Close Out the Year: Run a Quick Insight & Action Sprint

As you close the year, carve out time for yourself and your team to run a Quick Insight & Action Sprint. The focus—what did you learn from 2021 and what learning and actions do you want to take into 2022. (Note that this model of a Quick Insight & Action Sprint can be used for other topics, but we’ve framed the questions below for this specific end-of-year purpose.)

Here’s how to Run a Quick Insight & Action Sprint to help you close out the year (and get your FREE planning document here):

1. Frame the Session. Determine the core objective for the Sprint and outline your desired outcomes. For this end of year session, what do you want to make sure you take away from reflecting on 2021, and what areas do you want to plan around for 2022? These are our suggestions upon which you can build.

   Core Objectives for the Sprint:

   • Reflect on 2021 and recognize accomplishments, learning, and drivers that will continue to impact 2022. 

   • Envision 2022, your goals, scenarios you need to plan for, what you want to optimize, and what you want to learn.

   • Create a 2022 action plan coming out of the session’s discussion, importantly also noting what you will stop doing. 

   • Close out the session and the year in a meaningful way.

   You might also consider framing a Problem Statement like: “We need a way to [NEED] because [INSIGHT].” Or, you may have a main issue question you want to address at the right time in the agenda. Or, is there a particular business, market, brand, or marketing opportunity you want to explore?

2. Prepare for the Session. For any workshop or sprint, one needs to prepare, but the intent here isn’t to create a lot of work for yourself or the team. Instead, leverage the time in the session for the real-time learning based on people’s incoming knowledge and experience. The few things to outline, in addition to framing your Why above, are: 

   • Who: Determine who needs to be in the (virtual) room as attendees and determine any roles you need filled (e.g., note taker, time keeper).

   • What: Assign Sprint pre-work requirements — review materials, pre-think questions (e.g., hypotheses and assumptions about an opportunity, learning from the year), or a fun consumer or stakeholder empathy assignment. Again, remember to keep this light. If you must, to frame the agenda appropriately, have the team pull some data to set the stage. 

   • Where: Figure out the logistics — where (likely on a Teams or Zoom call) and any elements for exercises or the team’s comfort at home (e.g., tell people to have a notebook or pen and paper near them, set-up a Google document or a document on Sharepoint that people can collaborate in real-time, give people a stipend to order breakfast and lunch for the day).

   • When: Block and schedule the time with the team.

3. Set the Agenda. Frankly, as we noted at the start, it could be as simple as exploring: what did you learn from 2021 and what learning and actions do you want to take into 2022.

   But here’s a more granular framework aligned to the session objectives we suggested above with even more detail in our guide document:

   1. Reflect on 2021 and recognize accomplishments, learning, and drivers that will continue to impact 2022

   2. Envision 2022, your goals, scenarios you need to plan for, what you want to optimize, and what you want to learn

   3. Create a 2022 action plan 

   4. Close out the session and the year in a meaningful way

4. Run the Sprint. Again, make sure to have assigned roles for the session. Determine the role you want to play as the leader. Are you the facilitator? Or, do you want to be a participant? Or, do you want to just listen in the room and probe the team with additional questions to let their voices be heard?

5. Summarize the actions and close out the year. Both at the end of the session and as a follow-up via email and/or whatever project management tools you use, capture the action items that were agreed to in the Sprint session. 

   And more importantly, plan on commemorating the year by crafting a “moment,” a la advice from the Heath brothers and their book, “The Power of Moments.” 2021 again has been a unique, and in its own way memorable, year. How can you acknowledge and meaningfully close the year for your team? Consider:

• Can you add some unexpected activity at the end of the session to turn it into a memorable, meaningful moment? 

• What could make it unique and special?

• How can you make this session and its close a special moment of connection and shared experience for you and your team?

We often don’t give ourselves or our teams enough time to reflect. 

Give yourselves a gift by carving out and honoring the time to look back at 2021, collectively gather learning to inform the coming year, and to commemorate whatever the year has been for you and your team. This is a final moment to turn 2021 into a more positive moment for you all, despite its ups and downs. 

Here’s to starting 2022 with clarity of insight, newly found motivation, and an action plan that helps move you forward to make positive progress together.

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The Agency Oneto is a disciplined yet agile business and brand strategy agency whose mission is to partner with leaders to make a positive impact on their business and brands and for their consumers and teams, unlocking potential. 

We do work in Business Strategy, Brand Strategy, Portfolio Strategy, Brand & Product Positioning, Brand Architecture, Marketing Strategy, Content Strategy, Innovation Strategy & Process, Consumer Insights, and Trend Studies. 

We also lead workshops and facilitate strategy and business planning sessions, provide advisory services, and offer Executive Coaching.