How_to_use_this_template
📖 How to use this template
A sprint retrospective is a short, regular session where a team examines how it worked rather than what it shipped, then commits to one or two changes. This board is filled in with one team's Sprint 24. Everything you see is sample data. Read it, then replace it.
- Duplicate this project into your own organization (dropdown next to the project name, then
Duplicate) - Switch to Table view. That is where this template is meant to be read: Category, Sprint, Votes, Impact, Effort and owner sit side by side, and you can sort by Votes to get your discussion order
- Delete the Sprint 24 samples once you have looked at a few. Keep the sections, the statuses and the fields
- Change the Sprint field options to your own sprint numbers
- Move the two milestones to your real retro date and your real action deadline. Everything else hangs off those
Sample dates run March to June 2027, so nothing shows as overdue while you are looking around.
How a retro runs on this board
Before the meeting. The Before the retro section holds the prep. The one that matters most is Review last retro's action items. Skipping it is how retros quietly stop mattering.
During the meeting. Roughly 90 minutes for a two-week sprint:
| Stage | Time | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Set the stage | 5 min | Restate the prime directive, share the sprint numbers |
| Gather data | 20 min | Everyone adds cards to What went well and What didn't go well |
| Dot-vote | 5 min | Three votes each. Put the count in the Votes field |
| Generate insights | 35 min | Discuss the top items only. Ask "why" more than once |
| Decide actions | 20 min | Move agreed items into Action items with an owner and a date |
| Close | 5 min | Read the actions back. Anything without a name doesn't count |
After the meeting. The Action items section is the output. Everything else is a record.
The fields
- Category tells the Table view what a row is, since sections don't show as a column there
- Sprint lets you keep several sprints in one project without the board turning to mud
- Votes is the dot-vote count. Sort by it descending to get your agenda
- Impact and Effort together tell you which actions to do first. High impact plus small effort wins every time
- Discussed is the checkbox that stops good cards being silently skipped
The statuses
To discuss → Discussing → Action agreed → In progress → Done, plus Parked for items the team consciously decided not to act on.
Parked is worth using properly. An item that was raised, discussed and deliberately not acted on is a different thing from one nobody got to, and pretending otherwise is how the same card reappears every sprint.
The sublists
- ✅ Open action items — every unfinished action across all sprints. Open the next retro with this
- 🔥 Top voted (5+) — the discussion agenda
- 🔁 Recurring problems — anything raised in more than one retro
The recurring list is the most useful one and the one teams skip. A problem that comes back is not a problem the team forgot, it is one where the agreed fix didn't work. Change the approach, don't repeat the action.
Two habits that make this stick
Cap actions at three to five. A retro that produces twelve actions produces none of them. Better to fix two things properly than list twelve and do zero.
Put a name and a date on everything. An action with no owner is a wish. This template makes that hard to fake, because the Table view shows an empty assignee column at a glance.
When to change format
Same four questions every sprint stops producing new answers after a while. The Retro formats cheat sheet document has four alternatives and says when each is worth using. The Every 6 sprints, change the retro format task in the cadence section is the reminder.