After-Action Review Template (AAR)

After-action review: objectives and intent, timeline, planned vs actual, causes, sustain and improve, SMART improvement plan, follow-up (TC 7-0.1, HSEEP AAR/IP)

ReunionesEstándarUS Army TC 7-0.1 After Action Reviews (2025); FEMA HSEEP Doctrine (2020)after action reviewActualizada 29 oct 2026

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Cómo usar: Use it straight after an exercise, event or operation to learn what to sustain and improve. Fill the objectives and agree the timeline before discussing causes. The main pitfall is lessons with no owner or date, so nothing changes before the next event.

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After-Action Review: [Event, exercise or operation name]

An after-action review (AAR) is a guided, candid discussion held during or straight after an event, exercise or operation to establish what was supposed to happen, what actually happened, why, and what to sustain and improve. This template follows the four-step approach (plan, prepare, conduct, follow up) in US Army Training Circular TC 7-0.1, After Action Reviews (13 February 2025), and the After-Action Report/Improvement Plan (AAR/IP) structure in FEMA's Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP) Doctrine (January 2020). Both are US government publications, cited and summarised in original words. Replace every [bracketed] value and every row marked Example. Worked examples use Pellmoor Transit Authority, a fictional bus operator, reviewing a winter-storm service disruption exercise.

Document control

Field	Value
Document ID	[AAR-YYYY-NNN]
Event	[Name, type (exercise, live operation, project milestone, event)]
Event date and location	YYYY-MM-DD, [location]
AAR date	YYYY-MM-DD
AAR type	[Informal / Formal]
Facilitator	[@facilitator]
Sponsor or senior leader	[@sponsor]
Status	[Draft / Final / Closed]
Classification	[Internal / Restricted]

Approvals

Role	Name	Date
Sponsor	[@sponsor]	YYYY-MM-DD
Facilitator	[@facilitator]	YYYY-MM-DD

Revision history

Version	Date	Author	Change
0.1	YYYY-MM-DD	[@facilitator]	Draft from the review session
1.0	YYYY-MM-DD	[@facilitator]	Findings validated, improvement plan agreed

1. The AAR process

	Informal AAR	Formal AAR
Led by	The team's own leader	A trained facilitator, often from outside the team
Preparation	Little; held on site, straight after the event	Planned with the event; data, venue and aids prepared
Typical length	15 to 45 minutes	Half a day or more
Output	Notes and a short action list	This full document

2. Event summary and objectives

ID	Objective	Target or standard
OBJ-1 (Example)	Notify customers of each route suspension	Public alert within 15 minutes of the suspension decision
OBJ-2 (Example)	Activate the operations coordination room	Room staffed within 60 minutes of the severe weather warning
OBJ-3 (Example)	Reassign drivers to the eight priority routes	All eight routes staffed within 2 hours of activation
[OBJ-N]	[objective]	[target]

Example intent: keep the eight priority routes to hospitals and schools running, suspend other routes early and safely, and tell customers before they reach a stop.

3. Participants and ground rules

Name or group	Role in the event	Role in the AAR
[@name]	[role]	[Participant / Evaluator / Scribe / Facilitator]

Ground rules: this is a professional discussion, not a critique; nobody has all the information, whatever their rank; everyone takes part and nobody dominates; differing views are welcome; we focus on what happened and how to improve, not on who to blame.

4. What happened

Time	Event	Source
06:00 (Example)	Severe weather warning injected by exercise control	Exercise log
06:45 (Example)	Operations coordination room staffed and active	Room sign-in sheet
07:10 (Example)	Decision to suspend route 14	Duty manager log
07:48 (Example)	Customer alert for route 14 published	Alert system timestamp
08:40 (Example)	Six of eight priority routes staffed	Dispatch system
09:25 (Example)	Last two priority routes staffed	Dispatch system
[hh:mm]	[event]	[source]

5. Planned versus actual

Objective	Target	Actual	Rating
OBJ-1 (Example)	15 minutes	38 minutes (07:10 to 07:48)	Not met
OBJ-2 (Example)	60 minutes	45 minutes (06:00 to 06:45)	Met
OBJ-3 (Example)	8 routes in 2 hours	6 routes in 1 hour 55 minutes, all 8 in 2 hours 40 minutes	Partly met
[OBJ-N]	[target]	[actual]	[rating]

6. Why it happened

Objective	Cause	Evidence
OBJ-1 (Example)	Alerts needed approval from the communications manager, who was not on the exercise roster; the duty manager waited 30 minutes for a reply	Duty manager log, alert system audit trail
OBJ-3 (Example)	The standby driver list was a spreadsheet on one supervisor's laptop and was not visible in dispatch	Participant accounts, dispatch notes
OBJ-2 (Example)	Room activation checklist was rehearsed last quarter and printed at the door	Evaluator notes
[OBJ-N]	[cause]	[evidence]

7. Sustain: strengths

ID	Strength	Why it worked
S-01 (Example)	Coordination room active 15 minutes ahead of target	Recent rehearsal and a printed checklist
[S-NN]	[strength]	[reason]

8. Improve: areas for improvement

ID	Issue	Analysis	Impact
AFI-01 (Example)	Customer alerts delayed by single-person approval	No delegate named for the approval step	Customers waited at suspended stops in freezing weather
AFI-02 (Example)	Standby driver list not visible in dispatch	List held offline by one supervisor	Two priority routes started 40 minutes late
[AFI-NN]	[issue]	[analysis]	[impact]

9. Improvement plan

Action ID	Linked to	Corrective action	Owner	Due	Status
IP-01 (Example)	AFI-01	Name two delegates who can approve service alerts and pre-approve wording for route suspensions	[@comms-manager]	YYYY-MM-DD	[Open / Done]
IP-02 (Example)	AFI-02	Move the standby driver list into the dispatch system and test it in the next drill	[@dispatch-lead]	YYYY-MM-DD	[Open / Done]
IP-03 (Example)	S-01	Keep the quarterly room activation rehearsal in the training calendar	[@ops-manager]	YYYY-MM-DD	[Open / Done]
[IP-NN]	[AFI or S ID]	[action]	[@owner]	YYYY-MM-DD	[status]

10. Follow-up and sharing

Draft shared with participants for validation within [5] working days.
Improvement plan actions added to the team's tracker with the same IDs.
Progress reviewed at [meeting or date] by [@sponsor].
Each corrective action tested in the next exercise or event, and the result recorded.
Lessons shared with [other teams or sites] in a form that names no individuals.

11. References

[Event or exercise plan, link]
[Logs, recordings and evaluator notes, link]
US Army TC 7-0.1, After Action Reviews, 13 February 2025: https://armypubs.army.mil/ProductMaps/PubForm/Details.aspx?PUB_ID=1030481
FEMA, HSEEP Doctrine (January 2020) and HSEEP resources: https://www.fema.gov/emergency-managers/national-preparedness/exercises/hseep

Standard and licence note

Based on public US government guidance: Department of the Army TC 7-0.1, After Action Reviews (13 February 2025, approved for public release), which describes the plan, prepare, conduct and follow-up steps, formal and informal AARs, and the review of what was supposed to happen, what happened, why, and how to sustain and improve; and FEMA's Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program Doctrine (January 2020), which describes the AAR/IP, strengths, areas for improvement and corrective actions. The earlier and widely cited Army guide, TC 25-20, A Leader's Guide to After-Action Reviews (1993), does not appear on the Army's current list of training circulars as checked on 2026-10-30. The text of this template is original and summarises these sources; check the current versions on the official sites. Template licence: MIT.

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