Ferret out systemic issues during Sprint Retrospective

Ferret out systemic issues during Sprint Retrospective

Sprint Retrospective

The retrospective meeting is held at the end of every sprint, and it is the time to discuss what went well, and what could be improved in the next sprints. I feel the Product Owner should be in attendance. The PO is a part of the team, and should be present. 

I handle my Sprint Retrospectives by the book with a minor exception.

My Retrospectives

It usually only lasts 20-30 minutes then we start planning for the next Sprint.

The two basic questions are asked of each team member:

• What went well during this Sprint?
• What are aspects of this Sprint you feel could have been improved on?

I add in a third question:

• Not thinking of this Sprint in particular, what is keeping you up at night with this project?

What this third question does it takes them out of the Sprint mindset and force them look at the big picture. This is where systemic issues are brought to the surface.

Some responses I have received:

• The Technical Leads are overworked and we end up waiting hours for assistance.
• The QAs are not dedicated so we are building up technical debt.
• Why can't we embed the QAs within the teams?
• It seems every time we ask Web Operations to get their tasks done that we are dependent on we get push-back.

These four points would never come up in retro if the third question wasn't asked. Now the ScrumMaster and PO can put their heads together and tackle the systemic issues.

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