The HBO Series Game of Thrones has me thinking about project retrospectives.
The HBO series Game of Thrones has come to its conclusion after eight seasons of treachery, hopes, dreams, betrayals, battles, victories, and defeats. This is not going to be an article full of spoilers but thinking about the conclusion of this multi-year entertainment investment has me thinking about its parallels in Information Technology.
Hopefully, none of the projects you’ve worked on were as ruthless as Game of Thrones, but stories have to end eventually. Whether you were pleased or disappointed with the outcomes of the show (or your projects) the wind-down happens.
Apex Process Consultants is an Agile Development shop. Part of that development methodology includes Retrospectives. There are several sports metaphors at play in Agile, such as scrums, and sprints. The Sprints are regular intervals of development which end in a playback. The playbacks are followed by retrospectives where the team discusses what was effective and what was ineffective during the sprint. At the end of the overall project (if there is an end) there should be an overall retrospective.
Through the course of a large, lengthy project it is not unusual for various contributors to come and go. As in Game of Thrones, you may come to really like some of these characters and rely on their assistance but it is common for budgetary, management or personal choices to take them away. Their watch has ended.
There are many reasons a project comes to an end. As external consultants, the ideal outcome is that our team has helped the business achieve both its internal project goals as well as a degree of autonomy by teaching the business teams our tools and methods. The project is rolled out into production and everyone lives happily ever after.
The End
Of course, no project ever really ends like that. There are always loose ends. But getting back to this Game of Thrones finale metaphor, what happened there often is the case on big development projects. The client has huge aspirations, but either deadlines or budget constraints press for hasty conclusions. Sometimes, much-desired features have to be pushed to future iterations. Sometimes, heroes have to come in and solve seemingly insurmountable problems with cunning and skill. Sometimes, hopefully rarely, the project will even fail.
That’s not the ending we want. That’s not the ending anybody wants. We want optimal solutions and best outcomes.
That’s what the sprint-level retrospectives are about. Through each phase of the project, we look at which strategies have worked well and which have not. The purpose of these reviews is to identify the positives and strive to get more of those outcomes and to identify the negatives and to mitigate or prevent those from continuing. These happen every two weeks or so, depending on the specific sprint-length used on the project. By constantly conducting code-reviews, playbacks, and retrospectives throughout the project, we are much more likely to identify obstacles and clear them so that the end of our project has a smooth and satisfying denouement.
Post-Project Disappointment
Some people experience a sense of let-down and even depression when a project comes to its end. The amount of effort to push the project into the world might be disproportionate to the recognition or sense of accomplishment one experiences. Post-project disappointment, even in the face of success, is not uncommon. Here are a few things that might help mitigate it:
- As you complete sprints, keep a list of your accomplishments and what you were proud of. When your watch has ended, go back and look at the cumulative list of things you did and take time to reflect on the good that you did.
- If you review the things you didn’t like or the things that went wrong, take the time to make a list of steps you could take to prevent those issues from affecting you on future projects.
- Talk to your teammates. Recounting stories with others who were there is one path to peace.
Get back on the wall
The best remedy for post-project disappointment may be to find that next project. Like all the Game of Thrones fans scrambling around the entertainment world looking for the next thing to obsess on, the creative personality needs to create. The story goes on.
Look at Arya — one of the most popular characters on the show. She was absolutely critical to solving key storylines in the series, but virtually no one in Westeros knew who she was. Moreover, she was often completely incognito as she did her work. It was accomplishing her goals that gave her intermittent peace. In a field where recognition for your accomplishments may be as rare as dragon eggs, it may have to suffice you too. (That and a paycheck, one hopes.)
