What, So What, Now What: a debrief in three questions

What, So What, Now What is a debrief: three questions you ask after something the group went through together, like a workshop exercise, a pilot, a role-play, an event or a hard quarter. It started as a reflection model in education, and Liberating Structures turned it into a group format.

Agile coach Carsten Lützen calls it his go-to for a quick debrief, because it gets everyone's observations and turns them into next steps, in a format you can reuse.

The three questions

How to run it

1. Split into small groups of five to seven.
2. Ask the What question. Run it as a quick 1-2-4-All: a minute alone in silence, then pairs, then fours, then a few observations shared with everyone.
3. Once the group has a common picture of what happened, ask So what, the same way: alone, pairs, fours, all.
4. Then Now what, again alone first. Focus on the patterns and the aha moments from the room, not one person's pet idea.
5. Capture the Now what answers somewhere everyone can see them.

Starting each question alone matters: everyone forms their own view before they hear the group's, so you get the real range of observations, not the first one said out loud.

Keep the stages separate

The hardest part is stopping people from jumping ahead. In the What round, someone will say "it went badly because we didn't plan" (that's So what) or "next time we should plan more" (that's Now what). Gently park it: "Hold that for the next round. What did you actually see happen?" Agreeing on what happened before deciding what it means is what makes the third round go well.

Example: after a training role-play

• What? "What did the customer say when the price came up? What did you say back?"
• So what? "What made the difference between the calls that went well and the ones that didn't?"
• Now what? "What's one thing you'll do on your next real call?"

Online

Use breakout rooms for pairs and fours, and a shared doc or whiteboard with three columns: What, So what, Now what. Each group adds to a column at the end of each round. It doubles as the record of the debrief.

Common mistakes

• Asking all three questions at once ("What happened and what should we do?"). People skip to solutions.
• Running Now what as a vote on solutions. It's about what the group learned; decide afterwards with dot voting if needed.
• Doing it a week later. Debrief while it's fresh, ideally the same session.

Run it with Claryoo

At the Now what stage, put the strongest ideas into a live poll so everyone can say which to try first, in the meeting chat or on their phones in a room. Claryoo's summary after the session keeps the takeaways and next steps, with who owes what.

More to watch

• "What? So What? Now What?" with Carsten Lützen, Carsten Lützen (3 min): the format, run with 1-2-4-All.
• What is a Critical Reflection? Introducing the "What, So What, Now What" Model, U of G Library (3 min): the reflection model it comes from.
• For charged topics where feelings need room, use ORID instead.