Whenever you do the same thing more than once, you should strive to better each time.  This holds true whether it is you personally who is repeating a task or it is your organization that is holding an annual event.  The basic techniques for improving your performance are easy to learn and easy to use.

In the plus / delta technique, we ask participants to say things that were very good ("plusses") and things that need to be improved or changed ("deltas").  The information collected is reviewed soon after by the leadership team.

Plusses are those very good things that should be remembered and repeated for future events.  These are the things that helped to make the event special, better than anticipated.  These are the magic sauce of your event as seen by the participants.  If you don't remember these good things, you might not remember them for the next time you hold the event.

While the plusses are important, the deltas are even more important.  These are the things that could have been better.  When the leadership team reviews the deltas, there are a few questions they should ask about each one:

• How significant is this problem?
• Is this an isolated problem or something caused by the way we performed the task or ran the event? (The answer is almost always "Yes".  Maybe it rained on the day of this year's event.  We could consider changing the date to a drier season, moving the event indoors, or at least having a rainy day plan.
• What should be done better next time we hold the event or do the task?

The critical step in making the plus / delta technique produce a better result in the future is writing down the results of the analysis, and then, being sure the people organizing the next event or doing the task the next time have access to those results and all the other information you've collected about the event or task.  Don't make them start over from the beginning.

By taking time to use the plus / delta technique, study the results, record the highlights and improvements, and communicating them to the next team, you'll improve your personal and organizational performance. 

 Plus / Delta Tips 

• When using the plus / delta technique, use a flip chart or chalkboard to record the comments briefly in two columns.
• You may need to ask the commenter if you correctly summarized the comment.  Verifying makes sure that you've recorded the comment correctly. 
• Never reject a comment or indicate disapproval.  When collecting the comments, you are only to record them.