Why reflection and reflexivity matter in a complex world

In today’s fast-changing and interconnected world, navigating complexity requires more than just technical skills—it calls for self-awareness and adaptability. Reflection helps us critically evaluate past actions—what worked, what didn’t, and how we can improve. It’s like looking in a rearview mirror to gain perspective. Reflexivity, by contrast, is a practice of self-awareness in the moment, focusing on how our thoughts, feelings, and actions influence what’s happening. Together, they can transform how we approach challenges, relationships, and opportunities.

If you’re looking for tools and resources to help put these practices into action, the Reflective and reflexive practice resources page offers a range of practical guides, theoretical perspectives, and frameworks for individuals, teams, and organisations.

These concepts are not new. They have long been foundational for individuals, teams, and organisations seeking adaptability and success. Reflection and reflexivity complement planning and evaluation, providing critical insights to ground these processes in experience and adaptability. At the same time, they act as essential components, enabling better planning and evaluation by fostering deeper learning, awareness, and responsiveness. Yet, despite their importance, they are often overlooked, not formally included in our work, or practised only in name.

In this post, we’ll explore what reflection and reflexivity are, why they matter, and how you can use them to improve both personal and professional practice. Whether you’re a team member, a manager, or an individual, these practices offer valuable insights and practical benefits.

Understanding reflection: looking back to move forward

Reflection is the process of stepping back to think critically about your actions and decisions. It’s widely used in fields like healthcare, where practitioners reflect on complex cases to refine their clinical judgment and improve patient outcomes. It helps us understand what happened, why it happened, and what we can learn from it. Think of it as looking in the rearview mirror to make sense of the road you’ve travelled.

Regardless of the form it takes, the value of reflection lies in asking the right questions to uncover insights and foster growth. By doing so, we can move beyond surface-level observations to identify the deeper factors shaping our experiences. Good reflection looks at both obvious details and hidden influences.

Key theorists like Donald Schön and David Kolb have shaped how we approach reflective practice. Kolb’s experiential learning cycle emphasises how reflection consolidates and applies learning, while Schön’s concepts of reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action highlight the value of adapting in the moment and reviewing experiences afterwards. Together, these ideas show that reflection is not just about looking back but also about improving how we think and act in real time. For a deeper dive, Shaun Coffey’s blog, “Reflection-in-action, reflection-on-action: What is it that we do when we do what we do?” provides an accessible introduction.

Frameworks like Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle offer a practical structure for this process, encouraging reflection across several dimensions. Gibbs’ six-stage model—outlined clearly in Sarah Morgan’s post on reflective practice—guides you through description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion, and action planning. It shows how organised reflection can turn experiences into useful lessons.

Building on this foundation, you can use more specific prompts tailored to your context, such as:

• Content: What happened? Identify the key facts or outcomes.
• Process: How did it happen? Look at the steps, interactions, and decisions that shaped the outcome.
• Premises: Why did it happen this way? Question the values, assumptions, and frameworks influencing the situation.
• Emotions: How did it make you or others feel? Recognise the emotional aspects to gain deeper insights into relational dynamics.

These prompts illustrate how reflective frameworks can be expanded or adapted to suit different needs, incorporating areas like emotional awareness or systemic factors. Reflective practices, such as After Action Reviews (AARs) and learning debriefs, build on the foundational ideas of thought leaders like Schön, Gibbs, and Kolb, offering structured ways to frame questions and encourage collaborative learning. My After Action Reviews – and how they can support strategic thinking post highlights how they create opportunities for teams to collectively review what worked, what didn’t, and how to adapt for the future.

By integrating additional approaches, such as appreciative inquiry, you can actively highlight successes and explore how to build on them. This positive approach helps create a balanced view that looks to the future. Incorporating feedback from colleagues, mentors, or other stakeholders further enriches reflection by adding diverse insights and uncovering factors you might not have considered. Together, these approaches deepen the impact of reflective practices, making them more inclusive and actionable.

Understanding reflexivity: staying aware in the moment

While reflection looks back, reflexivity happens in the moment. It’s about being critically aware of how your own values, assumptions, and actions shape what’s happening. Reflexivity involves recognising that you are not a neutral observer but an active participant in shaping outcomes and interactions. This real-time adaptability helps you adjust on the fly, making it especially useful in dynamic or relational contexts.

Imagine you’re in a meeting, and you realise you’ve been making assumptions about a colleague’s perspective. Reflexivity enables you to pause, question those assumptions, and invite their input instead. This awareness fosters better communication and decision-making. Reflexivity isn’t just about intellectual understanding—it also involves tuning into your emotional and physical reactions. These gut-level responses can act as powerful signals, alerting you to unspoken assumptions, biases, or dynamics influencing the situation.

In the social sciences, reflexivity is often linked to double-loop learning, a concept introduced by Chris Argyris. Double-loop learning encourages practitioners to go beyond questioning how things are done to ask why they are done that way. There is a great post from John James and Denise Bewsell, Unravelling double-loop learning, that expands on this showing why it can  lead to fundamental shifts in understanding and behaviour, not just surface-level changes. For example, in educational research, a teacher might move from simply adjusting their teaching methods (single-loop learning) to questioning their underlying beliefs about how students learn best, potentially transforming their entire approach to education.

For individuals, mindfulness can play a crucial role in developing reflexivity. By cultivating present-moment awareness, mindfulness enhances our ability to notice our thoughts, emotions, and reactions as they occur. This self-awareness allows you to respond intentionally rather than react automatically, making mindfulness an invaluable tool for reflexive practice.

Teams can practice reflexivity collectively by creating an environment where members feel safe to question assumptions and explore their impact. During a project discussion, for example, a team might ask: Are we considering everyone’s perspectives? What biases might be influencing our approach? Such dialogue strengthens collaboration, ethical engagement, and shared learning.

Reflexivity is not a one-time activity but an ongoing process of self-examination and adjustment. While it requires honesty and vulnerability, tools like reflexive journals or guided prompts can help individuals track how their perspectives evolve over time. Similarly, organisations can encourage reflexivity by providing training on recognising biases, fostering open dialogue, and creating spaces for collaborative reflection. Reflective debriefs and stakeholder mapping exercises can help teams align their actions with their values and goals.

The value of reflection and reflexivity in work and life

Reflection and reflexivity are more than abstract concepts—they offer tangible benefits for individuals, teams, and organisations.

• For individuals, these practices enhance self-awareness, enabling more informed decisions and fostering creativity by challenging assumptions and encouraging fresh perspectives. Reflexivity also connects thought and feeling, helping you tune into emotional cues or gut instincts that reveal deeper insights. Additionally, they offer tools to manage stress and build resilience, making it easier to navigate high-pressure situations.
• For teams, they strengthen collaboration and innovation. Reflection allows groups to learn from their experiences, identifying what worked and what didn’t. Reflexivity enables teams to adapt in real time by uncovering and addressing biases or power dynamics that might otherwise go unnoticed. Together, these approaches create more inclusive and effective teams.
• For organisations, these practices drive continuous improvement and adaptability. A culture of reflection encourages employees to question existing processes and propose meaningful changes. Reflexivity, when supported by training and dialogue, enables teams to critically examine their approaches and adapt to rapidly changing environments. By fostering these practices, organisations can better align actions with core values and stakeholder needs, enhancing ethical decision-making and long-term effectiveness.

For example, a team reflecting on a missed deadline might analyse what went wrong and how to improve their workflow. At the same time, applying reflexivity could lead them to question whether assumptions about timelines or priorities influenced their approach. This dual lens fosters deeper learning and more sustainable progress.

Putting reflection and reflexivity into practice

Reflection and reflexivity offer powerful tools to navigate complexity, foster growth, and drive meaningful change. As we’ve explored, reflection allows us to learn from the past and apply those lessons to future practice, while reflexivity keeps us attuned to how our actions and assumptions influence the present. Together, they help individuals, teams, and organisations adapt, innovate, and thrive in dynamic environments.

These concepts, however, come with challenges. Reflection can feel difficult due to time constraints or the discomfort of critically evaluating past work, outputs, or decisions, while reflexivity requires honesty and vulnerability, which can feel unsettling but is essential for meaningful growth. Overcoming these barriers requires intentional effort, setting aside time, and using structured tools to guide the process.

While these challenges can seem daunting, the rewards are worth the effort. Reflection helps us identify meaningful lessons and actionable steps, while reflexivity fosters real-time adaptability and deeper connections with others. By committing to small but consistent actions, we can create significant positive change over time. Whether it’s carving out a few minutes each day for personal reflection or fostering open conversations within your team, simple actions like the following can make a significant impact over time:

• Set aside time for reflection: Schedule moments to evaluate your actions and decisions. Journaling at the end of the day or debriefing with your team after a project are simple ways to build this habit.
• Ask powerful questions: Use thoughtful prompts to guide your reflection and foster deeper understanding. Examples include: What worked well? What didn’t? What assumptions might I need to challenge? Include questions that help you explore your emotions or gut reactions, such as: What am I feeling right now,  why, and how should I respond?
• Practise mindfulness: Develop present-moment awareness with techniques like focused breathing or short meditations. Mindfulness can help you notice thoughts and emotions in real time.
• Encourage open dialogue: Foster team environments where assumptions can be questioned and diverse perspectives explored. Practices like After Action Reviews can support this.

By embedding reflection and reflexivity into daily practice, we can improve how we navigate challenges, engage with others, and respond to change. These practices are not about perfection but about learning, adapting, and growing over time. Start small, stay consistent, and embrace the process. Whether you’re working individually, leading a team, or shaping organisational strategies, reflection and reflexivity can empower you to create more thoughtful, inclusive, and effective outcomes.

The accompanying resource page for this topic – Reflection and reflexivity – points to guides and resources in this area. A number of other Learning for Sustainability pages provide additional information on this topic.These practices are closely linked to planning, monitoring and evaluation (PM&E), as well as systems thinking, action research and adaptive management.

Will Allen( Principal, Will Allen & Associates )

An independent systems scientist, action research practitioner and evaluator, with 30 years of experience in sustainable development and natural resource management. He is particularly interested in the development of planning, monitoring and evaluation tools that are outcome focused, and contribute towards efforts that foster social learning, sustainable development and adaptive management.