Why do We Vary Retros?

One of the facilitation techniques that a scrum master must have is retro facilitation. Normally a scrum master would vary the retro techniques on different sessions. Most people think that this is just to keep things interesting and increase the team engagement.

While there is some truth in making things interesting, there is a more important goal to change around the retro facilitation. That is to help the team surface different aspects of their experience in the last sprint. A different retro technique will produce different information.

Let me give you some examples. The classic technique of 3 columns with the happy, confused and sad columns, focus on the things that currently work and things that are not working well. Using this technique the team will be able to come up with future improvements, especially if there are things in the sad column.

Another retro technique that I like to use is the boat and its anchor. Basically, the sail represents the things that push things forward and the anchor represents the things that hold the team back. While similar at the first glance with happy and sad, the emphasis of this technique is improving an already high performing team. Furthermore, this will also show the things that are holding the team back.

If you are in a scrum master (or any team lead) role, think about what you want to achieve out of the retro. Remember that the most important thing that comes out of the retro are actionable items. If nothing comes out by in a session then think of different facilitation techniques.

As always, this website is great for retro techniques inspirations: http://tastycupcakes.org/?s=retro&x=0&y=0