How You can run a Stop, Start, Continue Exercise

A Stop, Start, Continue exercise is a simple retrospective method for getting focused feedback from a team, group, or individual.

Purpose

It helps answer three questions:

• What should we stop doing because it is unhelpful, inefficient, or harmful?
• What should we start doing because it would improve results?
• What should we continue doing because it is working well?

When to use it

Use it after:

• a project milestone
• a sprint or work cycle
• a meeting series
• a leadership change
• a team conflict or performance issue
• a course, workshop, or event

How to run it

1. Define the scope

Be specific about what the exercise is about.

Examples:

• “How we worked together during the last quarter”
• “How this project was run”
• “How our weekly team meetings are working”

A narrow scope produces better feedback than a vague one.

2. Set up the three categories

Create three columns labeled:

• Stop
• Start
• Continue

You can do this on a whiteboard, shared document, virtual board, or slide.

3. Explain the rules

Tell participants:

• Focus on behaviours, processes, and practices, not personal attacks.
• Be specific.
• Write one idea per note.
• Aim for constructive suggestions.
• Duplicates are acceptable.

A useful framing is:
“Identify actions or patterns that are helping us, hurting us, or missing entirely.”

4. Give silent thinking time

Ask everyone to write ideas individually first, usually for 5 to 10 minutes.

This avoids groupthink and gives quieter participants room to contribute.

Examples:

• Stop: scheduling meetings without agendas
• Start: sending decisions in writing after meetings
• Continue: quick check-ins at the start of each week

5. Share and group responses

Invite participants to post or read out their items under each column.

As they share, cluster similar themes together. For example:

• “too many meetings”
• “meetings run too long”
• “unclear meeting purpose”

These can be grouped into one theme.

6. Discuss the themes

Facilitate a short discussion for each cluster:

• What is the issue exactly?
• Why does it matter?
• Is there an example?
• Is this widely felt or isolated?
• What would better look like?

Keep the discussion practical. Do not let it turn into blame or a debate over isolated incidents.

7. Prioritise

You will usually get more ideas than you can act on. Ask the group to identify the most important items.

Common methods:

• dot voting
• each person selects top 3
• discussion and consensus

Prioritise actions, not just observations.

8. Turn feedback into actions

For the top items, define:

• the action
• the owner
• the deadline
• how success will be judged

Example:

• Start: send agendas 24 hours before meetings
• Owner: team lead
• Deadline: from next Monday
• Success measure: agenda included in 90% of meetings this month

9. Close the session

Summarise:

• main themes
• decisions made
• actions assigned
• review date

This is important. The exercise loses credibility if feedback is collected but nothing changes.

10. Follow up

Revisit the actions after an agreed period, such as 2 to 6 weeks.

Ask:

• Did we actually stop it?
• Did we start it?
• Are we continuing the right things?

Example agenda for a 30-minute session

30 minutes total

• 5 min: introduce purpose and scope
• 5 min: silent brainstorming
• 10 min: share and group ideas
• 7 min: prioritise
• 3 min: assign actions and close

Facilitation tips

• Keep the scope tight.
• Encourage concrete examples.
• Redirect personal criticism into process language.
• Make sure “Continue” gets equal attention, not just problems.
• Limit the number of final actions.
• Record outcomes clearly.

Sample script

You can say:

“We are going to do a Stop, Start, Continue review of how we have been working over the past month. Please think about what we should stop doing because it is getting in the way, what we should start doing to improve, and what we should continue because it is helping. Focus on behaviours and processes, be specific, and write one point per note. After that, we will group themes, prioritise a few, and agree actions.”

Common mistakes

• making it too broad
• allowing personal criticism
• collecting feedback without action
• discussing every note equally instead of prioritising
• focusing only on negatives and ignoring what works

Simple template

Stop	Start	Continue
What is not working?	What is missing?	What is working well?

For each priority item, add:

• Action:
• Owner:
• Deadline:
• Success measure: