Leading teams is hard, and it's even harder to know where the problems are and how to solve them, unless you do retro properly and effectively. Apart from 1:1s the retro is the most important tool in your leadership belt, when done well it gives insight into a teams thoughts with real actions for them to take control of it.

By the end of this article you should have the details to know what a good retro looks like, the impact it has on teams and different approaches for running them (including how to do it async). In my opinion retros should be used in every single job, and in your own personal life.

The only way to improve is to reflect on where you fucked up

• Michael Tempest, just now

Why run a retro?

The return on investment (ROI) with retros is massive, as a few hours spent every few weeks have incredibly long lasting impacts on:

• Continuous improvement
• Team morale and health
• Risk identification and navigation
• Team productivity

What does a good retro look like?

If I had to summarise the the following points of the most important:

• Keep it regular
• Psychological safety
• Actionable items (consistently reviewed) So let's look into these in more depth.

Keep it regular

Humans in general are habitual creatures, it's why things like sprints, ceremonies and habit forming are so important to keeping things running smoothly in a humans mind. Forming a habit around running retro means you will get a much better engagement from your team, and they will probably even have things they want to bring up in retro. As a side note encourage your team to not wait for retro to bring up issues, otherwise it could be weeks it's been playing on their mind.

If you are running sprints, or regular cycles then try and link up your retro with the rhythm of this. I have found the best time is to focus on the last day before you jump into the next flow of work and focus.

Psychological safety

This is something that needs building within the team within and outside the retro, but the retro is the best place to demonstrate it. It's an opportune moment to allow anyone to give their opinion and not feel like it's either stupid, unwarranted, or that they will be attacked for having an opinion.

During retro the facilitator is there to help people feel safe to say what's bothering them, to support it being taken seriously.

Actionable items (consistently reviewed)

There is no point in doing a retro without any actionable actions coming out of it. If there are no actions then it was just a session to moan, which is fine but it means nothing is likely to change. During retro make sure actions are raised and assigned specifically to individuals, but also be careful to assign actins for everything as you will soon end up with nothing being done. The facilitator is there to document and assign the actions, but they are also there to prioritise what really needs actions.

One area I often forget but is the most important is to start or end every retro with a review of current on-going action items. If you aren't doing the things you have signed up for then nothing is going to change. Use this time review on going actions, celebrate where actions have been done and support ones that have not had a chance to be completed.

Types of Retros

The most traditional type of retro is one you would do in a sprint or 2 week cycle, but there are other types of retros you can run for very specific outcomes. Let's look at these concepts, why you would run them and what kind of outcomes to expect.

Cycle retro

The most common form of retro, usually done during the end of a sprint (every 2 weeks) and is focused more on a general retro of how things are going. This is probably the most important style of retro as it give you the regularity and the most benefits as a team to raise things and actively action it.

Why run this one?

Having a regular retro allows for problems to be caught early and solved, but it also helps identify common patterns. Teams appreciate the regularity and although feedback should be raised whenever it does give individuals a space where they can dedicate time to get things off their chest.

Outcomes expected

• Celebration and achievements
• Identifying challenges
• Actionable improvements
• Team alignment
• Increased ownership

Async retro

This is a way to run retros without needing to constantly sync all the time. Even though I love async working it's important to use this style of retro on rare occasions as you can easily miss those benefits of team members bouncing ideas off each other, and not having those healthy discussions on what actions we should take and why they matter.

Why run this one?

If you are struggling to get time with everyone and want to give a bit of flexibility to team members for their own time then running an async retro is an awesome way to do this. It does mean that there is more ownership on the person running the retro to keep engagement and visibility high. Do this one well and you can still get most of the benefits of a traditional retro with a splash of flexibility.

Outcomes expected

• Celebration and achievements
• Identifying challenges
• Actionable improvements
• Team alignment
• Increased ownership

Project retro

If you have had a recent big or problematic project then it's advised to assign a specific retro to look at that project and define, what went well, what didn't and what to do differently next time. This is usually something that the lead of the project should run as they have the best view of the life of the project, but it really helps influence future projects.

Why run this one?

Regular retros will catch things in the moment, but they might not catch things that happen on specific projects over a long period of time. Running a project retro allows people to focus on specific areas that happen in a project and decide as a team how to avoid that in the future. As an example did the delivery go as expected, what hurdles did we face that we don't want to next time. With a project retro it's important to leave any ego at the door because there may be a lot of decisions that are challenged that might display gaps in people skillset. If you feel like you skills are coming into question, before defending yourself, listen and take everything and really question yourself. Next time try the alternative way that's being suggested, remember it's not a personal attack it's a chance to learn something new.

Outcomes expected

• Understanding of the full lifecycle of the project
• Celebration and achievements
• Identifying challenges
• Actionable improvements
• Ways of working changes

Future-spective

This is one of the rarest but also one of my favourite style of "retro" as it can set a project up effectively but also give a huge amount of excitement into the project before it's even started. This is probably the hardest one to plan and facilitate as it's usually quite custom and needs a good understanding of the project.

Why run this one?

If you have a critical project coming up, or have never had a chance to run a project retro then this is a great opportunity to set things off to a really good start. Use this as a chance to act as a "retro" and "kick-off" in one hit by learning from the past to influence a specific projects future.

Outcomes expected

• RACI of who will own what
• Specific ways of working for the project
• Things to avoid
• Things to try

Summary

Retro is one of the important tools in a teams arsenal and should be at the corner stone of the ceremonies that are must haves for a successful team. It can improve psychological safety, it highlights where things are going well and where you need to improve and it gives a platform for everyone to suggest and action change. In my opinion having regular and effective retros will establish a strong team that avoid toxic behaviours and actively knows if something is wrong they have the power to change it.