. The week ends, and the next one starts.

Experience alone is not enough

We often assume that experience automatically makes us better. Do something for ten years and you will be an expert. But experience only turns into learning when we stop and think about it. Without reflection, ten years of experience can be one year repeated ten times.

What research shows

Giada Di Stefano, Francesca Gino, Gary Pisano and Bradley Staats studied learning at work. In a field study at a business process outsourcing company, employees who spent the last 15 minutes of their training days writing about what they had learned performed clearly better in the final test than colleagues who simply worked those 15 minutes. Their research suggests that once you have some experience with a task, deliberately reflecting on it can be worth more than simply doing more of it.¹

Anders Ericsson’s research on expertise points the same way: people get better through deliberate practice, which means looking closely at what went wrong and correcting it, not just repeating the task.²

Why leaders skip it

Reflection feels unproductive. There is always another email, another call, another fire. Sitting and thinking looks like doing nothing. And reflection can be uncomfortable: looking at your week honestly means looking at your mistakes.

But a leader who never reflects keeps making the same mistakes at a higher and higher level.

A simple weekly routine

Take 20 minutes on Friday afternoon. Write, don’t just think. Four questions are enough:

• What went well this week, and why?
• What did not go well, and what was my part in it?
• What did I learn?
• What will I do differently next week?

Tasha Eurich’s research on self-awareness suggests that “what” questions help more than “why” questions when looking at ourselves, because “why” often leads to excuses and circles.³

Reflection with someone else

Reflecting alone is good. Reflecting with someone who asks questions is often better, because they notice what you skip over. That is one reason why coaching tends to improve goal-directed self-regulation, the ability to steer your own progress.⁴

What this means for you this week

• Book 20 minutes on Friday afternoon for reflection.
• Answer the four questions in writing.
• Pick one change for next week and put it in your calendar.
• Repeat for four weeks before judging whether it helps.

Every week is a match. Watch the replay.

Sources

1. Di Stefano, G., Gino, F., Pisano, G. P. & Staats, B. R. Making Experience Count: The Role of Reflection in Individual Learning. HEC Paris / Harvard Business School working paper. ebslgwp.hhs.seEmployees who spent 15 minutes at the end of the day reflecting on what they learned performed better than those who kept working. The full paper is also on SSRN (abstract 2414478).
2. Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. T. & Tesch-Römer, C. (1993). The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. Psychological Review, 100(3), 363-406. doi.orgExpert performance grows through deliberate practice: focused work on specific weaknesses with feedback.
3. Eurich, T. (2018). What Self-Awareness Really Is (and How to Cultivate It). Harvard Business Review. hbr.orgAbout 95 percent of people think they are self-aware, an estimated 10 to 15 percent are; “what” questions help more than “why” questions.
4. Theeboom, T., Beersma, B. & van Vianen, A. E. M. (2014). Does coaching work? A meta-analysis. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 9(1), 1-18. doi.orgCoaching improves performance, well-being, coping, work attitudes and goal-directed self-regulation.