Holi Retrospective

Holi is a Hindu festival celebrating Radha-Krishna, who unites masculine and feminine energies into one divine being. Also called the Festival of Colors, Festival of Love, and Festival of Spring, it’s a gorgeous and uplifting time. 

Why not bring that energy into a joyful, seasonally-inspired Holi retrospective? 

Holi can get delightfully messy, and that’s what makes it so much fun! If you attend this retro, get ready to cover your colleagues in (metaphorical) paint, dance your heart out, and look at how you work together in a sweet, exciting new way! 

Here are the prompts you need to run a Holi retrospective with your team:

Holi celebration is all about beautiful, vibrant colors. It’s a bit like a community water fight, except with a rainbow of paints!  Where would you fit your recent work into that rainbow of Holi colors?

Maybe you’re feeling purple for creativity, or seeing the world in yellow for positivity. Conversely, maybe it’s dark blue if you’ve been having a hard time, or even grayscale (as in, not on the rainbow at all).

Whatever color resonates with you is okay. Now is your time to share!

Example: Lately, my work has felt like a calm, serene pale blue. I’ve been doing a great job of working at a steady pace, and not letting myself get exhausted or overwhelmed. 

In this prompt, think about times your team was bopping your heads to the same rhythm, and times you didn’t feel so aligned. 

Was there a shared soundtrack to your work, or did it feel like people were out of sync? 

This could be related to communication, your project’s cadence, preferred approaches, or anything else that helps you get on the same page. 

Example: I had a hard time adapting to our new asynchronous working style. Waiting as long as a day for answers to my questions really held up my flow. Can we talk about ways to make async more intuitive? 

Holi is all about music. Throughout the festival, people take to the streets playing drums and other musical instruments. Half the fun is expressing that upbeat energy through dance! 

What good outcomes made your team want to dance? Are there any new moves or actions you’re excited to try out next? 

Example: I want to celebrate our winning that last big proposal! I think we need to push our boundaries on that project, and create something really innovative and creative. 

Finish your Holi retro on a sweet note! In this prompt, you’ll give your colleagues an imaginary gulab jamun, kaju pista roll, or pink rose-flavored rasmalai. 

Now’s your chance to recognize someone who made your work life a little sweeter. Who deserves kudos, kind words, or a heartfelt thanks? 

Example: Sean was such a great collaborator this past sprint. Every time I bounced ideas off him, I felt like they got stronger. 

For the Holi festival, of course! Enjoy this retrospective in early Spring, when people across India are celebrating love, color, and the triumph of good over evil. 

Happy Holi, whether your team is in Mumbai, New York, London, or beyond!

Facilitators can start this meeting in Parabol by selecting their team on the right and then hitting that vibrant Add New Meeting button.

Jump into Parabol and select Retro Meeting with the arrows, then use the dropdown to select the Holi retrospective template. This is where you’ll find Parabol’s library of 40+ pre-made and customizable retrospective formats. 

Every Parabol retrospective begins with an optional icebreaker. This box is checked by default. You don’t have to do one, but we recommend it – especially for remote teams. 

If you’re doing an icebreaker, you’ll have a random question to answer. You can refresh it if you want another option, and of course you can create your own if you want.

After the icebreaker you’ll move on to the reflect stage. This is where your team will do all their ideation and brainstorm in silence using the prompts above. All reflections are kept anonymous at this stage to prevent groupthink.

All Parabol sprint retrospectives can be run synchronously or asynchronously. Functionalities such as the timer, voting and multiplayer grouping help you make your retrospective exercise a success and make facilitation easier.

Team members can all leave comments together on topics you’ve chosen. Parabol has a discussion thread just for that!

After the reflect phase, you’ll group reflections into topics, vote on issues to discuss, talk about the most voted on items, and set action items for each process improvement so you can make it a reality.

Parabol will send a summary of the retro when you’re done so nobody needs to take notes. You can also send any action items out to Jira or GitHub where your tasks belong!

If you like this template, you might also like other holiday-themed retrospectives, like the Diwali retrospective, Christmas retrospective, Halloween retrospective, or Thanksgiving retrospective!