In one of my projects I developed a retrospective technique that is the combination several other techniques. This technique I called the ‘bicycle game’ because of the result: a nice bicycle.

Goal

This game has two main goals:

  1. To let the participants think not only from their own perspective  but also from an external perspective
  2. To let the participants do a deep dive in finding the real cause of a problem
Timing

The game can be finished in about 60 minutes.

Materials

The Bicycle game makes use of :

  • Sticky notes (3 colors) and pens
  • Two pieces of paper (flip-over, brown paper)
Instructions
Preparation

The agile coach prepares the game by identifying some (6 to 8)characteristics, that he wants the team’s feedback on. This might well be the shared team values that the team has defined during project start.

Prepare a spreadsheet (like Microsoft Excel), containing the criteria the number of participants and columns that calculate the minimum, maximum and average of the rates, and that plots these values in a circular graph.

image

image

Duplicate this worksheet, and be finally creative in combining both graphs into a nice bicycle showing the average circles as wheels.

Execution – Information gathering

Start the game by asking the team to stand up.

  • The Agile Coach draws a star on a paper one ax per selected characteristic.
  • The Agile Coach asks each team member to rate his personal feeling regarding each characteristic on a scale of 0 to 5
  • The Agile Coach draws a circle like curve that connects the maxima and minima
  • This will end in a team radar.
  • The Agile Coach draws the same star on the second paper one (ax per selected characteristic).
  • The Agile Coach asks each team member to rate the feeling of some one the team is cooperating with regarding each characteristic on a scale of 0 to 5
  • The Agile Coach draws a circle like curve that connects the maxima and minima
  • This will end in a second team radar.
Execution – Deep dive into causes
  • The Agile Coach shows the ideal bicycle, with almost round wheels to the team
    image
  • The Agile Coach shows the team created bicycle, like the one below
    image
  • The Agile Coach asks the team to write down for themselves the causes of this so unpleasant riding bicycle on orange sticky notes
  • The team sticks the notes on the related axis of both team radar
  • The team members discuss and group their notes
  • The Agile Coach asks the to write down the basic causes on yellow notes
  • The Agile Coach asks the to write down a proposed solution on green notes
  • The team sticks the notes on the related axis of both team radar
  • The team members discuss and group their notes

Note: Other colors will fit as well.

Execution – pick actions

The team members eventually decide on the best actions to take in the next sprint.

Learning points

Of course the learning points of this game depends on the characteristics that are discussed. However, a very nice thing is that the participants look to their project form out an outside in perspective and that the participants have experienced not to stop thinking when they have found a cause for a problem as there might be a bigger cause as well.

 

This game was originally published on: AgilePMandCoaching.blogspot.nl