Full Answer
What are the 3 retrospective questions?
Three things you can do todayWhat went well (keep doing these things)What could be improved (went OK, but could be better)What went badly (don't do these things again)Focus for next period/sprint/month/quarter (One or two things to focus on)
What is a scrum retrospective?
The Scrum sprint retrospective is a timeboxed meeting that takes place after the sprint review and before sprint planning. Its purpose is to: Examine how the just-completed sprint went as far as people, relationships, processes, and tools. Identify and order what went well. Do the same with things that didn't go well.
What is retro meeting?
Definition: A retrospective is a meeting held after a product ships to discuss what happened during the product development and release process, with the goal of improving things in the future based on those learnings and conversations.
Why do we do retrospectives?
The general purpose is to allow the team, as a group, to evaluate its past working cycle. In addition, it's an important moment to gather feedback on what went well and what did not. Finally, retrospective is a moment for the team to define actions that may fix or improve things identified as negative.
How do you conduct a retro?
How to run a remote retrospective with your teamStep 1: Create an environment of psychological safety. ... Step 2: Figure out the agenda and logistics. ... Step 3: Review the recent past. ... Step 4: Discuss candidly, but respectfully. ... Step 4: Decide what you'll take action on before the next retrospective.More items...•
How do you run a Scrum retrospective?
You may try the steps interactively by visiting the interactive product tour.Step 1: Prepare for a 'Start, Stop and Continue' retrospective. ... Step 2: Discuss what should start doing. ... Step 3: Discuss what should stop. ... Step 4: Discuss what went well. ... Step 5: Vote for the most important items. ... Step 6: Wrap up the meeting.
What should I tell in retrospective meeting?
Questions to ask when closing a sprint retrospectiveCan you reiterate the most important thing you learned today?How are you feeling about our next sprint now that we've identified these issues?Is anyone confused or unclear on any of the items we discussed today?Do all of our next steps make sense?More items...•
How do you facilitate a retrospective?
Facilitators need to get the team talking during the sprint retrospectiveAssemble the right group.Prime them for participation.Prompt feedback, if you don't see it coming.Get out of the way so participants have the space to speak.
What is sprint review and retrospective?
Sprint review is a meeting at the end of a Scrum Sprint cycle where Scrum team members inspect what was done during the last Sprint and update their product backlog. Sprint retrospective is a structured meeting at the end of the Sprint where the Scrum team discusses their performance and ways of improving it.
What are retrospectives in agile?
A retrospective is anytime your team reflects on the past to improve the future. Between technical and non-technical teams, you can retro on just about anything!
Why retrospectives are important in Agile?
A Critical Component of Agile Success Retrospectives play a critical role as post-sprint milestones for any large-scale project. Knowing how to get the most out of each meeting will help you to identify points for improvement, collect more feedback from your teams, and position your next sprint for success.
When should you do a retrospective?
Try adapting retrospectives to every 2-3 weeks, or some more relaxed time frame once your team have built strong relationships and a team culture. This could mean switching up exactly when you hold retros – perhaps you want to try running them after every other sprint or only at the ends of projects.
Who facilitates the Sprint Retrospective event?
The Scrum Guide leaves this point open, but it’s usually the Scrum Master who facilitates the event in practice. I would recommend that the Scrum Master encourage others to facilitate the event, too, because this tends to bring out different perspectives and a different focus, which can benefit the team.
Retrospective ideas
Each team can decide how to run their Sprint Retrospective, and changing approaches from time to time can help keep things fresh. Below are a few agenda ideas: try them out and leave a comment to tell me how it went or to share other ideas you have.
Remote facilitation of Sprint Retrospectives
Most teams have sorted out how to facilitate events remotely as a result of the pandemic. Conference platforms (such as Microsoft Teams, WebEx and Zoom) have shared whiteboard functionality that allows teams to have audio discussions supported by a shared whiteboard. Tools such as TFS and Jira even have specific Retrospective tools embedded.
Conclusion
The Sprint Retrospective is extremely useful when used correctly. After every Sprint, the team identifies at least one improvement idea to focus on during the next Sprint. Remember, even minor improvements can result in an astonishing amount of change over time - so don’t neglect this valuable process!
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Scrum Retrospective Questions
Focuses on success and things that people are proud of both from a technical or teamwork aspect.
Ideas and tips for your scrum retrospectives
Set the stage. Welcome people and set the tone of the meeting and give them a safe space to share ideas. A great way to do this is to ask “Can we begin now?” and waiting for people to begin.
Scrum Retrospective Method 1: Retro Bow
The retrospective method consists of a total of 3 questions, which you can of course also modify or shorten. In principle, it works according to the generally known scheme. Let's start with the positive:
Retrospective Method 1.1: A Sailboat Retro Special (pre-registration)
Okay, your team will love this. The most creative, fun and interactive remote retro you can imagine.
Scrum Retrospective Method 3: Rocket Retro
Similar to the racing car metaphor, this is about acceleration and velocity. This time we want to reach the sky and reach for the stars! The questions can be asked in the past or in the future, for example for planning a project. This time I have put it in relation to the future:
Bonus – Scrum Retrospective Method 4: Echometer
Another way to design retros is of course to use Retro Tools! In particular, I would like to mention Echometer, which I was involved in developing myself.
More Scrum retrospective methods
There is many Scrum retrospective methods. But I hope that these four are new to you. And by the way, you can find three more retrospective Scrum ideas in this blog article – Hearsay, the team acronym and the conflict compass!
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A Scrum retrospective method from science
The task described Lt. Kellys was the final part of a team method training in overseas warfare. It prepared the participants for their assignment as head of a NAVY ship.
The power of a good Scrum retrospective
There was one variable, one difference in the method being trained. This distinguished the experimental group from the control group. To understand this difference, let's take a look at the entire training.
When Scrum Retrospectives Work - The Secret Method
What is a mental model? The theory behind it, based on knowledge from cognitive science, social psychology and anthropology: people perceive reality, external stimuli, through internal, cognitive “mental models” (also “frames” or schemes); Lee, Johnson, Lee, O'Connor & Khalil, 2004 ).
An exemplary mental model
Lieutenant Kelly had received training. This has given him the importance of mental models. He was also introduced to a mental model for successful teamwork in a military context.
The basis for the magical Scrum retrospective method
The retrospectives of Lieutenant Kelly (quasi the group's Scrum Master) and the rest of the experimental group, on the other hand, had no chronological sequence.
How to Nitro-Retro - the Scrum Method as a workshop
Because the results in the above study are no exception. (And don't worry - managers can also moderate retros).
How to do an Agile retrospective?
These five stages are presented in the book Agile Retrospectives – Making Good Teams Great by Esther Derby and Diana Larsen. They are: 1 Set the Stage 2 Gather Data 3 Generate Insights 4 Decide What to Do 5 Close the Retrospective
What colors to use in a retrospective meeting?
Additionally, you can use some “screaming” colors, like pink or orange, so that they stand out on the board. Then, a couple of days after the Retrospective meeting, when you see that an action item is not marked as done yet, you can ask the team during Standup about the status.
Is Scrum an empirical approach?
Make clear to the team that Scrum is an empirical approach—you are working with a try-measure-learn loop. If you have identified a possible solution, you cannot be sure whether this solution might really work. But you can decide to give it a try for a couple of Sprints and measure its outcome.
What is retrospective session?
The retrospective session is basically an “improvement” meeting held to find ways and means to identify potential pitfalls, past mistakes, and seek out new ways to avoid those mistakes, which are attended by all – the product owner, scrum master, development team members, and optionally with the stakeholders.
How long is a sprint retrospective meeting?
Length of Sprint Retrospective Meeting. The thumb rule for the length of a sprint retrospective meeting is that it usually take no more than 45 minutes per week of sprint duration. The following table illustrates this rule: Total Sprint Duration. Sprint Retrospective Duration. 1 week. 45 minutes. 2 weeks. 90 minutes (1.5 hours)