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Norman L. Kerth

Project Retrospectives: A Handbook for Team Reviews

by Norman L. Kerth (Author)

(4.3) 44 ratings

Part of: Dorset House eBooks (19 books)

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With detailed scenarios, imaginative illustrations, and step-by-step instructions, consultant Norman L. Kerth guides readers through productive, painless retrospectives of project performance.

Whether your shop calls them postmortems or postpartums or something else, project retrospectives offer organizations a formal method for preserving the valuable lessons learned from the successes and failures of every project. These lessons and the measurements they yield foster stronger teams and savings on subsequent efforts.

For a retrospective to be effective and successful, though, it needs to be safe. Kerth shows facilitators and participants how to defeat the fear of retribution and establish an air of mutual trust. One tool is Kerth's Prime Directive: Regardless of what we discover, we must understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job he or she could, given what was known at the time, his or her skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.

Applying years of experience as a project retrospective facilitator for software organizations, Kerth reveals his secrets for managing the sensitive, often emotionally charged issues that arise as teams relive and learn from each project.

Don't move on to your next project without consulting and using this readable, practical handbook. Each member of your team will be better prepared for the next deadline.

ISBN-10

0932633447
ISBN-13

978-0932633446
Publisher

Dorset House
Publication date

January 1, 2001
Part of series

Dorset House eBooks
Language

English
Dimensions

5.5 x 0.5 x 8 inches
Print length

268 pages
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Dorset House (January 1, 2001)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 268 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0932633447
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0932633446
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.3 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.5 x 8 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,510,487 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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(4.3) 44 ratings

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4.3 out of 5

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Must read for anyone involved in retrospectives

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 10, 2006

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Norm Kerth's book introduces the retrospective ritual and a very good description on how and why to do them. Since published, Norm's book has become a mus-read in the field of software and I predict this will stay that way for quite a while.

Project Retrospectives are review and improvement sessions which the project team does at the end of a project. A typical project retrospective takes a couple of days. During these days, there are a bunch of retrospective exercises which can be follows (and are described in the book). These exercises create a safe environment, help the project team remember the past and help them learn from it. An retrospective is not done properly if it doesn't also result in some improvement actions.

I've used Norm's exercises in my own retrospectives and they work exceptionally well. This book is therefore a treasure of practical advise. If you feel uncomfortable when reading the first description (as some exercises might), try not to discard the exercise, but try it out. Often you will learn and find that they work surprisingly good.

In the world of Agile Development, retrospectives have become an essential part of any agile method. These retrospectives are iteration retrospectives (or heartbeat retrospectives). They are shorter, but the ideas are the same. Much of Norm's exercises can also be used in that context.

As mentioned earlier, a must read for anyone serious in product development.

3 people found this helpful

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Cosmic Chica

A bit outdated but good read

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 17, 2021

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This book is a little outdated but some concepts are still applicable.

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Serban Ghita

This is the bible for facilitators, but there are ...

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 16, 2016

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This is the bible for facilitators, but there are a LOT to learn even if you do small retrospectives with your team. Helped me a lot to focus the discussions in the right direction. It might repeat some of the conclusions, but I understand this is a practice because people skip some chapters. It helps you solidify them.

2 people found this helpful

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Florence Rabanal

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on October 20, 2016

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good tips but a little hokey and unrealistic

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 3, 2016

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The book to make teams great

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 28, 2003

This book is intended as a manual for software developers intending to hold a project retrospective at the end of a large project. A retrospective is a little like a post-mortem. Much is learned during the course of a large project, and a project retrospective is a way to preserve that knowledge for use in later projects.
A retrospective is different than a post-mortem in that a post-mortem sometimes implies that the project was a failure. Kerth makes it clear that as long as knowledge is gained from mistakes made, and that steps are taken to avoid the repetition of those mistakes, then no mistake is a total failure.
Much of what Kerth writes about involves the tools and techniques of a facilitator. A facilitator is something like a psychotherapist for project teams. The facilitator's purpose is to get the members of the team, who sometimes do not work closely together either out of circumstance or preference, to share their opinions and observations about different aspects of the project in a non-threatening way.
A facilitator must be an excellent communicator and should not offer his or her own opinion, only help others to express their own. In Kerth's opinion, much of what makes a project successful involves interpersonal communication and through a project retrospective a facilitator can help a project team improve their communication skills.
I felt that the book offered some excellent suggestions. In particular, I liked Kerth's suggestions for illustrating to management of the value of a project retrospective. He provides an excellent checklist for preparing a proposal to management.
I also liked his suggestions for demonstrating to project teammembers the value of failure. One suggestion is to have everyone watch a movie that involves project management, such as Kerth's favorite, Flight of the Phoenix. Another of Kerth's suggestions is to discuss the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger. Kerth suggests pointing out how the fact that four of the five books written on the explosion are oriented toward children shows how our culture shuns failure, and then discussing how analyzing the causes of the explosion helped NASA prevent similar accidents in the future.
The book is intended for those intent on performing in-depth project retrospectives or project post-mortems. Much of the book consists of specific tips and techniques for those facilitating retrospectives. If I have a criticism of the book it is that much of the book is at a very practical level and that too little time is spent discussing how to make use of information garnered from project retrospectives in future projects.

2 people found this helpful

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P. B. Taylor

The Lazy Project Manager's top pick

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on September 27, 2009

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A must read for all of my project managers - the forgotten part of some many projects, the close, but one that allows you to learn so much more from the people you have worked with.

Using the workshops suggested in this book I have seen some fantastic insights in to projects, and they are always fun to do!

Peter Taylor
[]

The lazy project manager: How to be twice as productive and still leave the office early

Andre Schaupp

Tipps aus der Erfahrungswelt von Norman Kerth

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on December 21, 2018

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Der Grundgedanke beim Kauf dieses Handbuchs war es, als Projektleiter ein paar Ideen zur Durchführung eines internen Reviews nach einem externen Softwareprojekt zu erhalten. Aus dieser Sicht heraus hat es sich für mich auf jeden Fall gelohnt, einen Blick hinein zu werfen. Norman Kerth gibt auf etwa 250 Seiten viele wichtige Ratschläge mit Beispielen aus Situationen, die er selbst so erlebt hat und wahrt dabei einen sehr angenehmen Schreibstil.

Allerdings darf man den Marketingsatz auf dem Buchcover ("belongs in the library of every project manager, for any kind of project") aus zwei Gründen nicht wirklich ernst nehmen: Einerseits handelt es sich eher um Tipps für Freelancer, die nicht am Projekt beteiligt waren und nur das Project Review durchführen (Norman Kerth geht auch mehrfach deutlich darauf ein, dass die Moderation des Reviews ein Außenstehender vornehmen sollte), andererseits sind die Beispiele stark auf Softwareprojekte und die daran beteiligten Personen zugeschnitten (weil das eben seine Erfahrungswelt ist).

Der Aufbau des Buchs ist gut gewählt. Nach einem groben Überblick über den Ablauf eines Reviews geht er in den späteren Kapiteln dann ins Detail, beschreibt die Durchführung einzelner Übungen und gibt Ratschläge, wann diese hilfreich oder angemessen sind und wann nicht. Dabei kommen auch Aspekte wie das Selling ("Warum denn ein Review? Ist doch nur Zeitverschwendung...") und die viel gerühmten Soft-Skills (Umgang mit den Teilnehmern, Auflockern der Atmosphäre) zum Tragen. Zu guter Letzt liefert er dann noch Beispiel-Zeitpläne und Protokollvorlagen.

Warum dann nur vier Sterne? Weil sich das Buch zu sehr um die Erlebnisse von Norman Kerth dreht. Das ist zwar authentisch, leicht zu lesen und sicher deutlich hilfreicher als die Ausführungen eines Theoretikers, welcher nur meint, das Handwerk zu beherrschen. Es schränkt die direkte Zielgruppe jedoch meiner Meinung nach etwas ein. Zu guter Letzt schreibt er ja aber selbst, dass man sich bei seinen Recherchen mehrerer Quellen bedienen sollte. Von daher kann man dem Autor definitiv keinen Vorwurf machen und etwas Gedankentransfer zu Nicht-Softwareprojekten hin kann man dem einen oder anderen sicher zutrauen ;-)

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Andrea Heck

Das Standardwerk über Retrospektiven

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on December 22, 2012

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Das Buch Norm Kerth ist wirklich das Standardwerk über Projekt-Retrospektiven, das alle Autoren von Büchern über agile Retrospektiven gelesen und als Grundlage genommen haben.

Was man hier noch neues lernt: Kerth geht sehr genau auf den gemeinsamen Lernprozess des Teams ein, und erklärt, was in so einem Softwareprojekt psychologisch und sozial mit dem Team passieren kann, und wie er verschiedene Elemente seiner Retrospektiven benutzt, um das Team wieder zusammen zu bringen und Wunden zu heilen. Wichtig ist dabei, dass man bei einer Projekt-Retro deutlich mehr Zeit braucht, als bei einer Iteration, nämlich etwa 2-3 Tage. Gerade in Projekten, wo sie ein starkes wir-ihr Verhältnis herausgebildet hat, und wo man in der nächsten Runde besser zusammenarbeiten will, lohnt es sich auf jeden Fall, eine Projekt-Retrospektive nach diesem wunderbaren Buch durchzuführen.

3 people found this helpful

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András Dezsõ

Nicht nur für Retrospektiven

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on November 7, 2015

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Längere Retrospektiven sind jetzt mit Agile wenige in Mode. Nichtdestotrotz finde ich dieses Buch ein Evergreen. Wenn jemand verstehen möchte, was die sorgsame Erschließung des Gedanken- und Gefühlgutes einer Gruppe bedeutet, der kann gerne zu diesem Buch greifen.

Den gezeigten professionellen, maximalistischen Ansatz und Mindset kann ich nicht nur in Retrospektiven sondern in alle Arten von Workshops anwenden.

One person found this helpful

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A. Harder

Retrospektiven-Klassiker

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on February 13, 2013

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Ich fand das Buch toll und für mich unverzichtbar als Grundlage für meine eigenen ersten Retrospektiven, weil es darin nicht nur um die "Mechanik", sondern auch um den "Geist" von Retrospektiven geht.

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