Agile QuickTip: Use an External Facilitator

Have you ever considered improving your Sprint retrospective with the help of an external facilitator? If you can’t think why that would help, just keep reading.

As the ScrumMaster, you know that a successful retrospective is key to the continued improvement of the team. This is where the team discusses the sprint as a whole and dive deep into what worked, what didn’t, what challenges came up, and what they would do differently in the next sprint. However, as the facilitator, the team’s ScrumMaster needs to be an impartial and unbiased guide, not an active participant in these discussions.

Sometimes, it could be helpful to include someone else in this process, inviting a different person to facilitate the retrospective – which would free up the ScrumMaster to actually be a participant.  Having someone else facilitate would free you up to openly share your opinions  as well. The facilitator could be anyone: perhaps a ScrumMaster of another team, or someone external to your organization. You can use this opportunity to share your observations or ideas, and bring up any patterns that you’ve uncovered during the sprint, introducing those to the team yourself. While the facilitator needs to be agnostic and objective, as a participant you get to weigh in and share your viewpoints. This provides additional opportunities for your team to improve, with your support.

I hope you enjoyed that Agile QuickTip and found it valuable! Give it a try at your next retrospective, and let me know how it went. Make sure to head to my YouTube channel and check out the rest of the series, and if you have something to share, please do send me a comment or a question! You can also head to thinklouder.com, where you can see how our training and coaching offerings can support you and your team.