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Criterion
Paper illustration of a review with planned work, actual event sequence, comparison, and assigned improvement actions.
Operations
After-Action Review
The Scrum Team inspects people, interactions, processes, tools, and the Definition of Done, then agrees on a few testable improvements.
Agile
Sprint Retrospective
Paper illustration for Starfish Retrospective
Agile
Starfish Retrospective
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.When improvement options need to be sorted more finely than just start and stop, it brings observations into clear kinds of action. This makes visible what should be done more, less, newly, or continued.
Complexitysame
LowLowLow
Timedifferent
20-45 minUp to 3 hours for a one-month Sprint; shorter Sprints are usually shorter45-90 min
Participantsdifferent
3-12Scrum Team4-12
Formatdifferent
Workshop + asyncWorkshopWorkshop
Outputdifferent
Lessons learned, Action items, Event summaryImprovement actions, Team agreementsStarfish Board, Practice Changes, Experiments
Tags1 shared
LearningOperationsImprovement
RetrospectiveImprovementLearning
RetrospectiveImprovementExperimentsTeam
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A structured reflection surfaces what was liked, learned, lacked, and longed for. It is a conversation format and does not validate actions automatically.
Agile
4Ls Retrospective
Paper illustration for Learning Review.
Operations
Learning Review
Paper illustration for Sailboat Retrospective
Agile
Sailboat Retrospective
Paper illustration of a team retrospective with three separate Start, Stop, and Continue areas and a shared action list.
Agile
Start Stop Continue