Start Stop Continue Retrospective Template

What is the Start Stop Continue Retrospective?

Start Stop Continue is a retrospective format in which the team sorts its observations into three buckets: behaviours to start, behaviours to stop and behaviours to continue. Each column is phrased as a verb, so every note is already halfway to being an action item. That is the whole trick, and it is why the format has outlived dozens of more elaborate ones.

The structure predates agile. It comes from the 'start, stop, continue' feedback model used in management coaching and performance reviews, where a manager asks a person what they should begin, drop and keep doing. Scrum teams adopted it in the 2000s because it maps neatly onto the goal of a sprint retrospective in the Scrum Guide: inspect how the last sprint went and identify the most helpful changes to improve effectiveness.

Because the questions are so plain, the format needs almost no explanation. That makes it the default choice for a team's first retrospective, for mixed audiences with stakeholders in the room, and for any retro that has to fit in half an hour.

When to use Start Stop Continue (and when not to)

How to run a Start Stop Continue Retrospective step by step

Total time: about 37 minutes for a team of 3–12 people. Adjust the timeboxes to the size of your team and sprint.

1. 1

   Set the stage · 3 min

   Remind everyone of the sprint goal and read out last retro's action items. Ask for a one-word check-in on how the sprint felt, or run a quick GIF ice breaker.

2. 2

   Silent writing · 7 min

   Everyone adds cards to all three columns at the same time, without discussion. Ask for at least one note per column. Keep cards hidden or anonymous to avoid anchoring on the first opinion.

3. 3

   Read and group · 7 min

   Go column by column. Each author reads their cards in one sentence; the facilitator merges duplicates and groups related notes. Clarifying questions only, no debate yet.

4. 4

   Dot vote · 3 min

   Each person gets three votes to spend on the cards or groups they most want to change. Votes across columns are fine: a strong Continue is worth protecting.

5. 5

   Discuss the top items · 12 min

   Take the most voted items in order, timeboxed to about four minutes each. For every item ask: what exactly would we do differently on Monday?

6. 6

   Commit to actions · 5 min

   Turn the outcome into one to three action items, each with an owner and a check date. Fewer is better: an action item without an owner is a wish.

Start Stop Continue questions and prompts for each column

Read a couple of these aloud if the board stays empty after the first minutes of writing.

Start Stop Continue retrospective example

A five-person product team after a two-week sprint in which a release slipped by two days. Here is what their board looked like at the end of the writing phase.

Action items they agreed on

• ☑️ Draft a release checklist and use it on the next deploy (owner: Priya, check at next retro)
• ☑️ New rule: no merges to main after 3 pm on Fridays (owner: whole team, revisit in 2 sprints)

Common mistakes and facilitation tips

Variations and related templates

• Starfish retrospective template: Adds 'More of' and 'Less of' to the three columns, for teams that want nuance instead of all-or-nothing calls.
• KALM (Keep, Add, Less, More) retrospective template: Replaces Stop with 'Less', which feels softer and works well when nothing needs to be dropped completely.
• Start, Stop, Continue, Change: A fourth column for things that should stay but be done differently.
• Personal Start Stop Continue: Each person writes one commitment for themselves, useful in team-health retros.

Start Stop Continue retrospective FAQ