Content crits and retrospectives

In sections below you will find:

• Processes to learn about
• Templates and examples
• Tools to help

How to run content crits

Content crits are a collaborative process where you share content, ask for constructive feedback, bounce ideas around, and consider alternatives.

Crits could take time to learn and get used to, but the practice can help improve and make your content better.

Processes to learn about

• Content crits: conquering through collaboration GOV.UK share how they have conquered content crits through collaboration.

• How to do content crits well This post from Scroll details what a content crit is, and how to do one well.

• Running a content crit This Medium post shares a brief guide on how to run a content crit.

• How to run a design crit and why they're important Co-op Digital Blog discusses the importance of a content crit, and how to do it.

• Content crits Sarah Winters writes about content crits, what they are, and how to do them - and her own rules on running one.

• S1 Episode 6 - Improving your content with peer-to-peer crits This podcast tackles how to run a content crit with fellow content designers or your wider team.

Templates and examples

• Meet the GOV.UK content design team A short video showing what goes on in a GOV.UK design team 'crit' meeting.

How to run retrospectives

Retrospectives or 'retros' are regular meetings where your team reflects and talks about how everything went and decide what needs remediation or improvement.

Retrospectives are team-driven, and the team members decide how to run the meetings and how decisions are made for improvements.

The purpose of the meeting is to fix any problems and to ensure you keep doing the things that are working.

Processes to learn about

• Retrospective Atlassian guides you on running a retrospective with your team complete with prep time, tools, and tips.

• Heartbeat Retrospective Agile Alliance share a glossary of terms, common pitfalls and benefits of Retrospective.

• The Agile Retrospective Definition and Example Formats: Plutora's blog post looks at how to structure a retrospective, and some norms that will make your retrospective more effective.

• Agile Retrospective Resource Wiki A resource for sharing retrospective plans, tips and tricks, tools and ideas to help you get the most out of your retrospectives.

• Agile tools and techniques Part of this article from GOV.UK is a section focused on how to do retrospective meetings.

• 3.8.1 Agile Tools and Techniques This post talks about retrospective meetings as part of Agile tools and techniques.

• Running a giant retrospective ESFA Digital show how a giant retro was completed.

• Creative ways to run a retrospective differently Sometimes when you're running retrospectives often, you need to freshen them up and get creative.

• Running the Data Discovery end-of-Alpha retro ONS Digital share how they approached a big end-of-Alpha retro for their Data Discovery project.

Templates and examples

• Quick Retrospective Template A tool that helps structure positive and negative feedback, and plan improvements after a completed project or a working sprint.

Tools to help

• Sprint Retrospectives Trello share how to use their board for running Sprint Retrospectives with your team.

• Retrospective Template This template is an online tool where you and your team can collaborate in real time to reflect on what happened in the most recent work iteration and identify actions for improvement going forward.