The two columns
Went well: what helped us?
Wins, good decisions, people who helped, practices that paid off. Naming them makes it more likely the team keeps doing them.
Prompts: What are you glad we did? What would you repeat next sprint? Who made your work easier?
Didn't go well: what got in the way?
Delays, surprises, friction and mistakes. Focus on the process, not on who was at fault.
Prompts: Where did we lose time? What surprised us late? What would you change if you could replay the sprint?
Retrocycle's template adds an Action items column at the end, so the conversation ends with actions that have an owner.
When to use it
- Your team's first retrospective.
- A short retro at the end of a busy sprint.
- Teams that find themed formats distracting.
- When you want the most time for discussion and the least for explaining the format.
When something else may work better: if retros keep producing the same complaints with no change, Start, Stop, Continue pushes the team towards concrete actions.
A 30-minute agenda
- 1
Set the scene (3 min). Recap the sprint goal and the main events. The aim is to improve the process, not to judge people.
- 2
Write cards silently (6 min). Everyone adds cards to both columns.
- 3
Reveal and group (5 min). Show the cards and group the ones about the same topic.
- 4
Vote (2 min). Everyone votes on what they most want to discuss.
- 5
Discuss (10 min). Start with the most-voted Didn't go well cards. For each, ask what the team could do differently.
- 6
Agree on action items (4 min). One to three actions, each with one owner.
Example cards
From a fictional sprint on an internal tool:
| Went well | Didn't go well |
|---|---|
| We shipped the export feature a day early | Two tickets were blocked waiting for API access |
| Daily stand-up stayed under 15 minutes | The bug bash found issues too late to fix this sprint |
| Good handover when Marta was off sick | Nobody owned the flaky integration tests |
And the actions that came out of it:
- Request API access during refinement, not when the ticket starts (owner: tech lead).
- Move the bug bash to the middle of the sprint (owner: QA engineer).
Tips for a better Went well, Didn't go well
- Spend as much time on Went well as the team needs, but no more: the value is in what you change.
- Turn each Didn't go well card you discuss into a question: what would have prevented this?
- Rotate the facilitator so the same voice doesn't lead every retro.
- If the same card shows up three sprints in a row, make it the only topic of the next retro.
Run it in Retrocycle
Pick the Went well / Not well template, share the link, and your team joins as guests with just a name: no accounts needed. Turn on blur so cards stay hidden while people write, let people post anonymously if they want, vote, and close the retro with action items that carry over to the next one. How action items work
FAQ
How long should it take?
About 30 minutes for a team of five to eight. It's one of the shortest formats.
Isn't it too simple?
Simple is the point. When a team needs more structure, move to Start, Stop, Continue or Sailboat for a few sprints.
Why add an Action items column?
Without it, retros become a list of observations. Writing actions with an owner in the same board makes it easy to follow up next time.
Do participants need an account?
No. In Retrocycle, guests join with the link and a display name, once a team member lets them in.