How to Solve the Lessons Learned Problem in Design
Improvement Strategies and Career Tactics for Design and Construction
Why do teams in design and construction keep repeating the same mistakes? The problem isn't a lack of Lessons Learned—it's that they're shared at the wrong time, given equal weight, and lost in translation between disciplines.
Highlights
Timing: Lessons Learned need to be shared at the right time.
Focus: Not all Lessons Learned are of equal importance.
Language: Design and construction teams need to organize their work in the same way.
The Lessons Learned Problem
True knowledge management – for both tacit and explicit information – has yet to be solved within the industry. In his book Managing Quality in Architecture: Integrating BIM, Risk & Design Process, Charles Nelson noted:
“[w]e have no objective methods for capturing and comparing information about how we did on previous projects, or benefiting from structured learning about the results” (Page 23).
There are two core problems with Lessons Learned in both design and construction: importance and timing.
Importance: All Lessons Learned are treated with equal importance.
Example - On a industrial project, the team attempted to incorporate every lesson from previous jobs. This resulted in bloated checklists, information overload, and a team struggling to differentiate critical risks from minor details.
Timing: Lessons Learned are shared at the wrong moment in time.
Example - On a multifamily project, the design team spent time reviewing mechanical startup issues from past projects—months before construction even began. By the time those lessons were relevant, they were buried under newer priorities, and key insights were forgotten.
In the above examples, teams review information on all Lessons Learned from previous projects, attempting to incorporate them into the new project. While this is well-intended, it is a massive administrative effort.
Design checklists and other templates become long and cumbersome.
The amount of information becomes unmanageable.
The team has no means to capture and compare information, and also lacks a strategy that outlines what Lesson Learned items deserve more focus and attention than others. As Atul Gawande discusses in The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right, it is unreasonable and impossible to expect a team to incorporate every Lesson Learned into a project checklist. (See my Book Notes on The Checklist Manifesto here.)
Information is lost during project phase transitions because each discipline uses different language to establish their objectives. For example, design team members often use design intent to articulate important elements of the project, however design intent has little executable value to the construction project manager, superintendent, foreman, or electrician. Meanwhile, construction team members use terms such as Definable Features of Work (DFOW) to organize their work.
Without a structured approach, these inefficiencies compound, making it difficult to apply the right lessons at the right time. The solution lies in refining how we capture, prioritize, and communicate Lessons Learned throughout the project lifecycle.
The Tactical Solution
The solution to these problems is knowing what lessons learned are most applicable to the project and are of the highest risk. Not all risks can be mitigated.
Information needs to be gathered into one place, organized in manageable chunks, and delivered to the right team member at the right time. These “manageable chunks” are Definable Features of Work. (I wrote previously about the DFOW being the foundational building block here.)
Design teams must organize Lessons Learned information the same manner as construction teams. In Value Management in Design and Construction: The Economic Management of Projects, the authors note:
“[…] the quality of decision making cannot rise above the quality of the information upon which the decision is to be made […]” (Page 12).
The issue of knowledge transfer is solved by establishing the use of a common language early in the design process. Discuss how information will be organized and shared. Leverage technology to ensure Lessons Learned are incorporated at the right time. Use of a Pareto chart organized by DFOW will create focus around what risks are most impactful and relevant to the project. The Pareto chart can be a graph of anything that is impacting previous projects and the organization. (I wrote previously on how to showcase this information here.)
Effective Lessons Learned management requires more than just documentation—it demands strategic timing, prioritization, and a shared language across disciplines. By aligning design and construction teams under a common framework like Definable Features of Work, organizations can streamline knowledge transfer, reduce administrative burden, and focus on the most critical risks. Leveraging tools like Pareto charts and structured information-sharing practices ensures that teams receive the right insights at the right time, leading to better decision-making and improved project outcomes.
By refining how we capture and apply Lessons Learned, we can improve efficiency, reduce risk, and drive better project outcomes.