Story Cube Retrospective II

Introduction

This retrospective technique originates from a post on Tastycupcakes.org and uses Rory's Story Cubes as a metaphor for the past sprint or similar in the retrospective. The intention is to provide a visual tool that can be used by a team to express their feelings about a sprint or an iteration especially if it has been a particularly difficult one.

Learning Objectives

• Awareness of deeper feelings and realisation about a difficult sprint or iteration
• Derive deeper actions or improvements with respect to events that happened or might happen during a sprint or iteration

Timings

This workshop should be done within 60 to 90 mins dependent upon how much the team want to discuss what they find.

Materials

• 2 x sets of Rory's Story Cubes (from different sets works well.)
• Flip chart paper
• Post-it notes
• Sharpies

Workshop Flow

Connections

Connections part of the activity are intended to enable the attendees to connect with the subject and with each other, and should have more context than “ice breakers” that would otherwise not have any relevance to the subject or context of the workshop.

Activities	Description
Retrospective Positioning	Draw up on a sheet of flip chart paper or whiteboard the intention and positioning of the retrospective, i.e. what events, timeline or context are we going to hold the retrospective on.
Story cube selection	Invite the team to select 1-3 story cubes from a mixed bag and to check them out. Feel free to swap with others if they like other pictures on the cubes.
Story on a Flipchart	On a sheet of flip chart paper draw squares big enough for a post it note in a sequential order, enough for the each member of the team

Concepts & Concrete Practice

For a majority of the activities, they will include introducing new concepts and ideas to attendees, and also provide interactive opportunities to practice them and apply the new found knowledge.

Activities	Description
Ask a Question	Ask the team a question such as "What went well?", "What were the challenges?" or "What improvements do you want to make?"
Roll The Cubes	Invite the team members to roll their dice and choose a diagram that resonates strongly with them and their perspective, relative to the question asked above.
Representation	Invite the team members to draw their chosen diagram on a post-it note with a few words for context, and describe their chosen diagram from the story cubes and what it means as an answer to the question asked above.
Retro Actions	Finally invite the team members to put up their post-it notes with diagrams on a sheet of flip chart paper

Conclusions

Conclusion activities enable the attendees to take stock of what they have learnt and how these new ideas can be applied in practice to real world projects.

Activities	Description
Actions	Working through each of the actions or improvements on the second sheet of flip chart paper, facilitate a discussion on how we can get the actions realised and completed.
Close	Finish up with an action list or similar to make the ideas and improvements a reality