1. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Rachel Davies Retrospectives Reflect together to tune the way you work

2. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Session Overview Guide on how to run a retrospective [30 mins] Time for: – Questions [10 mins] – Practical experience [35 mins] Mini-retrospective on Agile Development conference – Feedback [15 mins]

3. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Connextra Story Team set up on XP principles in 1999 under the guidance of John Nolan and Tim Mackinnon Started using Retrospectives after talking to RoleModel Software at XP2001 Retrospectives helped us to improve our process: – Communication both inside and outside the company Improved Planning Game, Standup meetings Client Support – Our development environment Language, IDE, OS

4. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 What is a Retrospective? A meeting where a team looks back on a past period of work so that they can learn from their experience and apply this learning to future projects

5. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Background Pioneered by Norman Kerth, author of “Project Retrospectives” 2000 Adapted to support XP iterations by agile development teams – Eg RoleModel Soft, Connextra

6. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 What a Retrospective is not... A Retrospective is not a Post-Mortem: Aim to use Retrospectives regularly during the life of the project rather than after catastrophic failure A Retrospective is not a Witch-Hunt: Retrospectives are not about apportioning blame

7. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Why hold a Retrospective? To reflect and learn from the past To decide how the team will work in the future To improve communication within the team To allow a team to own and drive their development process

8. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Regular maintenance After work period, hold a retrospective – Reflect on what did and didn't work over the past work period – Make adjustments Repeat “heartbeat” cycle to boost.. – Communication – Ownership (+intrinsic motivation) – Effectiveness

9. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Who should attend? Try to represent many viewpoints: – Development – Marketing – Customer Support – QA – Managers May split into specialist groups – eg Dev only for specialist discussions

10. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Choosing a Location On-site – Convenient – Cheaper but may imply unimportant – Risk of interruptions Off-site – Possibly not practical for regular retrospective Room requirements – Moveable tables/chairs – Flipcharts

11. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Choosing a Facilitator Use a Facilitator to manage the Retrospective: Neutral outsider Background in software development Experienced in mediation and conflict resolution

12. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Kerth's Prime Directive “Regardless of what we discover, we must understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job he or she could, given what was known at the time, his or her skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.” Norman Kerth, 2000

13. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Negative Packaging A message wrapped in a complaint may be worth listening to, but the negative packaging can harm the learning process Retrospective format should use activities which try to diffuse the negative nature of complaints...

14. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Create Safety Create an atmosphere in which team members feel comfortable talking openly and honestly – Everything is optional – Secret ballot 5 = “No problem” 1 = “No way” – Establish ground rules

15. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Ground Rules For example: ●We will try not to interrupt (use a token) ●We will talk from our own perspective and not speak for anyone else ●There will be no jokes at the expense of anyone in the room

16. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Getting the Story Out Techniques: Artifacts Contest [item to jog memories] Develop a Timeline Draw Process Maps [how we actually work] Offer Appreciations [Tim, I appreciate you for..] Outputs: – What worked well – What we should do differently – Puzzles

17. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Practical Split into groups – Nominate a facilitator and a scribe Mini-retrospective on ADC2003 [30 mins] – Agree ground rules to “Create Safety” – “Get the Story Out” Artifacts/Timeline/Process Maps/Appreciations Present conclusions to session group [5 mins] – What worked well? – What we should do differently? – Puzzles?

18. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Any Questions? Do you have any questions about the process and practical?

19. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Feedback Groups feedback on how useful they found the process

20. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Reading List “Project Retrospectives: A Handbook for Team Reviews” by Norman Kerth “Agile Software Development” by Alistair Cockburn “Adaptation: XP Style” XP2001 conference paper by Chris Collins & Roy Miller, RoleModel Software

21. © Connextra 2001: delivering the right information to the right people at the right time© eXtreme Tuesday Club 2003 Useful Links Norm Kerth's site – http://www.retrospectives.com Ward Cunningham's wiki – http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?ExtremeProgrammingRoadmap Extreme Tuesday Club, XTC – http://www.xpdeveloper.com Agile Alliance – http://www.agilealliance.com