July 26, 2017

Take 3, Scene 26: The Value of Retrospectives

On this episode of Take 3, Jonathan Rivers and Alexis Ireland discuss the lessons that Agile development teams can learn when they have retrospectives once per iteration, and how being intentional about the practice can benefit the business as a whole.

LISTEN TO THE EPISODE

Interested in hearing more? Tune in to the full episode via the embed below.

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS

  • Agile teams should have retrospectives once per iteration because a constant stream of small improvements generates more efficiency as you go along. In every sprint and every iteration, you have a small set of feedback that allows you to adapt and change more often, without really compromising delivery abilities.
  • Retrospectives can help teams focus on what works and stay engaged, if they approach it with the right perspective. Retrospectives can’t turn into a blame game or a complain fest – we’re all going to make mistakes so, if we’re going to fail, we might as well fail fast.
  • One of the great things about Agile and it’s its rituals, especially the retrospective, is the level of introspection and focus on craft. It allows us to get out of the whirlwind of our schedules, take a moment, and think about what we did. Are we moving in the right direction or are we blindly driving towards our initial goal?
  • There’s always a little bit of hesitancy to do retrospectives outside of the delivery cycle, but there is a lot of value to looking back and noting what went really well, and potentially what could be learned, outside of product development.

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ABOUT THE GUESTS

Jonathan Rivers is the Chief Technology Officer at 3Pillar Global, where he leads 3Pillar’s product and engineering organizations. He works with 3Pillar team members in each of our locations throughout the world to foster product development best practices that lead to business value for clients.

Alexis Ireland is a product manager at 3Pillar Global, where she builds, owns, and drives successful SaaS and digital products. Her specialties include SAS and digital products strategy, Agile methodologies, user experience testing, and audience and data analytics.