Retrospectives provide an opportunity to inspect and adapt. They allow a team to hit the pause button to really reflect about the work at hand and how the team is working together. The best retrospectives are the ones that result in a couple solid action items that drive improvements.
Retrospectives are best leveraged when they are executed throughout the project, not just at the end. This allows the team to make improvements that can still be applied to the current project.
So, what about retrospectives themselves? Should the facilitator wait until the end for feedback? NO! NO! NO!
Using the same logic as above, waiting until the end of the retrospective doesn’t enable the facilitator to inspect and adapt to make improvements for that retrospective, it’s too late.
The best-practice is for the facilitator to check in with the audience at multiple points throughout the workshop or meeting.
Check on the energy level. Check on the feeling of progress. Check on the feeling of the pace and the clarity of explanations.
The facilitator can then adapt as needed to respond to the feedback of the collective audience.
Just the act of asking for feedback will affect how the audience views the facilitator and session. People like it when they feel their input matters.
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