An agile retrospective is a team meeting at the end of each sprint or project where members reflect on what worked, what didn't, and what to improve. Formalized by Norman Kerth in his 2001 book Project Retrospectives, the three-column format (What went well / What can improve / Actions) is now standard in 90% of Scrum teams. This template provides the three areas plus space for each team member to add virtual post-its before the group discussion.
An agile retrospective is the final ceremony of a Scrum cycle, where the team sets aside 1 to 3 hours to reflect on how they worked (process, relationships, tools) — not on what they delivered, which is the sprint review's role. It was formalized by Norman Kerth in Project Retrospectives: A Handbook for Team Reviews (2001), the book that introduced the 'Prime Directive': believing everyone did the best they could given the context. The most common format has three columns: What went well (celebrate) / What can improve (problems) / Actions (concrete next steps). Variants include Start/Stop/Continue and Mad/Sad/Glad. The quality of a retro depends on psychological safety — if people fear speaking up, real problems don't surface.