Retrospective

Last updated Jun 5, 2023

A workshop or meeting that gives project teams time to reflect on a project.

Performed after a Project is completed.

• Encourage team building
  • Sharing the different points of view in the team
• Facilitate improved collaboration on future projects
• Promote positive changes

The emphasis in retrospectives is on Continuous improvements and Change, instead of recycling old and potentially bad habits, procedures, and processes.

• Ensure discussion is blameless
  • Changing perspective
  • Switching from “you” language to “we” language
• Reflect on the positive aspects of the project as well as the negatives
• Put the changes in place
• Maintain a positive tune throughout the retrospective
• Consider teams outside of your own to be part of the activity
• Ask open-ended, probing questions.
• Cover the many aspects of the Sprint when conducting a retrospective.
  • The productivity and efficiency of the team
  • The scope and understanding of the definition of done
  • Communication and interactions within the team
  • Stakeholder communication
  • Progress towards more long-range release plans
• Consider reflecting periodically on Scrum Scrum principles and Scrum values by asking specific questions.

• Avoid too many gimmicks.
  • There are many fun games and exercises that can be used by a Scrum Master when facilitating a Sprint Retrospective. However, not all teams enjoy this style. Consider using these exercises only occasionally or when the team asks for new ways of doing retrospectives.
• Try not to only focus on the negative.
• Avoid changing processes after each retrospective.

• The blue hat manages the meeting,
• The white hat puts all the information on the table,
• The red hat puts all the feelings on the table,
• The yellow hat finds solutions and brings optimism,
• The green hat creates new ideas
• The black hat finds risks.

• Establish a safe environment for the team,
• Model the kind of participation you’d like to elicit from your team,
• Pose a group question and ask for individual responses
• Review the project timeline.

Accountability: being responsibile for decisions associated with a project or task.

Accountability and blame are two very different things, and only accountability belongs to retrospective.

• Encourages the team to think holistically about mistakes and challanges
• Identifies solution for the future
• Enrourage ownership

• Come prepared with specific challenges to discuss a a group
• Turn team complaints into SMART action items
• Push the team to identify its role in creating a given challenge
• Detach the challenge being discussed from any specific person in the room

• Aims to set a positive tone at the start of the meeting
• Determine how you’ll set the tone of the meeting
• Try anciticipating potential negativing by meeting one on one with team members before the retrospective happens
• Cosider asking team members individually to share their thoughts
• Call a meeting break