Why should we care about reviews and retrospectives?
The review and retrospectives are the backbone for organizational evolution.
To create new knowledge means quite literally to recreate the company and everyone in it in a nonstop process of personal and organizational self-renewal.
—Nonaka, Ikujiro, The Knowledge Creating Company
Just like the snake sheds its skin every so often to reveal shiny new scales, an individual, a team, and an organization must shed its old culture skin by creating new knowledge and sharing stories about the new way of doing things. One excellent place to start is in the retrospective. And during those times of reflection, a team can dig up challenges as heavy as boulders.
An example of this presented itself to me a short time ago with a client. We were in the very first sprint review. The team was very proud of itself, as it should have been—they achieved a lot in their sprint. However, I noticed that they were scurrying right...