Six ways to make your Review meeting suck

The Review Meeting is a wonderful practice, but sometimes teams implement it poorly. To use its full potential, we will take it out of the Scrum context and define it as a regular meeting where the team presents their past work to receive valuable feedback for their future work.

Through the years, I noticed some bad practices at Reviews. Here is what you should avoid:

No Review

The worst Review Meeting is the one that never happened. You should really avoid a situation where nobody knows what the team is doing. And no, reporting to a chat is not good enough. Talking to people makes a difference in efficient communication.

Private Party Review

Showing the past work if only team members attend does not make any sense. Team members should be aware of the team’s past work and don’t need yet another meeting for it. If they are not aware, you have other problems.

A good way is to invite some guests. Select the ad-hoc guests by the criteria that they can make use of the things you’re showcasing and/or can give you valuable feedback for your future work. Stakeholders, other team members, managers…you got it!

Powered by PowerPoint

Everything works on PowerPoint, but you should be more convincing. Do not just mention what you did – showcase it. If you’re producing chairs, bring the damn chair in and let the people try to sit on it! Good feedback is more likely to come after a real experience.

Ex Cathedra Review

If you receive feedback that your Review was boring, it is very likely that it was just reporting what was done. A good Review is not a one-way communication. Showcasing past work is only half of the pie. The other, more sweet half is to encourage the attendees to comment, propose, and engage. And you have to allocate enough time for it.

Bossy Review

If only the boss is presenting, the other team members’ work is undervalued. You should do the opposite: the Boss should not be the presenter. Grab the opportunity to give credit to the people who actually did the work. It is a very effective and free way to motivate people.

Wall of Initials

We live in a post-COVID era, and online Reviews are common now. It’s better to organize them in person, but sometimes, it is impossible.

If it has to happen online, ask people to turn on their cams. Having everybody turn their cams off and forming the “wall of initials” instead of live people’s video streams is an excellent way to ruin the meeting completely. When cams are off, you can be sure that most people are not focused, some even doing something else.