What is the Temperature Reading Retrospective template?
Don’t fall into a pattern of noticing only the failures or missed opportunities within your organization. Instead, conduct a powerful yet simple retrospective session during which you will help your team reach, maintain, and regain a positive mindset. Consider running a periodic temperature reading retro event to reduce tensions, solidify connections, and interact more constructively and productively with all your team members.
The temperature reading retrospective template will be perfect if your team works under demanding and deadline-driven circumstances. Designate the technique for your project milestones or during simple team meetings. Point out five categories to which everyone can contribute their positive comment:
- Appreciations — Compliment other team members by addressing them directly, mentioning how helpful they are in your everyday tasks or how much they contribute to the team.
- Puzzles — Mention things you don’t fully understand but are curious about to spark a conversation and get possible answers.
- Complaints with recommendations — Express what you think could work differently in your team and thus create a space for generating new ideas and finding solutions.
- New information — Share any information that might be helpful and relevant for your team.
- Hopes and wishes — Voice what you wish and hope will happen after the retrospective session.
What are the benefits of the Temperature Reading Retrospective template?
Thanks to the Temperature Reading Retrospective template, you can:
- Promote giving regular kudos to your teammates instead of focusing only on things that went wrong and putting the blame on each other.
- Aim to keep the relationships healthy and respectful between team members.
- Encourage everyone to share their honest thoughts without being worried about improper and unnecessary comments.
- Uncover issues and remedy the situation before they evolve into something major by sharing your recommendations, hopes, and wishes for further work.
- Make people stay energized and focused on meetings by assuring their voices are heard and feedback is taken seriously.
How to use the Temperature Reading Retrospective template in a few steps?
- Invite participants to your board and introduce the activity using the video chat feature. The goal is to contribute ideas on sticky notes in a respectful manner.
- Point out available categories and explain each of them if necessary — appreciations, puzzles, complaints with recommendations, new information, and hopes and wishes.
- Set up the timer for up to ten minutes to let people individually write down their ideas in all categories.
- Review the notes from each category and allow some time for discussion.
**This template has been inspired by the Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great book.
Use this template
