Scrum Retrospective: Ideas and Examples

Scrum or Sprint retrospective is the scenario where the scrum members come together to do an appraisal of their work. It is a self-inspection on how they are executing their tasks.

In any organization, there is a need for the stakeholders to come together to do an appraisal of the activities of their project over time. This helps them in knowing their strengths and weaknesses to make them better in their operations.

No doubt, this is what is always done by the scrum team in scrum retrospective. Scrum retrospective is the soul of agile methodology; it offers the team an opportunity to painstakingly evaluate their activities to boost their efficiency and ability to deliver the right values to their clients.

In Scrum retrospective, the team will evaluate what is working effectively, what went wrong, and what could be improved on.

 

 

In essence, Scrum retrospective is an avenue for the team to empower, criticize the whole process and acknowledge their achievement as a team. It will allow the team to make a plan and a list of tasks for improving the next agile sprint.

However, the scrum retrospective of a project team should be painstakingly carried out with the project management tools to ensure that the desired outcome is achieved.

For example, Sinnaps, project management software can be used by the Scrum team in undertaking their scrum retrospective, it will allow effective collaboration among the stakeholders involved in the task.

Also, it is useful in executing iteration retrospective, this is a regular ceremony where agile team members discuss the results of the iteration, review their practices, and identify ways to improve their iteration in the software development project.

 

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Scrum Retrospective Ideas

 

How to generate them and maximize them to the advantage of your team:

 

The ideas used by the team play a vital role in the outcome of the scrum retrospective meeting. 

The following are the Scrum retrospective ideas that can be used during Scrum retrospective:

• The scrum retrospective ideas entail setting the stage that will make everybody in the team feel comfortable in a safe place. Send a retrospective reminder; start with your ideas to stimulate the team members.

• Show results: this will include reviewing the previous goals and improvement. By doing this, it will serve as a motivation for the team and spur them to aim for a greater result.
•  Always get a different scrum retrospective every time: taking a different approach to make a scrum retrospective very simple will enhance the generation of new ideas. Also, ask the team what they are required to start doing, stop doing, and continue doing.
•  Get a great feedback system.
•  Rotate the Scrum retrospective facilitator.

In Scrum project management, scrum sprint retrospective is the ceremony done by the scrum team.

 

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What is Sprint Retrospective?

 

In Scrum project management, sprint retrospective is the ceremony of the scrum team to inspect their activities and develop a plan to improve their next sprint.

The ceremony is done by the Scrum team to plan ways of increasing the products’ quality by improving the work processes. In the sprint retrospective, the scrum retrospective agenda is to identify what went well in the sprint, what could be improved on, and what will be committed to improving the next sprint.

In comparing sprint review vs. sprint retrospective, sprint review is a ceremony meant for the stakeholders for the purpose of inspecting where the stage of the project is, it is centered on what was built in the last sprint and the overall product while sprint retrospective is meant for the team to inspect their last sprint of a project.

In sprint retrospective, lesser concentration is on what was done and how it was done. In sprint review, the Product Owner must attend while in sprint retrospective, the Product Owner can choose whether to attend or not.

 

 

 

Sprint Retrospective and Example Template

 

Sprint retrospective template is the template that describes the previous sprint retrospective ideas of a Scrum team. The template will reflect on the previous work that was done, the goals achieved and generate ideas for improvement.

It offers a project team a model for managing their sprint activities. As a tool, it will simplify the process of reflecting on the previous sprint retrospective activities of the team, the achieved goals, and generate ideas for improvement.

Sprint retrospective template will save the Scrum team a lot of time because it will clearly define what to start, stop, and continue doing; thereby making them hit the ground running. The template is always flexible and can accommodate changes if necessary.

A good example of a sprint retrospective template is Sinnaps, it is very easy to use and it will support various Scrum teams in their scrum retrospective and can be used as their Scrum retrospective template.

 

 

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Retrospective Ideas

 

The nature of the retrospective ideas that the scrum team members can come up with during the sprint retrospective is paramount to the success of the sprint retrospective.

A retrospective is the ceremony held by a project team at the end of a project’s iteration to discuss what was successful the project, where there could be improvements and how the successes and improvements can be incorporated into future projects.

In Project retrospective, the project team should devote time to evaluate a completed project and learn from both the successes and failures of the project so that the team and organization can improve on how they execute their project in the future to enhance their operational efficiency.

 

The retrospective ideas include the following:

•  Embrace the feedback: this will allow you to know how your projects are perceived; the team will get to know their qualities, and what qualities they need to improve on.
•  Discussion of the team’s purpose: this will allow the team to deliberate on their activities in order to improve their work.
•  Placing a sphere in the middle and gather the team around the sphere
•  Reasons for the retrospective: document every answer and post them for everyone in the team to see.
•  Retrospective expectations: this will address the expectations of the team members.
•  Write everything

Besides, Project scope planning is immensely important in project management and can sometimes be seen as a complex topic that takes up a lot of time. Here, you will find a project scope example.

 

Agile Retrospective Techniques

 

The agile retrospective is a vital activity in agile methodology.  Agile methodology is extensively used globally by business organizations. According to the report by the Project Management Institute, 71% of business enterprises are using an agile approach to execute their project activities. 

No doubt, agile teams are expected to gather ideas during their retrospective sessions. This is to aid them in undertaking their activities to boost their overall efficiency.

With this, they can enhance their quality delivery to their clients and aim to improve on where they are lagging as a team in their activities.

The techniques in the agile retrospective are the following:

• Starfish: here, the team will reflect on their practices and project management activities and the level of impact they have on their results in order to know what to start doing, stop doing, keep doing, do less, and do more.
• The next technique is puzzles, ideas, problems, and appreciation. This is depicted by the acronym PIPA.
• The next technique is ORID (objective, reflective, interpretive and decision): objective focuses on reactions, emotions, feelings. Interpretive focuses on meaning, conclusions, and impacts. Decision focuses on what should be done.
• 4L’s (liked, learned, lacked, and longed for). The 4Ls retrospective will serve as feedback for the process.
• Plus/Delta: this technique will address what went well and what should we change?
• Start, stop, and continue technique.
• Mad, sad, and glad technique
• Force field analysis (driving/restraining). This technique will help the team in identifying what is driving the team forward and what is holding the team back?
• Sailboat: the technique will identify what is the wind in the sail and the anchor holding the team back.
• Imagine the future: this will allow the team to think about the possible status of the future, the good and bad. What will take the team to the states?

Sinnaps can be used by the team in carrying out their agile retrospective techniques because of its ease of use.

 

 

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Agile Retrospective Idea and Example

 

The agile retrospective is the ceremony held at the end of iteration in agile applications development where the team will evaluate on the happenings in the iteration and determine the next line of action.

For example, the project team using agile methodology can execute the agile retrospective idea with this typical example below:

1. Setting the stage: the team will be able to engage in the retrospective with a warm-up activity such as plus, minus and interesting (PMI) (5 minutes)
2. Gather data: create a shared picture of what happened during the last retrospective (10 minutes)
3. Generate ideas: discuss what was successful and identify the hindrance to the success of the team (10 minutes)
4. Make a decision on what to do: determine the highest priority items to work on and assign measurable goals to them in order to get completed (15 minutes)
5. Close the retrospective: reflect on the retrospective and how to improve it and how to appreciate the achievement of the team and individual interactions (5 minutes)

 

Online Retrospective Tools

 

These are free retrospective tools that can be used by scrum teams for free to facilitate their retrospectives. The Scrum teams can use the retrospective tools to gather inputs, reflect, and retrospect.

With the tools, you can engage effectively and carry out an action-oriented meeting with the team members that are remotely located.

These tools will save you a lot of time in executing your meeting. Also, they have an intuitive interface that promotes smooth conversation between you and your team.

For instance, Sinnaps is a free online team collaboration tool that supports the scrum team for their retrospective tasks. It is very easy to use, it supports Scrum methodology, and it is effective for the planning of the scrum team.

It is efficient for communicating and sharing vital information about team activities. Furthermore, it is cloud-based, thereby making it very reliable for the use of the Scrum teams in storing their plans.