The Retromat-Blog
Great to see you at the Retromat-Blog! Here are some posts you might want to start with:
New to Retrospectives? Check out our series “Getting Started with Retrospectives“.
Part of a distributed team? Find all our posts about Remote Retrospectives here.
Or check out the latest posts:
tl;dr I’ve built an online version of the brilliant Debriefing Cube CC-BY Julian Kea and Chris Caswell:
Long version:
Debriefing is a super important skill for a facilitator. Exercises become more valuable when participants reflect on their observations and the meaning they make of everything.
Continue reading “New: Debriefing Cube – Online!”As hinted at in the previous blog post, I’ve created a ginormous Miroboard with a template for each and every activity in Retromat.
If you are using Miro, come check out the Mega Template 🙂
[Update: It’s done! Check out the Retromat Miroboard Mega Template!]
Ever since Covid hit, we use Miro at my work. A lot. For all our remote and hybrid retrospectives. To make preparing easier we’ve got a board with templates for about 30ish activities. It’s helpful but the collection is haphazard and they have very different looks to them.
So I got thinking… What if I made a template for each and every activity in Retromat, all 144 of them. Because I use Retromat to prep 99% of my retros. And it would fit my workflow beautifully: Pick activities that I like, find the template by its ID, copy it into a new board for the individual retro, maybe finishing touches like entering names, boom, done!
Behold the budding Retromat Mega-Template:
I’m 50 activities in and have already started using it. As I think it might be useful for other too, I’ll turn this into a product, when I’m done. (Paid Miro plans can export and import boards.)
The nice side effect of designing these as a product is that I build them a lot prettier than I would build a set for just myself. I’m known for my knowledge of methods, I’m not known for pretty boards … Well, until now!
Via the newsletter I found beta testers and have already improved based on their feedback. I think it’s gonna be great \o/
Are you using a digital whiteboard? Which tool? And do you also have a template board for quick preparation by copy-pasting?
Update: It’s done! Check out the Retromat Miroboard Mega Template!
There are a million different ways to start a meeting with something that connects the participants. The activities for “Set the Stage” in Retromat has some specifically for retrospectives. Today I’d like to share two additional resources with you, to check out for inspiration:
Quite well known, at least in Germany: This site randomly suggests a question, e. g. to ask at the beginning of the daily standup. A nice collection with a very pleasing look and feel.
If you’d like to invest a tiny bit more time you can insert more playfullness with one of the games from this site.
Which sites, questions or games do you like to use to get off to a great start?
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
... and which popular activities I never use
This week I ran another workshop on retrospectives, during which participants plan a retrospective (usually the first time they are doing that). While I was hopping through the breakout sessions, I got a super specific question: “When do you use ‘Start Stop Continue’ and when do you use ‘I like, I wish (I wonder)‘?” (I had introduced ‘I like, I wish, I wonder’ earlier in the workshop but not ‘Start Stop Continue’.)
To me, that question is very easily answered because I never use ‘Start Stop Continue’. That’s weird right? It’s one of the best known activities out there and I never pick it. Don’t get me wrong, ‘Start Stop Continue’ is not a bad activity. It’s perfectly adequate and will get results. I just know other activities that I think yield even better results so that I never fall back on ‘Start Stop Continue’.
And why is that? Well, when I see ‘Start Stop Continue’ in action, there’s often duplication: topics that appear in both ‘Start’ and ‘Stop’ just differently phrased. But that’s not unique to this activity and also not a big deal. The better question is perhaps why I love ‘I like, I wish, I wonder’ so much more:
To me, both ‘I wish’ and ‘I wonder’ are invitations to raise issues in a way that is non-threatening. It makes it easier to address hard topics without antagonizing someone and thus easier to talk about. There is no such nudge inherent in ‘Start Stop Continue’. And that’s why I find myself picking ‘I like, I wish, I wonder’ a lot.
PS: Another popular activity that I use even less than ‘Start Stop Continue’ is ‘Starfish‘. IMO it leads to soooo much duplication (way more than ‘Start Stop Continue’) to the point that it makes clustering difficult. But it is undoubtedly popular. If you love using ‘Starfish’, what’s the benefit that I’m missing?
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
For years and years I’ve been meaning to get a proper coaching education. Last year I finally took the plunge and this year I finished the year-long programme “Lösungsfokussiertes Coachen und Beraten“. It’s been amazing and I’m so glad I picked it! Solution-focus is definitely my jam 🙂
It’s helpful as a mindset in just about any situation and retrospectives are no exception. If you’re looking for something that will help make your retrospectives more energising and achieve better results, say no more, that’s what I wrote my final thesis on:
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
A heartfelt “Witam!” to the Polish version of Retromat that launched on May 6th 2022 for Retromat’s 10 year anniversary \o/
Huge thanks go to Jarosław Łojko for translating 30 activities so far.
PS: There is a Japanese version in the works. So more language goodness to look forward to 😀
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
tl;dr The Retromat Forum is live – Connect with fellow facilitators
It’s high time to support a community around Retromat that is independent of me!
For example, because there are a lot of cool activities that never make it into Retromat – for various reasons (such as being tied to a specific time of year). But these activities would still be valuable to a lot of fellow facilitators. And in the Retromat Forum these can still be widely shared!
Another reason is that y’all are amazing people! The overwhelming majority of Retromat users I talk to are lovely and insightful and more of you should get to meet each other! (Only if you want to, of course!)
When I thought about which platform to build, I landed on forums. I’m probably showing my age here… It’s just that as far as asynchronous exchanges go, forums have always worked for me. The old phpbb forums, Reddit (arguably a kind of forum). My hope is that I’m not alone with that and forums work for you, too!
You surely know why communities hum or fall silent: They rise and fall with the people and discussions in them. I’ve met enough of you to know that you are interesting people with all sorts of tricks up your sleeves so I’d love for you to join! Get an account and share that activity! Or ask that question 🙂
For the longest time I thought it was my job as a facilitator to be neutral and impartial. I wasn’t sure I was “doing it right”, when I strengthened one party in a conflict by paraphrasing and helping them be understood, when they were at the disadvantage and I wanted the parties to have equal footing to work things out.
It wasn’t until the workshop with solution-focused coaches Veronika Jungwirth and Ralph Miarka that I learned a new word: Multipartiality (“Allparteilichkeit“).
It means to be able to understand and empathize with each party as needed, to help them phrase and explain their needs.
You expect neutrality from a judge. But mediators and (depending on the situation) facilitators will be more effective with a mindset of multipartiality.
Nowadays, I do not in facilitate meetings in which I know I won’t be able to be multipartial.
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
Many people are uncomfortable with silence. As a facilitator, it is important to become friends with silence and not feel compelled to fill awkward pauses.
I’ve learned that lesson a while back: Holding the silence used to be hard for me. I like to talk. I’m a chatty person. Shutting up is difficult for me. Letting silence be. Enduring it. It helped me to count from 10 to 20 in my head and to start over when I had reached 20.
If you look at people with attention and fully expecting them to continue talking, they will talk again. Even if, technically they have already said something about the issue. And that is when the magic happens!
Very interesting things happen when you don’t fill an awkward silence with chatter. You’ll hear things that others don’t readily come forward with. These are often newer or more controversial thoughts – Not surface level, not something they will readily share with anyone. Finding out about these deeper or more cautious thoughts is super valuable. You can work on concerns and keep issues from festering.
It’s magical. Enjoy the silence! Make it work for you 🙂
PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books
