Agile Retrospectives

Chapter 3 Leading Retrospectives

This chapter is about the role and skills of a retrospective leader. You don’t need to be a professional facilitator to lead an iteration retrospective, but you do need basic facilitation skills. To learn the skills, you need to understand the role, practice, and seek feedback.

As a retrospective facilitator you may follow the content, but your primary responsibility is the process. When facilitators talk about process, they aren’t talking about a heavyweight methodology. Process means managing activities, managing group dynamics, and managing time ( The Skilled Facilitator [Sch94]). Retrospective leaders focus on the process and structure of the retrospective. They attend to the needs and dynamics of the group and help the group reach a goal. Retrospective leaders remain neutral in discussions, even when they have strong opinions.

When the content involves your own team, it’s easy to get caught up in the discussion. It’s tempting to jump into an engaging conversation, especially when you care about the topic. But, if you’re immersed in the content, you can’t pay full attention to the process. Wait a beat to determine whether your thoughts are necessary. Most often, your team will do nicely without your input. The risk of giving input is that when the leader jumps in too often, it quashes group discussion.

Participants, on the other hand, focus on the content, discuss, sometimes disagree (though not disagreeably), and make decisions. Participants ...