Sprint Retrospective - Sketch your state

Sprint retrospectives

Retrospectives are a good way to reflect on a Sprint outcome. Agile framework is built on the principle of 'continuously improving through feedback'. Every team should take a moment from the delivery mode, look back on the previous sprint, and see how things can be improved. In case you feel the team is doing extremely well, take a moment, appreciate the team and the factors that are making this happen. I don't think this ever happens though, there is always room for improvement.

There is no standard frequency for retrospectives. Some teams prefer to do it once every sprint, some do it in alternate sprints. In my opinion, when we are starting new work or new project, this should happen more frequently so that we are stable early.

Why the blog?

This blog is for teams, who have been doing retrospectives for a while, but are bored of the regular templates. 'What went well', 'Things to improve' have now become 'Things that are boring'. 'Sketch your state' is something that I have used a few times with different teams and they have found it as a good break from the regular models. 

Sketch your state

I know a lot of people love to draw. Drawings bring out the creative side of an individual. Some people are good at it, some are bad, but this art is not something that is visible on the team table. Hence, this adds up as a new thing you learn about your team members.

The idea of this exercise is to ask individuals to draw their feelings about the project. Are you happy on the project/ team, are you excited, do you have enough challenges, are you too stressed or underutilised? Give everyone 5-10 mins to draw. People can draw using stick figures, smileys, box diagrams whatever they are comfortable with. 

Post the given time, each one has to explain what they have drawn. Identify points that are making the team successful or people are excited about. E.g. 'happy on the team', 'following good practices', 'loads to learn', etc. etc. Identify the pain points or the issues that the individuals are feeling. E.g. 'Tech debt burden', 'no direction', 'code smells', etc.

What I like the most about such retros is that everyone gets a chance to speak and it is not hijacked by a dominating person!

Ask the team to vote on the most painful points. Discuss the top voted points and identify actions to resolve them. Well, the success of a Retro depends on identifying the actions to resolve problems and completing them. The 1-1.5 hours retro will help the team feel heard, gives them a platform to raise their concerns, helps every stakeholder understand the problem that the team is facing. But, the most important aspect is what do you do with it? So, remember to follow up on the action items.

Finally, you should always close the Retrospectives on a positive note. Spare 5 mins to do appreciations. There are a million variations for this as well. For one, just create a small space on the wall, distribute sticky notes and ask members to add their appreciations. While you read them, a round of applause would be great.

Follow this up with one or two of the regular retrospectives (Starfish, Sad Mad Glad) and do this one again. See if there is any improvement in the drawing skills ;) and also in the team status. 

Here are some examples: