Do you recognise this? The change project that you have been working on intensively for the last 1 to 2 years simply lacks momentum. It’s not running smoothly.


You have held management workshops, drawn up project plans, involved employees, developed corporate values, improved internal communication processes, analysed and optimised workflows. You had thought that everything was now running smoothly and that the corporate culture had developed a great deal. But then the change process stalls, old patterns of behaviour reappear, employees complain about poor communication, old process errors reappear, meetings are cancelled, staff turnover and sickness rates rise again. What’s going on?
Traditionally – as we know from our consulting projects – the steering group or management then sits down and analyses what needs to be done. Sometimes a few more employees are interviewed or another workshop is organised. But this is usually the wrong approach. In a situation like this, it is much wiser to break through patterns of avoidance, minimisation and justification.

This is where the ‘Retro-Delphi’ tool comes in. And it works like this:

First step: Evaluation by the change team or the steering group

  • Evaluate the current situation in the change group; the following questions can help:
  • What have we already achieved in the change project?
  • What benefits has the change brought?
  • Which new processes and behaviours have already become a matter of course?
  • What opportunities and risks (or what hopes) were associated with the change and which of these have already materialised and in what form
  • What has not materialised, what problems have arisen, what setbacks have we experienced?

This method works particularly well if you exaggerate things, perhaps even exaggerate them. Write down your answers.

Second step: feedback from a representative group

Such analyses are usually presented to other people and discussed with each other. The risk here is that group dynamics (pressure to conform, resistance phenomena, opportunism, whitewashing, etc.) can distort the results of the discussion and lead to false conclusions. With Retro-Delphi, it is important that there is no direct exchange with the first group. Instead, the results are received and evaluated by the feedback group.
The following questions can be used for this purpose:

  • In your view, which of the changed processes and behaviours described by the change group are being implemented and to what extent?
  • Do you agree with the description of the benefits, how would you rate the situation?
  • Do you agree with the problem description, do you see other problems?
  • In your opinion, what is overstated and what is understated?

These answers and comments on the view of the first group are also noted down and now played back to group 1, e.g. to the change group.

Third step: Interpretation and measures by the change group
Now it’s Group 1’s turn again. It reads through the comments of the feedback group, comments on them and develops suggestions and measures to improve the situation.

  • What could be the reasons why our assessment differs from the view of the representative group?
  • What measures of a strategic, structural or cultural nature are suitable for closing the differences between our assessment and that of the representative group?
  • How can we give new impetus to the change process?

Now you may be thinking, let’s get started. Implement. But stop. Feedback is needed first. After all, the measures should really help, be accepted and be effective. This is the case if the analysis was deep enough and the measures are accurate. That’s why a third group can now get to work.

Fourth step: Feedback from another representative group

Now have another group from your organisation evaluate the results of the change group. The group should be as heterogeneous as possible and should include people who have observed and been affected by the change project themselves. The questions for this group are:

  • Have these or similar measures been tried before?
  • How effective were these measures?
  • What opportunities and risks arise from implementing the proposed measures?
  • Or simply: What do you think of these proposals from the change group?

Fifth step: Reflection by the change group

Only now do we come to the finale of ‘Retro-Delphi’, a multiple progressive feedback in several loops. The change group reads the result of round 4 and continues to work with these questions:

  • What does the feedback mean for the continuation of our change project
  • Which routines are already working well?
  • Which routines, procedures and processes should we adjust?
  • What measures do we think would be helpful, taking into account the feedback from the two representative groups?

And now further steps for the further development of the change project are being planned and implemented.

chart showing feedback process in a change group using the tool 'retro-delphi'

chart: flow consulting

Retro-Delphi at a glance

Five tips to bear in mind when using Retro Delphi:

  1. do not defend your own opinion. It’s not about ‘being right’, but about including as many perspectives as possible.
  2. let the groups work uninfluenced, so don’t ‘whisper’ your opinion to them in advance – you need unbiased feedback.
  3. do not allow any unnecessary time to pass between the five steps. It would be good if all five steps were completed quickly within one to two weeks.
  4. select the feedback groups carefully: On the one hand, you need as broad a representative distribution as possible; on the other hand, you need people who have experienced the change process themselves.
  5. when answering the questions, separate the analysis (What went well, what went badly?) from the suggestions (What should we do now?). These are often mixed together.

Give it a try. Perhaps with a change project that is already well advanced, but where you are not 100% satisfied with the implementation.

I wish you lots of fun and success with this perhaps unusual method
Dieter Kannenberg

P.S. You can find online tools for analysing change projects here on our website and 36 other tools in our new book ‘Toolbox Leading Change’ published by Schäffer Poeschel Verlag

Image: shutterstock_1937300755