In a variety of contexts, I have asked members of professional service firms to write down what they have learned from their activities over the past year that has made them better at what they do – to identify something they learned about serving clients, managing projects, or approaching certain matters in a new way. In many cases, this has proven a difficult exercise. The professionals seem to have been too busy rushing from project to project to stop and reflect on their experiences. They say that they feel they have learned something. but they cannot either identify or communicate what it is. This doesn’t mean they haven’t learned it – but it does mean the experience has not been converted into knowledge that can be shared.

One mechanism for sharing knowledge is provided by a prominent consulting firm. Every Monday morning all professional staff, senior and junior, attend a one-hour meeting. At each session one staff member presents a case his team has worked on and describes how they handled it, what new approaches were attempted, how they dealt with client problems, and so on. In brief, the staffer reports on what was learned on a recent matter. Discussion follows, with junior and senior colleagues providing critical feedback and examining whether the activities described offer anything useful to others in the firm. Each person (or team) has to take a turn at making a presentation, Since everyone knows this is coming up, each is forced to reflect continually on his or her experiences, thus, each is more likely to succeed in converting the knowledge available from his experiences into a shared resource.

Excerpted from ‘Managing the Professional Service Firm’ by David Maister, page 160