Three little pigs – Fun Retrospective Technique

Probably you know as Scrum Master that it’s hard to vary the way to do Retrospectives in a Scrum team. I came across a nice site funretrospectives.com, where I found the one: Three Little Pigs. For the ones that don’t know anymore how that fairytale went, including a catchy melody…

The goal I had with the retrospective, was to look back at the past sprint, but also to talk about what goes well (bricks); what goes well most of the time, but needs improvement to get impediments out of the way on structural basis (sticks); or what subject needs further improvement (straw).

The retrospective

The setup of the retrospective I used was as follows in a time boxed setting of one hour.

Check-in

Welcome the team for the retrospective and tell the fairytale. Use voices, huff and puff!
Divide a whiteboard or wall in straw, sticks and bricks categories, maybe even add a drawing of the three little pigs ;)

Gathering the information

It’s up to the team to decide how to gather the information. Team members can write down subjects on post-its and place it in the category straw, sticks or bricks. The other way is write down the subject directly in the category on the whiteboard. The subjects will bring discussion on where to place them on the whiteboard. After like 20-30 minutes it’s time to wrap up this fase of the retrospective. I tried to get consensus if the subjects are in the right category. The last pros and cons were discussed in this fase.

Focus on the subjects itself

During this fase we went through the subjects on the whiteboard starting with the bricks and end with the straw. Talk about improvements that can be made on the different subjects or what should stay the same.

Checkout

In the checkout I let the team pick three subjects to convert into an action for the next sprint. Take a picture of the whiteboard, including the picked subjects for later use.

The extras

During this retrospective I got a great number of subjects the team can improve on process, knowledge and personal aspects. Not all subjects were picked for the next sprint, but the subjects can be used to set long term goals as well. Also this retrospective acknowledged the strengths of the team and what makes the team work like a Swiss watch.