Ben Linders presented on driving improvements through agile retrospectives. Some key points include: - Agile retrospectives enable continuous improvement at all levels by reflecting on ways of working and improving. - Facilitation and exercises used in retrospectives have a major impact on results. - Retrospective practices can be used to improve other processes like project evaluations. - When participating in retrospectives, project/product managers should support teams rather than manage them. - Regular retrospectives can motivate teams and bring business benefits like better products delivered faster.

1. Ben Linders Consulting
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Ben Linders
Driving Improvements with Agile
Retrospectives
Keynote Project & Product Management Day

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Key Takeaways
• Agile retrospectives enable continuous improvement at all levels
• How you do retrospectives has major impact on the results:
Good facilitation and suitable exercises matter!
• Spice up your (post-)project evaluations, post-mortems, and lessons-learned sessions
using agile retrospective practices
• When joining a retrospectives as a project manager or product manager, don’t “manage”!
Instead support teams & facilitators to get maximum results
• Agile retrospectives can bring significant business benefits:
Better products and faster delivery through motivated teams
With agile retrospectives organizations drive their improvements!
Ben Linders

3. Ben Linders Consulting
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Trainer / Coach / Adviser / Author / Speaker
Agile, Lean, Quality & Continuous improvement
Freelance Editor for InfoQ.com
BenLinders.com
Books: Getting Value out of Agile Retrospectives What Drives Quality
Agile Self-assessment Game Continuous Improvement
Games: Agile Self-assessment Retrospective Bingo Retrospective Smells

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State of Practice
Agile Retrospectives
Doing them?
Like doing them?
Valuable?

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Agile Retrospectives
Agile practice for teams to reflect on their way of working
and to continuously become better in what they do.
Focus upon
• Teamworking, collaboration
• Self organizing, autonomy
What is an Agile Retrospectives
Sustainable Improvement through Agile Retrospectives

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How I started with Agile Retrospectives
• Struggling with Project Lessons Learned
• Learned about retrospectives in 2001
• Apply in Stealth Mode
• Becoming agile in an agile way
Inspired by Project Retrospectives & Agile Retrospectives
Wrote Getting Value out of Agile Retrospectives
How I started with Agile Retrospectives

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Prime Directive
“Regardless of what we discover, we understand and truly believe that
everyone did the best job they could, given what they knew at the time, their
skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.”
Norm Kerth – Project Retrospectives
Prime Directive in many Languages
Create an Open Culture
where team member Speak Up
with Respect for each other
to Learn and Improve Soft Skills Matter
русский (Russian) Вне зависимости от того что будет обнаружено, мы должны понимать и
искренне верить, что каждый из нас выполнил свою работу настолько хорошо, насколько
мог, с учетом знаний, доступных на тот момент, его или её умений и возможностей,
имеющихся ресурсов и текущей ситуации.
Belarusian Незалежна ад таго, што мы высвятляем, мы павiнны разумець i шчыра верыць,
што кожны робiць усе магчымае, улiчваючы вядомую iнфармацыю, яго (яе) навыкi i
магчымасцi, даступныя рэсурсы, а таксама абставiны, якiя склалiлiся на дадзены момант.
Prime Directive in many Languages

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Developing Awesome Teams
Awesome teams:
• are self organized & take responsibility
• value collaboration & interaction
• eager to learn and improve themselves
Agile Retrospectives:
 empower teams
 help teams to take action
 enable sustainable improvement
If all teams improve in their own way, the best they can,
the whole organization will improve continuously!

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Example: Failed sprint
The Sprint that failed One-Word Exercise:
• Deal with Feelings
• Trust & Respect
• Empowerment

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Example: Not able to improve
Team that wasn’t a team yet 5-Times Why exercise
• Getting to know each other
• Collaborate
• Skills to Improve

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Facilitating Retrospectives
Facilitators
• Prepare the meeting
• Select appropriate exercises
• Chair: Retrospective Smells / Behavior
• Ensure action is taken
Making retrospectives effective
• Open & honest culture
• Build a shared insight
• Focus on the process
• Remain independent Facilitation Good Practices

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Retrospective Exercises
• Asking questions
• One-word retrospective
• Root Cause Analysis
• Asking Why?
• Strenghts (Solution Focused)
• Perfection game
• Action priorities
• Retrospective of Retrospectives
• Teams with multiple customers
Toolbox of Retrospective Techniques
• Remote Teams
• Futurespectives
• Strengths/Core Qualities
• Self-assessment Game
• Agile journey
• Safety check
• Faces Jack Sparrow

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Designing your Retrospective
amazon.com/dp/B00SWJO1DI benlinders.com/exercises/

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Vital Few Actions
• Small Actions
• Frequent Change
• Focus on Value
• Stop Starting,
Start Finishing
• Kanban
Short Cycled Improvement Vital Few Actions

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Spicing Up with Agile Retrospectives practices
(Post-) Project evaluations, post-mortems, and lessons-learned sessions:
• Too late, we’re done
• Not invented here
• No time/budget
• Don’t see the need
Valuable Agile Retrospectives:
• Frequent small improvements
• Involve everyone actively
• Decide & done by teams
• Follow up on actions

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Improve with Retrospectives
Focus on:
• Effective Teamwork
• Better Collaboration
• Development Process / Way of working
To get:
• Productivity Increase
• Product Quality
• Lower Costs
• Shorter Lead Time

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Improving Products with Retrospectives
Focus on the product, suitable exercises
• Building Awesome Products
• 3S Retrospective: Start, Spice-up, Stop
• Car Brand (from my book)

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Advice for Project/Product Managers
• Stop managing people
• Focus on outcomes
• Support teams & facilitators
• Foster collaboration
Leadership approaches
 Sociocracy (consent-based decisions)
 Intend-based leadership
 Host leadership
 Inviting leadership

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Enable organization for retrospectives
• Establish a culture of learning
• Drive out fear and blaming
• Do retrospectives at all levels
• Make retrospectives part of your processes

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Key Takeaways
• Agile retrospectives enable continuous improvement at all levels
• How you do retrospectives has major impact on the results:
Good facilitation and suitable exercises matter!
• Spice up your (post-)project evaluations, post-mortems, and lessons-learned sessions
using agile retrospective practices
• When joining a retrospectives as a project manager or product manager, don’t “manage”!
Instead support teams & facilitators to get maximum results
• Agile retrospectives can bring significant business benefits:
Better products and faster delivery through motivated teams
With agile retrospectives organizations drive their improvements!
Ben Linders

22. Ben Linders Consulting
@BenLinders 22
Questions?
Ben Linders
Independent Consultant Agile, Lean,
Quality & Continuous Improvement
info@BenLinders.com
@BenLinders
www.linkedin.com/in/benlinders
www.facebook.com/BenLindersConsulting
www.benlinders.com

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Spicing up Retrospectives
Full Day Workshops
 Why and How
 Business Benefits
 Facilitation Skills
 Exercises
Workshop Agile Retrospectives
Spice up your Agile Retrospectives
Increasing Agility with Retrospectives

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Making Agile Work for You
Practices for teams and stakeholders to develop the right products, deliver
faster, increase quality, and create happy high performing teams.
Full Day Workshops:
Deploying Agile practices effectively
Improve Collaboration
Tips & Trick for Agile & Lean
Improve Continuously
Increase your organization's agility!
BenLinders.com/agilelean

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Retrospectives Book
Getting Value out of Agile Retrospectives
By Luis Gonçalves & Ben Linders
Download from InfoQ or Leanpub
Buy on Amazon or Lulu
amazon.com/dp/B00SWJO1DI
leanpub.com/gettingvalueoutofagileretrospectives
Mailinglist: eepurl.com/Mem7H

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Continuous Improvement
Become aware of importance of continuous
improvement,
Explore how it’s engrained in agile software
development
Suggestions that you can use in your daily work to
improve continuously
Increase your organization's agility!
Leanpub.com/continuousimprovement
“Continuous Improvement is the act of continuously doing whatever helps to
become better and thus more valuable”

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Retrospectives Book Bundle
Six successful retrospectives books
• Getting Value out of Agile Retrospectives
• Fun Retrospectives
• Fifty Quick Ideas to Improve Your Retrospectives
• The Retrospective Handbook
• Retrospectives for Organizational Change
• The Retrospectives Kickstarter
These books will make your agile retrospectives rock!
Teams will love to do them :-).
leanpub.com/b/agileretrospectives
Discounted price: $30,48 (excl. VAT)

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Assessing your Agility
Over 80 tools:
• Self-Assessment checklists
• Readyness checks
• Maturity assessments
• Agile health checks
• Measurements
• And much more!
Agile Self-Assessments

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Services for Agile Self-assessments
Services for assessing your agility and increase delivered value:
• In-house workshop for playing the Agile Self-assessment Game
• Public workshops to experience the Agile Self-assessment Game
• Agile assessment for your team, department, or organization
• Facilitation for playing the game at your event (conference, meetup, hackathon, game lab, etc)
• Tailoring the Agile Self-assessment Game to your specific needs
• Licenses for playing the game
• …
Contact: benlinders@gmail.com +31 6 2901 3863