2.4 Structuring a Retrospective

Agile Retrospectives — by Esther Derby, Diana Larsen (15 / 72)

👈 2.3 Determining Duration | TOC | 2.5 Selecting Activities 👉

In Chapter 1, ​Helping Your Team Inspect and Adapt​, we laid out a structure: Set the Stage, Gather Data, Generate Insights, Decide What to Do and Close the Retrospective. This structure brings in perspectives from all team members, follows a natural order for processing information, and moves the group toward committed action.

You’ve decided how much time you need to achieve the retrospective goal; now what do you do with that time?

Here’s how it might work for a two-hour retrospective:

+----+---------------------------+-----------+---------------+
|    |  Set the stage            |  5%       |  6 minutes    |
|    |  Gather data              |  30--50%  |  40 minutes   |
|    |  Generate insights        |  20--30%  |  25 minutes   |
|    |  Decide what to do        |  15--20%  |  20 minutes   |
|    |  Close the retrospective  |  10%      |  12 minutes   |
|    |  Shuffle time             |  10--15%  |  17 minutes   |
|    |  Total                    |  100%     |  120 minutes  |
+----+---------------------------+-----------+---------------+

You’ll need time to cover all the phases. Plus, people need time to move from one activity to another, so build in “shuffle time.”

Tip 2: Time for a Break