Sprint retrospectives - challenges and solutions for Scrum Masters

[@ScrumMastered]

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[@alebigna]

Nice interesting video Daria. I agree basically on everything you said. The challenge that I find most difficult to overcome is this: every agile framework, and the practices that can be set into it, work only if the team wants to play that game. I mean: supposing that we are using Scrum, Scrum itself can work only if the team wants to learn how to use it, to apply its (few) rules, to follow its values. In the case of the retrospective, if the teams doesn't want to play the game (people doesn't speak or it does'nt want to write any sticky and so on), I feel that as a Scrum Master I can invent the most engaging retro but there is no way that it can works. In Italy (at least in my part of Italy) there is a saying: "you can bring the donkey to the water spring source but you cannot make it drink, if it doesn't want to". It's a same for a team: you can explain things to them, teach them, coach them, engage them but, if the don't want to, you don't have a chance. Anyway, thank you for your insight! And, BTW, you have a really lovely cat! Alessandro

[@ScrumMastered]

I see the point and I think many Scrum Masters are facing that unwillingness to contribute. But let's ponder this question: if your team comes to work they are paid for and just decides to sit around and do nothing - is that ok? That's a rhetorical question, of course. Because we go to work, and we are paid for that work, whether we want to or not, when we come to work, we work. Actively participating in retrospectives is part of Scrum Team members' work. And I think this is where the disconnect is. Retrospectives (or even planning, refinement, goal setting, etc.) are rarely taken in that way, as part of people's jobs, and that's why team members believe it's ok to refuse to do it. So I think this is where we should start first. What would you do if a team member came into the office and refused to do anything? I know it's a bit radical 😁