#158: Should You Skip the Sprint Retrospective? with Mike Cohn

Is your team dreading retrospectives, or skipping them altogether? Mike Cohn joins Brian Milner to unpack what’s really going wrong (and how to fix it) so retros don’t just take up time… they actually make your team better.

Overview

In this candid conversation, Brian Milner welcomes back Mountain Goat Software co-founder Mike Cohn to talk about one of the most misunderstood parts of Scrum: the sprint retrospective.

Too many teams treat retros as boring, repetitive, or even pointless—and end up skipping them entirely. But retros are where the magic of continuous improvement actually happens… when they’re done right. Brian and Mike dig into the common reasons teams dread retros, how to spot the signs a retro isn’t working, and the practical ways to bring them back to life.

They also share their own lessons learned (including how Mike once argued retros shouldn’t be part of Scrum!) and walk through the real reason retros matter: giving teams space to inspect, adapt, and improve together.

References and resources mentioned in the show:

Mike Cohn Your Fast Tract to a Fresher Retrospective Webinar #141: Cooking Up a Killer Retrospective with Brian Milner Overcoming Four Common Problems with Retrospectives by Mike Cohn Retrospectives Broken? Fix Them for Good by Mike Cohn Subscribe to the Agile Mentors Podcast

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This episode’s presenters are:

Brian Milner is a Certified Scrum Trainer®, Certified Scrum Professional®, Certified ScrumMaster®, and Certified Scrum Product Owner®, and host of the Agile Mentors Podcast training at Mountain Goat Software. He's passionate about making a difference in people's day-to-day work, influenced by his own experience of transitioning to Scrum and seeing improvements in work/life balance, honesty, respect, and the quality of work.

Mike Cohn, CEO of Mountain Goat Software, is a passionate advocate for agile methodologies. Co-founder of Agile Alliance and Scrum Alliance, he thrives on helping companies succeed with Agile and witnessing its transformative impact on individuals' careers. Mike resides in Northern Idaho with his family, two Havanese dogs, and an impressive hot sauce collection.

Auto-generated Transcript:

Brian Milner (00:00) Hey everyone, welcome back to the Agile Mentors Podcast. I'm here with you always, Brian Milner. But before we dive in today, I wanted to let you know that we're gonna have a free webinar that I'm gonna be running here for you. It's gonna be on September 24th at 9 a.m. Pacific. So do your adjustments wherever you are. It's called Your Fast Track to a Fresher Retrospective. It's just gonna be a little short 20 to 25 minute presentation. And then there's gonna be some open question and answer that we're gonna have after that. it's perfect if your team's retros are feeling a little stale, or if you're looking for practical ways to shake things up. We're gonna put a link to it our show notes, but wanted to make sure right up top that you guys knew about that. It's completely free, September 24th, 9 a.m. Pacific. We're gonna have that webinar on retrospectives. And joining me here today, also is the one and only Mike Cohn. Welcome in, Mike.

Mike (00:55) Hey, Brian's good to be back.

Brian Milner (00:57) Glad you're here. We wanted to have a conversation because I think we can probably all agree that not all retrospectives, we might even say are worth having. When you look back on them and you look back on the content of it, maybe we'd say it wasn't worth having. If your team isn't getting value from the meeting and skipping it might feel rational. But skipping the point of retrospective, continuous improvement, is