AoAD2 Practice: Retrospectives
This is an excerpt from The Art of Agile Development, Second Edition. Visit the Second Edition home page for additional excerpts and more!
This excerpt is copyright 2007, 2021 by James Shore and Shane Warden. Although you are welcome to share this link, do not distribute or republish the content without James Shore’s express written permission.
Retrospectives
- Audience
- Whole Team
We continually improve our work habits.
Key Idea: Continuous Improvement
Every Agile team is different. The team members are different, the stakeholders are different, and what the team needs to do is different. That means every team’s process needs to be different, too.
Although it’s usually best to learn Agile by starting with an off-the-shelf process, such as the one in this book, that’s the beginning, not the end. There are always ways to make your team’s process work better, and when your situation changes, your process needs to change with it.
Agile teams constantly look for opportunities to improve their process, work habits, relationships, and environment. Anything that will make their work better is open for consideration.
Organizations can put constraints around their teams’ processes, but they should never expect every team to have the exact same process. The more teams can customize their process to their specific needs, the more effective they’ll be.
Your team should constantly update and improve your development process. Retrospectives are a great way to do so.
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In this Section
- Retrospectives
- Key Idea: Continuous Improvement
- Types of Retrospectives
- How to Conduct a Heartbeat Retrospective
- Step 1: The Prime Directive (5 minutes)
- Step 2: Brainstorming (20 minutes)
- Step 3: Mute Mapping (15 minutes)
- Step 4: Generate Insights (10–30 minutes)
- Step 5: Retrospective Objective (10–20 minutes)
- Follow Through
- Questions
- Prerequisites
- Indicators
- Alternatives and Experiments
- Further Reading
Discuss the book on the AoAD2 mailing list or Discord server. For videos and interviews regarding the book, see the book club archive.
For more excerpts from the book, see the Second Edition home page.