Looking Back to Move Ahead: The Business Value of Retrospectives

Retrospectives are structured rituals for reviewing projects and are used as a forum to reflect upon performance, learn from experiences and assess strengths and weaknesses in projects. This research is designed to identify and validate the significance of performing retrospectives within organizations. Popular knowledge indicates that holding retrospective rituals produces a host of benefits including an increase in the efficiency of project planning and process development, stronger team cohesion and productivity, knowledge sharing and crisis aversion. The intent of this research is to assess the value in conducting retrospectives. The findings are the results of a comprehensive literature search that collects and categorizes the descriptive benefits gained through conducting retrospectives and solicited feedback on these findings from retrospective leaders. The results serve a dual purpose: to provide a consolidated list of benefits that retrospective leaders can use to sell retrospectives to clients; and, to propose a survey that can be used by retrospective leaders to gather quantitative data from their clients for future studies or marketing. The findings provide retrospective leaders and businesses with data for identifying the significance of the retrospective technique, increasing its marketability and aiding in the acceptance of retrospectives by the business community.