Agile retrospectives aren’t just for teams or organizations. Individuals (like you and me) also use them as a way of taking stock and choosing how to move forward—reflecting, inspecting, and adapting to the changing conditions in our lives. Chronological milestones serve as a great prompts for a personal retrospective (e.g., year’s-end, birthday, anniversary, solstice, etc.).
We find ourselves at the end of 2009, looking toward 2010 with eager anticipation and/or reluctant anxiety. What a great time to retrospect!
First, plan your retrospective.
Where will you focus? Choose a focus or theme for the retrospective that holds meaning for...
Values vs. Principles vs. Practices in the Iron Cage of Death*: Three Go in, One Comes Out
Discussions about where to start with Agile approaches tend to devolve into “you got your practices in my values”...”no, you got your values in my practices.” Trying to bridge the gap, some folks say, “look at the principles for guidance.” None of these works.
In reality, we have to have it all. We need values to use as filters for our decisions. We need principles to give us ideas about what values look like when they come out of the clouds and into actual...
Tom Cagley posted an interview with me at his Software Process and Measurement-Cast blog. Tom begins the podcast with part 7 in his series of audio essays, "Traceability, A Radical Approach Based on User Involvement." The interview with me starts about 25% of the way in. We discuss Agile, Agile Adoptions, Retrospectives and upcoming events.
Ola Ellnestam writes about “An AI Retrospective” that ended with the group “steaming with positive energy and really going.”
Nick Oostvogel describes a creative activity to revive boring retrospectives and tell the shared story of the project (Gather Data). He calls it Mr. Squiggle.