The Guide to Effective Agile Retrospectives

If you’re tired of having retrospective meetings greeted with groans and heavy, reluctant sighs or feeling like you’re rehashing the same old problems with no signs of improvement, the advice Mark shares with you will help make your retrospectives more effective.

There’s no need to have retrospectives that people hate and aren’t even useful – with a few tweaks, you can have meetings your team will look forward to, and start seeing real improvements and results!

Includes follow-up support emails to reinforce what you learned and help you make real changes right away.

Why This Book?

Our world is changing at a faster rate than ever, and the speed will only increase. Covid-19 gave us a taste of how vital it is to be able to quickly adjust. Scrum helps break change into manageable chunks and then gives us focus, with retrospectives as a critical tool in that arsenal for rapid adaptation. It’s worth learning how to use them properly.

In The Guide to Effective Agile Retrospectives, Mark shares his secrets to creating retrospectives that don’t suck!

You’ll learn about:

● Common misunderstandings about retrospectives – let’s clear those up

● Recommended techniques and activities to keep the meeting fun and engaging

● How to run retrospectives with distributed teams

● Why you need data for your retrospectives – what to gather, not gather, and what it can tell you

● Turning vague ideas like “We need to do better Unit Testing” into concrete experiments

● …and how to help these improvements actually happen

● Remedies for anti-patterns like: “All Talk, No Action”, “Perennial Problems”, and “ScrumMaster Hero”

Why this book? Because Mark was failing at Sprint Retrospectives before it was popular. After years of study and experimentation, his findings are now collected in this Guide so you don’t have to have to suffer the same pain.

Hint: This free eBook, and the accompanying email series, qualify for Scrum Alliance Education Units (SEUs).

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Mark appears to be knowledgeable and highly experienced in Scrum and did a great job in creating more clarity for the group on complex concepts.
Ryan RVirtual
Mark knows this content, kept us engaged and provided hands-on workshop tasks to understand the conent. Fantastic approach to this course with backlog and Sprints. Stories and answering questions of the group was appreciated.
Matt FPrivate Client
It was an excellent seminar. It gave us hands-on exercises. I can see lots of challenges ahead as I try to implement changes to our scrum team. Should be fun and interesting journey!
Ann Margaret GMontreal
Very informative and interesting introduction to the concepts and principles of Agile development and Scrum.
Michael HVancouver
Great training. Good energy throughout the workshop. Well facilitated. I liked the regular breaks. Good combination of both breakout room exercises and whole group learnings. Good use of technology for a virtual workshop.
Carole GVirtual
Great two days! Added new tools to my PO toolbox and Mark has inspired me again to improve as a PO and to improve my team's scrumming.
Binh HMontreal
Great course and material, I loved the theoretical information with was applied on day 2. Mark did a great job of relating everything to real work examples.
Michael FToronto
I enjoyed Mark's teaching style. I like the personal stories and puns. I always like to bring humor in to my meeting or when I am teaching or mentoring, it evokes a positive emotion and people will retain the information better. A+++ Would like to attend other courses done by Mark.
Shanna FVirtual
Very knowledgeable instructor, great info on theory and practice. Lots more info to cover if we had more time.
Jamie GOttawa
The course was very helpful by reinforcing my commitment to scrum team responsibilty and ownership. Mark was an excellent instructor, knowledgeable, professional, and in control.
Adrian GPrivate Client
Mark has a way to engage the group that is positive and unique. His ability to be flexible in the two days with regards to training makes the course fun.
David HOttawa
Great course that makes you think.
Seok Woo JToronto
Mark Levison is an outstanding instructor who knows how to effectively deliver course content tailored to the learning needs of this students. Everyone on the course benefited greatly from his ability to present new information in a clear and easily understood manner. The Agile Foundations course provided an excellent overview of the Agile Methodology and SCRUM.
Michael GVirtual
Great instructor, light atmosphere, very knowledgeable and engaging. Thank You!
Edwine JVirtual
Honest and open, encouraged us to think on our own. Really highlighted this is not a defined process, we need to figure out what works best for our teams,
Alana GPrivate Client
Thank you Mark! Up until last week I knew nothing about Scrum and now I know quite a lot. Took my test this morning -- just as you said, it was not that complicated and panicking was not warranted. Excited to apply the new skills in practice!
Anastasia KVirtual
The instructor and course were generally excellent – the curriculum was thorough, and the instructor was engaging. I definitely feel like I came out a lot more knowledgeable about Scrum and both the PO and Scrum Master roles (despite the fact that this was not Scrum Master training), and I have lots of ideas percolating on how to implement Agile strategies in my work and with my team.
Natasha HVirtual
Mark was a great instructor with the curse of knowledge (in a good way). Detailed examples, solid application advice, and adaptable during the course. Thanks!
Nick GToronto
Fun and focused. Mark knows Scrum inside and out.
Ryan JEdmonton
It was a very helpful course and it met my expectations.
Vinicious GVancouver
Mark was great! Although the online learning environment can be tricky, I found Mark has the ability to keep a class engaged. Whether you're introverted or extroverted, this course is for you.
Curtis HVirtual
Mark made a challenging and complex process (Scrum) very clear and highlighted the benefits and opportunities in an engaging and entertaining way.
Jeremy GVancouver
The instructor was very enthusiastic and knowledgeable on Agile. His teaching methods were very clever and humble, I feel that all the course attendees found him experienced and clever.
Jamin IToronto
Very instructive course and thought provoking. I will use it in a unique way and it gave me approach that will allow it to work for me.
Mike GVancouver
Loved this course! Mark is very thorough and attentive as a teacher. He leveraged Mural in such interactive ways, which allowed him to understand the students well and shape the class accordingly. He is like the Jedi master of scrum and insanely advanced methods of leaderless collaboration and accomplishment. He's also the king of super nerdy jokes, which made the class fun and brought out the super nerd in everyone.
Lia GVirtual
Well prepared, knows how to put practice into play and have passion for ideas/critical thinking.
Jamie HOttawa
Great conversations. Thanks, Mark! My confidence in understanding the role increased!
Orville HEdmonton
Instructor very excellent and the course is very good to introduce perople to the Agile Methodology.
Sonia JPrivate Client
Course was very informative. You spoke to the entire group on a level everyone can understand.
Monica HPrivate Client
Mark is the real s**t. He's lived through the pain points and knows where the bodies are buried.
Christian FMontreal
Mark's enthusiam was contagious. His energy and humor brought Scrum alive! I enjoyed the examples and many aspects we covered.
Michelle HKitchener-Waterloo
Mark has good mastering on the topic, keeps the audience engaged, and effectively delivers the material to get the job done.
David KEdmonton
This is an excellent course to take after the CSM. The instructor was excellent, the course was wonderful, the students awesome.
Marc HMontreal
I thought the courses were excellent, fun, and very thought provoking. I see this course as an impetus for change for our organization. Highly recommended.
Jack HVancouver
Great experience and great delivery. Really enjoyable course!
Darren HOttawa
Mark was amazing and held my attention throughout both days. Very relatable scenarios in real world.
Jerry HKitchener-Waterloo
Very knowledgeable instructor about scrum and software development in general.
Elizabeth GOttawa
Instructor was great, very knowledgeable and open to questions. The course opened my eyes to scrum mechanics. I now understand what scrummaster in the team was attempting to do.
Sharon JEdmonton
Mark is an amazing instructor who really knows how to make his audience listen and follow his instructions. He takes time to understand the audience's question and makes sure that the answer is fully satisfactory . The three days course was very well designed and almost all major aspects were covered. The scheduled breaks also gave the opportunities to get some fresh air and come back with a focused mind. I look forward to joining some more workshops with Mark in future.
Sanjida HVirtual
Informative and recommend every team doing (or going to do) scrum to learn the course.
Lian YToronto
Dynamic, get the class to answer instead of giving the answer, got me engaged with the content.
Marie-Josee RMontreal
Great seminar, very helpful and Mark showed us in real time examples the application of Scrum.
Pierre EMontreal
Mark was incredibly knowledge and experienced and it's very apparent. I learned more than I could have expected. I greatly appreciate all the additional reading materials. I would have never been able to collect such a library on my own and I have a fascination for good leadership and developing high performing teams.
Anly HOttawa
Instructor was great, would continue the engaging exercises and involving people in the room.
Hussein RToronto
The course and exercise were well designed to add value compared to reading about Scrum. Mark is an effective presenter, keeping things interesting and (often) entertaining.
Gordon EPrivate Client
Mark did an excellent job of teaching the material and went beyond just presenting it.
Noah AEdmonton
Mark maintained an ongoing environment of engagement. One of the best classroom based courses I have participated in.
Grant BPrivate Client
He is funny. And smart. And a good storyteller. All together = great combo.
Melanie HEdmonton
Two thumb up! = Great, very worthy for the money I paid.
Juan Manuel GOttawa
Excellent course! I learned a lot although I reliaze there's a lot to cover but now I have a very good understanding of scrum.
Martin ROttawa

Your Guide to Everything Scrum

Mark Levison spent 12 years as a ScrumMaster and Coach, helping teams by chance before he started to systemize it. Armed with an insatiable love for research, he has been studying and teaching Agile since 2001, introducing Scrum, Lean, and Agile methodology to a broad range of individuals and organizations. Mark has helped launch Scrum practice throughout Canada including Government of Canada departments, major financial and insurance institutions, healthcare agencies, and leading payroll, HR services, and software companies.

Students and communities benefit from Mark’s more than thirty years of experience in the IT industry and over two decades of Scrum and Agile expertise, as he brings his uniquely fun and effective teaching style to thousands of individuals and teams so they can be more effective.

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Focuses on the role of the team and the ScrumMaster. Get the skills and practical experience necessary to improve teamwork, take the exam, and advance your career with a certification that is in high demand today. Often the best fit for anyone new to Scrum.

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