Back to the Future – The value of doing retrospectives

‘’The retrospective glance is a relatively easy gesture for us to make.’’ George Crumb.

In a previous article, I mentioned the importance of including a retrospective (‘’retro’’) in your business planning process. According to the Scrum Guide: “The Agile retrospective is the opportunity for an Agile team to examine itself and to define a plan for improvement to be enacted during the next Sprint.” Apparently, retros have been around since 1997 and is now a key part of agile thinking. I linked the retro concept to a well-known 80’s Hollywood blockbuster movie called ‘’Back to the Future’’ in which the main character (Michael J Fox) travels back in time and changes future events, either positively or negatively, by ‘’fiddling’’ with the past. Time travel and changing the past may not be possible, but learning from history to shape a brighter future, is very possible. Retros allow us to reflect on the past so that we can learn, improve and make our future better. This article will use several quotes to illustrate the concept of retros. Why use quotes?  ‘’The wisdom of the wise, and the experience of ages, may be preserved by quotation.’’- Benjamin Disraeli. I use these pearls of wisdom from other people whilst remembering another quote which states: "Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly." -- Simeon Strunsky. So please excuse the use of quotes out of context, but by using quotes, I hope to make the read more memorable and fun.

 Why do companies do so little retrospection? Maybe it’s a reflection of the human condition. Many people don’t really want to reflect and take stock of their lives. Maybe humans are a bit hesitant in being honest with themselves and thinking about the stuff they did? Sometimes we don’t like what we see. Besides, life moves too fast, who has time to sit down and do some soul searching? But psychologist and other experts say that meditation and reflection are very important for a healthy mental state. The same is true for business and teams. We need to reflect often and honestly. This article expands on the concept of retros and how important it is as a tool and philosophy. We propose that teams have retro sessions regularly and build the retro way of doing things into their culture. We offer some tips and insights on how to do this effectively. I will explain why making retros part of your business will be beneficial to your teams. I must however state that retros are just one of the many tools used in agile. It works together with other agile practices ensuring more productive and happy teams. It’s not something that can be done in isolation, but by implementing this concept, it could possibly be a step in the right direction for your business and the health of your teams.

 Implementing retro sessions will have many benefits. These include:

· Helping teams resolve conflicts. The team may be experiencing irritations and things driving them crazy. If the retro is done correctly, these issues will be surfaced and discussed sooner rather than later. Why not talk about things instead of letting it simmer affecting the team’s mood and performance. Like any healthy relationship, discussing things as they happen, is much better than ignoring it, and allowing a buildup of issues and resentments.

· The retro ensures quicker learning. What is working or is not working well? How can we fix stuff or make sure we keep on doing the things that make us successful as a team? Retros should celebrate successes by focusing on the positives first. Amplify the good. If we don’t define and discuss what went well, how will we know to continue doing it? If problems exist, lets discuss and deal with them.

· Retros help with continuous improvement. W. Edwards Deming said: ‘’Learning is not compulsory; it’s voluntary. Improvement is not compulsory; it’s voluntary. But to survive, we must learn.” Having regular sit downs to reflect on our performance help us to learn on a continual basis. Someone also said: ‘’The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.’’  Professional sports teams watch videos of their previous games. This helps them understand what went well or who dropped the ball. It’s not a way of criticizing the team or individual team members, it should just be an honest and objective review of the game. If professional athletes use this practice, why not business teams?

·  Retros help solve problems. We must ask ourselves, what issues did we face in our last sprint? How can we solve it by all of us contributing to the discussion? It helps us to improve ourselves and the team. The challenges we are facing is a team thing and we need to solve it together.

· We have other benefits of a retro like giving the team a voice to speak, making them feel part of the process, raising concerns and giving all the opportunity to suggest improvements.

Herewith some important principles that are core to a retro event:  

When? The retro session should be held at the end of a specific period. It is normally done at the end of an iteration or sprint. The team can decide when the best time for this ceremony should be, but we suggest it be done before another sprint starts. Preferably before doing the planning for the next period. Once the new sprint starts, we forget what happened in the previous one. The retro should be at least an hour long. We have often tried limiting the session to half an hour, but this doesn’t allow for robust debate. You must timebox the session but give yourself enough time to discuss items. The facilitator needs to check the time and limit each agenda item to the required and agreed timeframes. Have retro sessions regularly. Don’t start skipping retros, because doing so, quickly becomes a habit. Don’t have excuses or get too busy and miss out on the benefits of the retro.

Cover the whole period to which the retro applies e.g. full two-week sprint. We often only reflect on the things that happened in the last few days, and not the full sprint. The leader of the session must remind the participants to focus on the entire sprint.

Who? The whole team needs to be included in the session. And only the team who was involved with the work during the specific period should be included. Be careful of inviting outsiders who did not contribute. The only outsider required could be a facilitator to run the session. I quote a funny but true saying: “Opinions are like bums. Everyone has one.’’ This is true for this ceremony. Get the opinions that matter and not of outside parties that haven’t been actively involved in the process.    

How? A very simple agenda and the purpose of the retro is to define what worked well, what did not go well and how can we improve? It’s as basic as that. ‘’The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak’’. Hans Hofmann. The session is about conversation, discussion and dialogue. A person called Thich Nhat Hanh said that ‘’In true dialogue, both sides are willing to change.’’ This is true for retros. The retro should have some actions as an outcome. This is very important because the retro can become a talk fest without any actions or change. Even well performing teams need to evaluate what they are doing on a continual basis and not become complacent. What actions can we take to improve?

 Use electronic boards to display items (whiteboard with sticky notes in pre covid19 days). Have something visual to display the feedback and comments. Split the board into separate parts i.e. what went well, did not go well and improvement ideas. People are invited to place their items in the relevant area. But focus on one category at a time.

I suggest an agenda for the retro as follows:

o  Setting the stage. The facilitator explains the purpose, process and ground rules for the session. The introduction is important. During the introduction, you may want to use what is called the ‘’prime directive’’ in agile which states: ‘’Regardless of what we discover, we must understand and truly believe that everyone does the best job he or she could, given what was known at the time, his or her skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.’’ This sets the stage for a productive and positive discussion. All team members should contribute in a constructive way.

o  Get data – It helps to have some data on hand. What did we achieve as a team e.g. how many tasks did we complete?  Also reflect on the actions of the previous retro. Did we solve an issue?

o  Team provides feedback on what went well, what did not go well, what are they concerned about and how can we improve.

o  Brainstorm improvement ideas and pick a solution as a team. What are the actions coming out of the retro? Someone must take responsibility for an action.

o  Close the meeting. Thank the team, summarize the discussion and actions.

I have been involved with many retros and would like to share some practical tips and advice. Herewith some lessons learnt in my journey:

· Give everyone the chance to participate in the session. “Most people talk too much, and what they do say is often just noise or irrelevant gibberish designed to keep themselves entertained” ― Stuart Wilde. It happens often that the session is a ‘’one man show’’. Especially if it’s the ‘’boss’’ or only a few outspoken individuals doing the talking. It’s a good idea to have a facilitator for these sessions. Someone who is objective and removed from the work. Retros can go badly wrong if management dominates the conversation. People won’t speak up and will be too afraid of raising issues especially if the boss is part of the problem. A good facilitator will create a safe environment to talk and to try and elicit a response from all. A lot depends on the maturity and personalities in the team. Not everyone is always comfortable with speaking up. Be careful that the session doesn’t become a moan session and / or the boss taking notes of who said what to use against them later. Often, people may want to submit items anonymously. But by allowing secret submissions, this already tells you a lot about the team and its leadership.

· Don’t focus on the negative. “Focus on an ocean of positives, not a puddle of negatives.” ― Kevin Ansbro. It happens in sessions that the negatives outweigh the positives in a retro session. This is okay, especially if the team is facing some issues. Negative feedback is not a bad thing, but start the session on a positive note by focusing on what worked well first. This creates a more positive mood and tone for the meeting. A good facilitator is able to ‘’read’’ the audience and channel the energy to ensure a more productive outcome.  

·  Prep for the session. “If I had one hour to save the world, I would spend fifty-five minutes defining the problem and only five minutes finding the solution. “ – Albert Einstein. The facilitator should prepare for the session upfront. Especially an outsider facilitator. Take time to understand the team and what they do, the issues being experienced as well as the personalities involved. Context is key here. 

·  The team should solve a problem. “Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.” – Henry Ford.  Looking at a challenge, as raised in the retro as a team, is very helpful. It happens on occasion that someone may raise a flurry of issues and this then dominates the conversation. Separate issues and get the team to come up with ideas to solve it. The understanding should be that it’s okay to raise an issue, but do you have any idea as to what the solution could be? It’s easy to highlight an issue, but are you not maybe part of it?  

· Don’t get personal. One of my favorite TV comedy series is ‘’The Office’’ with Steve Carell as one of the worst bosses you could ever imagine. He is egotistical, emotionally immature and clueless about being a leader. He often gets personal with his staff via insults delivered as jokes. Getting personal should be avoided in a retro. When raising issues, frame it as a team issue. This must be managed by the facilitator.

· Be creative – Don’t use the same retro formats and methods all the time. Mix it up. There are many tools you can use to do this. I must caution here that the tool you use should accomplish the purpose of the retro. I have been involved with retros where movie themes were used to get input e.g. what movie illustrates what went well for you and why? Some people may struggle to try and apply a movie theme to an issue, and this could lead to the issue not being well articulated or even raised. If you know the session may not go well, keep to the basics of a retro and the questions you want to ask.

· Group items together. When the team provides feedback under each category, group similar items together e.g. most people mentioned teamwork as a positive so group these items e.g. (‘’worked well together as a team’’, ‘’everyone jumped in to help’’, ‘’team spirit is good’’). Especially when chatting about what didn’t go well, group items together. This shows a pattern and a trend.

·  Use technology. Working from home is common and teams don’t physically get together in a room to chat. There are many tools you can use to do online retros. Build some fun into sessions.  

· Don’t rush – discuss the issues raised. Remember, the retro is about conversation. You can’t rush through a touchy subject.

·  A retro is a good way of celebrating successes. ‘’Celebrate what you want to see more of. Tom Peters. Focus on the good and build on this.

‘’At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behaviour accordingly.’’ Retros are very useful. If done correctly, it could help teams be more productive by collaborating, having honest and open conversations, keeping one another accountable and helping to constantly improve things. It can serve as a team energizer generating new ideas, be a team building activity and is a way of communicating with management about issues. But just as in the ‘’Back to the future’’ movie, we must be careful of how we do a retro. Doing it badly could negatively affect the future of the team with the team resenting these sessions, creating bad vibes between team members and becoming a place to moan and taking jabs at management and other stakeholders. Turning your neck to look back is easy and necessary. Just don’t look backwards for too long. You may walk into something whilst looking back. Don’t allow the past to define your future but use it to change your future in a positive way.

I end off with another movie quote from A Perfect World starring Kevin Costner and directed by Clint Eastwood. Costner asks a young boy driving in a car with him whether he has ever travelled in a time machine? Costner’s character then gives one of the most memorable movie quotes which applies to retros and life: ‘’We are driving in a 20th century time machine. ‘’Looking out the windscreen, he says to the lad, is the future. Looking out the back window is the past. If life is too slow, step on the gas. If life is moving too fast, hit the brakes. Its up to you. But enjoy the present while it lasts.

I hope this article will inspire you to start doing retros. Change direction, step on the gas or just slow down. But decide on the best course of action as a team.

References:

·       https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/what-movies-can-tell-us-planning-andre-peters/

·       https://www.scrum.org/resources/what-is-a-sprint-retrospective

·       https://blog.teammood.com/agile-retrospectives

·       https://luis-goncalves.com/agile-retrospectives/#:~:text=An%20Agile%20Retrospective%20is%20a,and%20adjusts%20its%20behaviour%20accordingly.

·       https://agilestrides.com/blog/40-ideas-to-spice-up-your-retrospective/