Planning your next agile retrospective? Start with a random plan, change it to fit the team's situation, print it and share the URL. Or browse around for new ideas!

Is this your first retrospective? Start here!
Retromat Miroboard Mega Template
Are you running your retrospectives with Miro? Create prettier boards faster with the giant Retromat Miroboard Mega Template!

Check out the Mega Template
Retromat.org – by Corinna Baldauf
Plan-ID:
Replaced by JS
◄
Set the stage

What kind of X? (#140)

Participants give a metaphor for the iteration
Source: Unknown via Corinna Baldauf
Start by asking "If this iteration was an X, what kind of X would it be?" This question has endless variations from "If the iteration was a animal, what animal would it be?" over cocktails and furniture to plants and "If the iteration was a car, what car would it be?"

Ask everybody to write down their answer on a sticky note. Go around the team, everybody reads out their note and posts it on a board. Briefly discuss the answers. After all it's a difference if the iteration were "a BMW, but the brakes don't work" or a "red 2004 Toyota Prius". What does it mean to the people who wrote it down?
►
◄
Gather data

Delay Display (#127)

What's the current delay? And where are we going again?
Source: Christian Schafmeister
Draw a table with 3 columns. Head the first one 'Destination', the second one 'Delay' and the last one 'Announcement'.

Introduce the scenario: 'You are at a train station. Where is your train going? (It can be anything, a fictional or a real place.) How much of a delay does the train currently have? And what is the announcement? Why is there a delay? (This can be a real reason or modeled after the typical announcements.)'

Each team member fills out 3 sticky notes, 1 for each column. Going around the circle, each team member posts their notes and explains briefly, why they're going to destination X and why there's a delay (or not).

Trains and train delays are very familiar in Germany. Depending on your country and culture you might want to pick a different mode of transportation.
►
◄
Generate insights

Remember the Future (#37)

Imagine the next iteration is perfect. What is it like? What did you do?
Source: Luke Hohmann, found at Diana Larsen
'Imagine you could time travel to the end of the next iteration (or release). You learn that it was the best, most productive iteration yet! How do your future selves describe it? What do you see and hear?' Give the team a little time to imagine this state and jot down some keywords to aid their memory. Then let everyone describe their vision of a perfect iteration.
Follow up with 'What changes did we implement that resulted in such a productive and satisfying future?'Write down the answers on index cards to use in the next phase.
►
◄
Decide what to do

Circle of Questions (#11)

Asking and answering go around the team circle - an excellent way to reach consensus
Source: Agile Retrospectives
Everyone sits in a circle. Begin by stating that you'll go round asking questions to find out what you want to do as a group. You start by asking your neighbor the first question, e.g. 'What is the most important thing we should start in the next iteration?' Your neighbor answers and asks her neighbor a related question. Stop when consensus emerges or the time is up. Go around at least once, so that everybody is heard!
►
◄
Close the retrospective

Appreciations (#15)

Let team members appreciate each other and end positively
Source: Agile Retrospectives who took it from 'The Satir Model: Family Therapy and Beyond'
Start by giving a sincere appreciation of one of the participants. It can be anything they contributed: help to the team or you, a solved problem, ...Then invite others and wait for someone to work up the nerve. Close, when no one has talked for a minute.
►
◄

(#)


Source:
►
Retromat contains 127 activities, allowing for 8349005 combinations (25x30x22x22x23+5) and we are constantly adding more.

Created by Corinna Baldauf

Corinna wished for something like Retromat during her Scrummaster years. Eventually she just built it herself in the hope that it would be useful to others, too. Any questions, suggestions or encouragement? You can email her or follow her on Twitter. If you like Retromat you might also like Corinna's blog and her summaries on Wall-Skills.com.

Co-developed by Timon Fiddike

Timon gives Scrum trainings. He mentors advanced scrum masters and advanced product owners. Human, dad, nerd, contact improv & tango dancer. He has used Retromat since 2013 and started to build new features in 2016. You can email him or follow him on Twitter. Photo © Ina Abraham.