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  <mainDescription>&lt;p>&#xD;
    Retrospectives, as applied in software development, have historical roots in Project Retrospectives described as:&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;blockquote>&#xD;
        &quot;A ritual held &lt;b>at the end&lt;/b> of a project to learn from the experience and plan changes for the next&#xD;
        effort.&quot; [&lt;a class=&quot;elementLinkWithUserText&quot; href=&quot;./../../../openup/guidances/supportingmaterials/references_6CCF393.html#KER01&quot; guid=&quot;_9ToeIB83Edqsvps02rpOOg&quot;>KER01&lt;/a>]&#xD;
&lt;/blockquote>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    While Retrospectives conducted at the end of a project remain valuable, the spirit of Retrospectives should be imbued&#xD;
    across the project continuum, conducted at key project milestones: at the end of project iterations, releases, and&#xD;
    immediately upon occurrences of key project incidents (significant unexpected events). &#xD;
&lt;/p>	&#xD;
&lt;p>	&#xD;
	When the practice of&#xD;
    Retrospectives is intimately intertwined with the processes of the project, the health of the team is constantly&#xD;
    monitored, the heartbeat of project progress is readily measured, and the team hones an awareness of opportunities for&#xD;
    improvement and increased productivity. A symbiotic relationship emerges between an evolutionary development process&#xD;
    and a Retrospective that supports the various methods of inspection and adaptation.&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The iteration, incident, and project Retrospectives are designed, in part, to calibrate the team's progress with the&#xD;
    goals of the project. Several methods can be used to incite the Retrospective team to begin their collective&#xD;
    investigative work, such as posing the following three driving questions to the team: &quot;What worked well for us during&#xD;
    the past iteration (or project, and so on)?&quot;, &quot;What did not work well for us during the past iteration (or project, and so on)?&quot;,&#xD;
    and &quot;What should we do differently, or what improvements should we undertake during our next iteration (or project, and so on)&quot;. &#xD;
&lt;/p>	&#xD;
&lt;p>	&#xD;
	The questions are expected to generate actions that will assist the team in prioritizing suggested improvements&#xD;
    for the project, to be implemented during the subsequent cycle. In addition to the aforementioned investigative&#xD;
    questions, a Retrospective should include steps that provide structure for the team's focus and resulting work.&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    An effectively facilitated Retrospective will create an environment that is conducive to various practices of&#xD;
    inspection and adaptation. The methods of inspection and adaptation are project control mechanisms that assume, and&#xD;
    respond to, the existence of complexity, unpredictability, and constant change. Practiced in the context of a&#xD;
    Retrospective, the methods of inspection and adaptation produce a feedback loop from which flexibility, responsiveness,&#xD;
    and reliability are realized.&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The mere execution of Retrospectives is insufficient without an organizational commitment to a collaborative culture.&#xD;
    The success of Retrospectives is directly proportional to, and necessarily contingent on, an environment that engenders&#xD;
    highly motivated and performing teams (not the individual), nurtures open and frequent communication, and a thriving&#xD;
    sense of dedication to the team community. Retrospectives embody the spirit of team collaboration and self-reflection&#xD;
    by offering an environment in which teams are encouraged to provide feedback and identify lessons learned [&lt;a class=&quot;elementLinkWithUserText&quot; href=&quot;./../../../openup/guidances/supportingmaterials/references_6CCF393.html#DER06&quot; guid=&quot;_9ToeIB83Edqsvps02rpOOg&quot;>DER06&lt;/a>]. The compositional aspects of the team are crucial in supporting the highly&#xD;
    collaborative nature of Retrospectives, enabling the team to produce insight(s) into improving the processes of the&#xD;
    project.&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The participants that gather in the context of a Retrospective constitute more than a &quot;working group&quot;.&#xD;
    The participants should be thought of as &quot;a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to&#xD;
    a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable.&quot; [&lt;a class=&quot;elementLinkWithUserText&quot; href=&quot;./../../../openup/guidances/supportingmaterials/references_6CCF393.html#KAT93&quot; guid=&quot;_9ToeIB83Edqsvps02rpOOg&quot;>KAT93&lt;/a>]&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The participants should consist of individuals representing cross-functional groups, having been involved in the&#xD;
    project period or project incident for which the Retrospective will be conducted. The size of the team is important,&#xD;
    for the rigorously participative environment of the Retrospective may be difficult to achieve with an overwhelmingly&#xD;
    large group (25+ individuals), and a time-boxed period in which to conduct the Retrospective. Conversely, a&#xD;
    small set of participants that is under-represented by the appropriate functional groups will limit the&#xD;
    benefits and productivity of team collaboration and self-organization. Although a Retrospective achieves productive&#xD;
    results by actualizing team responsibility, self-organization, and opposing traditional imposing authority, the work&#xD;
    conducted in a Retrospective - involving the members of cross-functional groups - demands the presence of a designated&#xD;
    facilitator.&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The individual that is designated to assume the role of facilitator, or Retrospective leader, should possess&#xD;
    fundamental skills of a facilitative management approach:&#xD;
&lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;blockquote dir=&quot;ltr&quot; style=&quot;MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px&quot;>&#xD;
    &lt;p class=&quot;quote&quot;>&#xD;
        &quot;A facilitator is an individual who enables groups and organizations to work more effectively; to collaborate and&#xD;
        achieve synergy. She or he is a &quot;content neutral&quot; party who by not taking sides or expressing or advocating a point&#xD;
        of view during the meeting, can advocate for fair, open, and inclusive procedures to accomplish the group's work. A&#xD;
        facilitator can also be a learning or dialogue guide to assist a group in thinking deeply about its assumptions,&#xD;
        beliefs and values and about its systemic processes and context.&quot; [&lt;a class=&quot;elementLinkWithUserText&quot; href=&quot;./../../../openup/guidances/supportingmaterials/references_6CCF393.html#KAN96&quot; guid=&quot;_9ToeIB83Edqsvps02rpOOg&quot;>KAN96&lt;/a>]&#xD;
    &lt;/p>&#xD;
&lt;/blockquote>&#xD;
&lt;p>&#xD;
    The facilitator can be expected to allow the participants to exercise a sense of ownership in the operating mode of&#xD;
    thought, act to remove impediments to the team's effort to reach targeted goals, foster an environment of trust and&#xD;
    thriving collaboration, and support the team in a manner that allows the team to achieve its best thinking. Ultimately,&#xD;
    the facilitator focuses on managing the format of the Retrospective, while the participants hone their skills in&#xD;
    managing the Retrospective content and maintaining a high-performance, participatory group dynamic.&#xD;
&lt;/p></mainDescription>
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