“In retrospectives we often make up for the fact that we didn’t have a liftoff”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Either Deborah Hartmann Preuss<\/a> or Steve Holyer<\/a> said that in a conversation and it rings true. Very few teams get a proper liftoff and they lose weeks and months of productivity to initial friction. In contrast, a proper liftoff sets up a team for success by laying a solid foundation of agreements and shared understandings. Then the team doesn’t have to spend their retrospectives patching up problems that could have been avoided.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You might know them as kickoffs, jump starts, launches or project starts \u2013 a meeting at the beginning of a team coming together and \/ or starting to work on something. I\u2019m going with the name \u201cliftoff\u201d because of the book by the same name written by Diana Larsen and Ainsley Nies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A huge chunk of “Liftoff<\/a>” describes Agile Chartering as a way to clarify purpose, alignment and context<\/strong> of the team and work. Srinath Ramakrishnan<\/a> summarises it like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAgile chartering is a lightweight minimum documentation approach to creating initial understandings, agreements and alignment about the work and how it will be accomplished.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n A liftoff is a longer event, lasting from a day up to a week. All the necessary people take part, i.e. the team, the project sponsor and whoever else is needed to provide context and insights. Many liftoffs are also off-site which improves focus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you forgo a liftoff you often spend a lot of retrospectives on clarifying things that should have been clear from the get go. Of course, there are retro activities that can help, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n But you try to compensate for a lack of alignment in short stretches of time and typically with crucial people & their knowledge missing. You really wanna do liftoffs, trust me. Your retros will go a lot smoother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, what if you missed the start? The project is already underway and you find yourself with a team patching up cracks in the foundation instead of “clicking”? Well, it\u2019s never too late to reboot with a mid-project liftoff to (re)gain footing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Check out \u201cLiftoff<\/a>\u201d for details on how to run one \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n When health is concerned, preventing issues altogether is often easier than treating them once they manifest. The same can be said for retrospectives: “In retrospectives we often make up for the fact that we didn’t have a liftoff” Either Deborah Hartmann Preuss or Steve Holyer said that in a conversation and it rings true. Very … <\/p>\nWhat are liftoffs exactly?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/liftoff-250x300.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nPS: 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><\/strong><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"