Should You Adopt a Retrospective for Your Work?
Leveraging the biggest critic (yourself) for significant gains at work
One concept I’ve borrowed from agile project management into my work is the retrospective. The retrospective is a recurring meeting held at the end of a sprint where the team gathers and discusses in a safe environment what went well, what could have been improved, and what to do in the next sprint.
Some of you don’t know anything about agile project management and that’s okay — there’s no need to. The important thing here is to know that the retrospective is a meeting to help the team improve continuously.
A retrospective for your work
Lately, I’ve scheduled time with myself at the end of the day to conduct a retrospective for my work. Anyone can do this — you don’t need to be an agile project manager or work on an agile project.
The benefits of reviewing your day
During that time, I ask myself and write down the answers to three questions:
- What went well today?
- What could have gone better?
- What will I do differently tomorrow?
These three questions are the core of the retrospective, but I’ve adopted them to critique myself about the work I do.
How to make it work for you
Here’s how to make it work for you:
- Determine the right cadence and frequency for your self-retrospective (mine’s daily, but you could do it weekly or bi-weekly)
- Schedule it in your calendar (I like to do it at the end of the day — I’m not super productive after a long day of work anyway).
- Ask and write down the answers to the three questions above
- Conduct a retrospective on your retrospectives (i.e., hold yourself accountable)
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