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agile-ceremonies skill

/steve/skills/agile-ceremonies

This skill helps agile teams run standups, retrospectives, and sprint planning smoothly by organizing formats, tracking progress, and documenting actions.

npx playbooks add skill 89jobrien/steve --skill agile-ceremonies

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SKILL.md
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---
name: agile-ceremonies
description: Agile ceremonies and sprint management specialist. Use when running standups,
  retrospectives, sprint planning, or tracking sprint progress.
author: Joseph OBrien
status: unpublished
updated: '2025-12-23'
version: 1.0.1
tag: skill
type: skill
---

# Agile Ceremonies Skill

Supports agile team ceremonies including standups, retrospectives, and sprint management.

## What This Skill Does

- Structures daily standups
- Facilitates retrospectives
- Tracks sprint progress
- Documents action items
- Measures team health
- Creates weekly summaries

## When to Use

- Daily standups (sync or async)
- Sprint retrospectives
- Sprint planning
- Progress tracking
- Team health checks

## Reference Files

- `references/RETROSPECTIVE.template.md` - Sprint retrospective format
- `references/DAILY_STANDUP.template.md` - Standup formats (individual, team, async)

## Standup Format

- **Yesterday** - What was completed
- **Today** - What's planned
- **Blockers** - What's blocking progress

## Retrospective Format

- **What went well** - Celebrate wins
- **What didn't go well** - Identify issues
- **What we learned** - Capture insights
- **Action items** - Specific improvements

## Best Practices

- Keep standups under 15 minutes
- Make blockers specific and actionable
- Follow up on previous retro actions
- Quantify progress where possible
- Celebrate team accomplishments

Overview

This skill helps teams run efficient agile ceremonies and manage sprint progress. It provides structured templates for daily standups, retrospectives, and sprint tracking so meetings stay focused and outcomes are recorded. Use it to capture action items, measure team health, and generate concise weekly summaries. The goal is to reduce meeting overhead and increase follow-through on improvements.

How this skill works

The skill supplies clear formats for standups (yesterday, today, blockers) and retrospectives (what went well, what didn’t, lessons, action items). It tracks sprint progress and team health metrics, collects and documents decisions and assigned follow-ups, and can produce weekly summaries for stakeholders. Facilitators use the templates to run short, actionable ceremonies and to ensure retro actions are tracked across sprints.

When to use it

  • Daily standups, synchronous or asynchronous
  • Sprint retrospectives to surface continuous improvement
  • Sprint planning to align scope and commitments
  • Tracking sprint progress and team health during the sprint
  • Generating weekly summaries for stakeholders and managers

Best practices

  • Keep standups under 15 minutes and focused on outcomes
  • Make blockers specific, owned, and actionable
  • Always record retro action items with owners and deadlines
  • Follow up on previous retrospective actions each sprint
  • Quantify progress where possible and celebrate completed work

Example use cases

  • Run a 10-minute daily standup using the yesterday/today/blockers structure
  • Facilitate a sprint retrospective using the four-part retro format and assign improvement actions
  • Track sprint burndown and health indicators to identify risks early
  • Document action items and owners so retro improvements are visible next sprint
  • Prepare a one-page weekly summary of progress, risks, and completed actions for stakeholders

FAQ

Can this be used for remote or async teams?

Yes. Standup and retro templates work for both synchronous meetings and asynchronous updates; use the async format to collect inputs ahead of time.

How do I ensure retro action items are completed?

Assign owners and deadlines to each action, review previous retro items at the start of every retro, and include progress in weekly summaries to maintain accountability.