How to Facilitate Agile Retrospectives

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. 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.

Goals of this class

• How to manage activities, group dynamics, time, and yourself
• Know Facilitation techniques to lead the group so that they reach the goal

You will learn

• Why explain the purpose of an activity before to begin?
• What is the four-step debrief method?
• How to make sure people who have something to say have the chance?
• How to make sure people who have a lot to say don’t dominate?
• How to stay within the timebox?
• How not to be overwhelmed by interpersonal dynamics?

References

• Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great, Esther Derby & Diana Larsen
• The Retrospective Handbook, Patrick Kua
• Improving Agile Retrospectives, Marc Loeffler
• Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision-Making, Sam Kaner