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| Criterion |  Operations After-Action Review |  Agile Sprint Retrospective |  DevOps Incident Command |  DevOps Blameless Postmortem |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | After missions or project phases with unclear outcomes, the method makes visible what actually happened and what can be learned from it. It separates course, effect, and causes so experience turns into solid improvement. | When a sprint is over and friction shouldn't simply be carried forward, it opens the view onto collaboration and patterns. It creates space to see causes and changes together. | During an acute incident with several people involved, the method creates a clear leadership and communication structure. It reduces chaos when fast coordination and clean situational awareness are both needed at once. | After an incident with damage or a near miss, the method creates a sober field for learning without assigning blame. It directs attention to the course of events, conditions, and effective countermeasures. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Low | Medium | Medium |
Timedifferent | 20-45 min | Up to 3 hours for a one-month Sprint; shorter Sprints are usually shorter | As needed | 30-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 3-12 | Scrum Team | 4-15 | 3-12 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Lessons learned, Action items, Event summary | Improvement actions, Team agreements | Incident Log, Action Tracker, Stakeholder Updates | Postmortem Doc, Action Items, Timeline |
Tagsno overlap | LearningOperationsImprovement | RetrospectiveImprovementLearning | IncidentOperationsReliability | Site Reliability EngineeringIncidentLearningReliability |