“If you could adopt only one practice from agile methodologies, it should be retrospectives.”, said Many Super Smart Experts. Retrospectives can inspire love, hate, and sometimes both, depending on who (and when) you ask. In this session we will explore the reasons why retrospectives get such a bad rap, how to think differently about participating in retrospectives, and explore some different ways retrospectives can be run.

1. Thanks
to
our
Sponsors!
To
connect
to
wireless
1.
Choose
Uguest
in
the
wireless
list
2.
Open
a
browser.
This
will
open
a
Uof
U
website
3.
Choose
Login

2. RETROSPECTIVES:
How (and Why) to Not Hate Them
Hala Saleh
Agile Coach, Product Manager, Entrepreneur
http://www.halasaleh.com
@HalaSaleh1

3. Who Am I?
• Hala Saleh
• CSM , CSP (as of last Tuesday!), PMP
• History/Evolution: Developer -> QA Engineer ->
Project Manager -> Agile Coach/ Consultant
• Today: Co-Founder: NomNomFinder.com, Director of
Product at Rentler.com, involved in Utah startup scene
• Passionate about agile because of my belief in the
power of agile values to transform the way we live and
work!
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

4. What is a Retrospective?
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

5. Retrospectives: Then and Now
q Historically: Post-Mortems
- Share your experience with post-mortems! Describe them. What
happens afterwards?
q Used to be done at the end of a long-term project.
Issues:
- Team frequently disperses afterwards
- No opportunity for real improvement
q Nowadays: Usually done at the end of a “sprint” or iteration,
especially in agile organizations
q Some teams are making retrospectives an ongoing activity
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

6. ©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com
If
you
could
implement
only
ONE
thing
from
agile
methodologies,
it
should
be
#retrospec;ves.

7. • Who has participated in a retrospective or post-
mortem?
• Who participates in retrospectives on a regular
basis?
Split into groups of 4 – 5 people:
– should have at least 1 person who has participated in
retrospectives in each group
Let’s Explore
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

8. In your groups, discuss the following questions (5
minutes):
1. What do you like about retrospectives, or what are
some potential advantages?
2. What do you NOT like about retrospectives, or
what are some potential disadvantages?
Keeping it Real
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

9. What do you like about retrospectives, or what are
some potential advantages?
• Safe place to implement changes
• Retrospective activities (like drawing – ways to think
outside of the normal paradigm)
• Talking about things that might need to change in
process
• Seeing a change implemented
Retrospectives: The Good
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

10. • When done frequently, can expose problems
before they become deep-seated issues
• Team interaction
• Openness
• “We can do it” attitude
Retrospectives: The Good
Crowd-Sourced (Twitter, F2F):
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

11. What do you NOT like about retrospectives, or
what are some potential disadvantages?
• Sometimes hard to get participation
• People come with complaints but no ideas on how to
change
• Another meeting
• Fels like baggage is being brought up every time
Retrospectives: The Bad (& the Ugly)
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

12. Retrospectives: The Bad (& the Ugly)
Crowd-Sourced (Twitter, F2F):
• Feels like a critical environment
– Fix: Frequency to feel more comfortable
• The information gathered is almost always
forgotten/ignored
– Fix: Treat action items as regular tasks that go in
your backlog
– Focus on 1 – 2 items that the team agrees on
• Blame/fingerpointing
– Fix: Setting retrospective rules ahead of time
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

13. Retrospectives: The 5 Whys
• Why retrospect?
– Retrospection = Analysis
• Why analyze?
– Analysis = Understanding
• Why understand?
– Understanding = Improvement
• Why improve?
– Improvement = Growth
• Why grow?
– Growth = So many things! (Let’s check the next slide)
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

14. Retrospectives: Growth = ?
• Growth =
– Achievement
– Novelty
– Excitement
– Motivation
– FUN.
• And at the end of the day, if you aren’t having
fun, then you aren’t going to stick around.
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

15. Retrospectives and YOU
If retrospectives can help create an environment
where you are motivated, learning, improving,
and having fun:
• What do you think now about your role in
retrospectives?
• How do you feel about whether retrospectives are
successful and achieve their goals?
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

16. • Retrospectives can come in different
shapes and sizes
• Encourage your team/ facilitator to
change it up
• Stagnation = the kiss of death
Retrospectives: Some flavors
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

17. • What went well?
• What didn’t go well?
• What can we change/ Action items (a.k.a
HCWMWDGWGWNT*)?
Retrospectives: Standard Edition
*
How
Can
We
Make
What
Didn’t
Go
Well
Go
Well
Next
Time
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

18. • Data Gathering:
– List the main events/highlights of the last iteration
• Data Analysis:
– Which of the events were highs? Why?
– Which of the events were lows? Why? Why? Why? Why?
Why? (i.e. 5 Whys to get to Root Cause). Let’s try!
• Root Cause -> Action Items:
– Now that we know root cause: What can be done to avoid
repeating the lows?
Retrospectives: Standard Edition+
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

19. ©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com
Starfish Retrospectives:
An Example

20. • Allow people to go mark certain dates on the timeline to show when
something happened that had an impact on them
• Discuss the different events and have people explain what the impact was
on them personally and on the team
• Ask the team to come up with solutions to the most commonly mentioned
events
• Team picks 1 – 2 action items to include in next iteration
Retrospective Timeline
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

21. Your Favorite Retrospective?
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

22. • Set Retrospective Rules
– Frequency (Experiment with this!)
– Who Facilitates
– End Result
• Gather Data
• Acknowledge the Positive
• Focus on 1 – 2 Challenges/Issues to Discuss
– Team should vote/agree on what they are most motivated to work on
• Action Plan Your Action Items
– Include them in your requirements, tasks, backlog the same as any other task
– Include in your next iteration’s planning
– Include in your next iteration’s review
Retrospectives: Framework for Success
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

23. Resources & Tools
• Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great
(Esther Derby & Diana Larsen)
• Esther Derby’s blog: http://www.estherderby.com/
category/reading/_retrospectives
• Retrospective cookies: (weisbart.com/cookies)
• retrospectivewiki.org
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com

24. ©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com
• TODAY: Make a difference in your team/org’s retrospectives!
• Send the following: (Note: Find me at hala.saleh@gmail.com or @HalaSaleh1, ping me TODAY
and I will send this to you! I will also include you in a drawing for 1 of 2 prizes: Agile
Retrospectives book and a box of Retrospective fortune cookies!)
Dear Project Manager/Scrum Master/Team/Person who facilitates retrospectives (or
should),
Today, I became a believer in the power of retrospectives.
There is so much growth and learning we can achieve together as a team! I am
happy to share some of what I’ve learned and some ideas I got from the session I
attended.
One example is generating concrete action items that get included in our planning
and development cycles, and are treated the same as any other development task!
I look forward to contributing to making our retrospectives a success.
Retrospectives: Your Task

25. • Ben Linders (@BenLinders)
• Matt McMurry (@mcmurrym)
• Samantha Laing (@samlaing)
• Karen Greaves (@karen_greaves)
• John Miller (@agileschools)
• Syednazirrazik (@joesat)
Thanks to the following RetroRockstars
(for answering my Twitter request)
©
2014
Hala
Saleh
www.halasaleh.com