How

Retrospectives are held at regular intervals as part of the team’s recurring meeting cadence. This time should be focused on identifying both successes that should be repeated and areas that need to be improved upon. Teams can vote on the most important item to improve and assign ownership; the team decides how much they can take on while still making and meeting their commitments. The work will be added to the team’s backlog and worked the same as every other backlog item. It is sometimes hard for teams to make the space for this work while they have so much already going on. Leaders must respect the Continuous Improvement (CI) items and support the team being able to incorporate it into their backlog.

Assessments should be occurring on a regular, monthly cadence to show where teams are progressing within a Basecamp. There are times when a team may regress or stay flat for a while. This information should be used to create a coaching plan for skills improvement and to remove impediments to team progression.

Metrics are another key input for identifying CI items. Baseline metrics have already been identified, as they evolve and data begins showing trends, they can be helpful in creating new CI items. The beauty of metrics is that they are black and white, the data tells the story.

Finally, Communities of Practice can be a great source for identifying CI items and getting ownership assigned.