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Lock, Stock and two platforms
Cross-functional
retrospective: what we
have learned in four years
Dmitry Lazarev,
Consultant on organizational development,
facilitato.ru
Maria Garanina,
Head of the Center of Expertise in
Operating Processes, Alfa-Bank

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The status of the project and
goals of the retrospective
I
n 2012, Alfa-Bank launched the project FLECS
(Fast Loan Easy Cloud System). The goal
was to change the IT platform in how they
execute and finalize all loan agreements with
individuals with regards to consumer loans, credit
cards and cash loans.
With the retail credit boom in 2012-13 the
old application could not keep up to current
spending trends. In this regard, there was very
little progress in introducing new credit products.
The bank decided to introduce a new automated
platform called BPM Pega, which would improve
their customer experience.
Project Settings
1. Budget: $ 12 000 000.
2. Duration: 4 years (2012-2016).
3. The project involved about 100 people at
different times and with varying degrees from
nearly 20 bank offices.
4. Development conducted by two external
companies.
FLECS system Introduction – is a unique project for us. First, it is associated with
piloting of BPM Pega platforms in the bank, and the adoption of strategic decision of
transferring banking processes to the new platform depended on the correct analysis
of the results. Secondly, this is an example of a serious cross-functional cooperation.
The integration of new software into the existing IT infrastructure and working with
multiple vendors at the same time. Which is especially important at a time when we are starting a
large-scale restructuring of IT systems in line with the bank’s new strategy.
These factors led us to the idea to hold not just the standard debriefing but try new, modern methods and to
perform cross-functional retrospective of the project with the involvement of all entities participated in.
In May 2015, when the project came to the finish line, we decided it was the very moment when
it is time to stop and analyze the way passed, again before the final segment to check whether we
can do something to improve the work.
In the IT project portfolio for re-
tail lending FLECS project has al-
ways occupied a special place.
During this project’s «journey»,
we have accumulated many as-
sets: experience, knowledge and a rich list
of life-hacks, as well as, operational issues and problems
remaining unresolved. When you do something for four
years and spend 12 million dollars, in the third year it will
always raise the eternal question: why so long and expen-
sive, and when will it all end?
We wanted to gather the whole team together to evaluate
achievements and victories. To formalize an experience,
understand what we have learned to do well, and how it
can help us in dealing with obstacles that still prevented
us from moving forward.
We wanted to avoid the classic mistakes – when dur-
ing a meeting of all remember insults, swearing, list very
trivial problems, and then, as an optimization, someone
proposes to cancel debriefing themselves. That is why
we decided to hold a meeting in a new way.
Now, after going through this exercise, I can say that
a retrospective preparation and its implementation – is
serious work. It’s not just one or two days of team-build-
ing retreat, during which all participants listen to five fas-
cinating presentations on the theme «How we did it»,
and then – sack races and dinner. Retrospective – a com-
pletely different format, with a qualitatively different level
of involvement of each individual. Next, we have consist-
ently describe the whole process of prepar-
ing a project’s cross-functional retrospective.
On one of the first meet-
ings with Maria Garanina
and the project sponsor,
we determined the list of
the participants for the
Retrospective session. We invited
employees of the 18 bank units (those who have
worked hard and long on the project), as well as
employees of two external vendors – suppliers:
“IT” and “BTC” companies. For maximum effi-
ciency, and to disconnect from the current af-
fairs, we decided to hold a retrospective offsite
and out of the city. We made a preparation plan:
a) Launch meeting for all those who will partic-
ipate in retrospective; b) individual interviews
with each member of the project; c) the retro-
spective itself; g) meeting after the
retrospective, aimed at further de-
velopment and implementation of the
decisions taken.
Launch meeting
(25 June 2015; 1.5 hours)
Work on the retrospective began with a big launch
meeting that included all project participants that are
significantly involved in the implementation. A total
of 40 people gathered for the launch meeting.
Launch meeting had three objectives.
Firstly, we wanted to demonstrate a sincere
interest of management and project sponsors in the
results of a retrospective. At the beginning of the
meeting, the head of retail management technology
announced the companies’ goals. «We carry out
FLECS project retrospective in order to:
a) to extract knowledge for the benefit of others;
b) to look at the project from different perspectives,
as the results of the project were controversial;
c) to develop teamwork, project participants to
cooperate, not just «learn to tolerate each other.»
Secondly, it was necessary to prepare participants
for the upcoming retrospective and set the
expectations. Retrospective – is not a session to
search, charge, or punishment of any scapegoats.
It is an opportunity to learn how and what can
be improved. The team will need to find ways to
improve their performance by themselves as the
most willing of socially acceptable answers do not
exist. It was important to have at the launch meeting
to convey to the participants Kerth’s Prime Directive:
Regardless of what we discover, we must
understand and truly believe that everyone did the
best job he or she could, given what was known at
the time, his or her skills and abilities, the resources
available, and the situation at hand.
Thirdly, the meeting gave the opportunity to start at
an early stage to get feedback from the participants
of the project and to give a more accurate
explanation of the retrospective itself. To do this,
we discussed the following question, what topics do
you think it is important to address in the course of
the FLECS project retrospective?
Interviews with project
participants (1-20 July 2015)
The next step was to have the retrospective
facilitators hold personal meetings with each
individual participant. This step was to understand
the mindset of the employees, to identify the
main issues and concerns, as well as to find out
their attitude and willingness to participate in the
retrospective.
However, the purpose of the interview before the
retrospective was not only to learn the specifics
of the project by consultant. Interviews have two
other purposes more important than raising the
consultant’s awareness.
The individual preliminary interviews were to help
the participants gather and understand their thoughts
MARTIN PILECKI, CIO, «Alfa-Bank»:
MARIA GARANINA, Head of the Center of
Expertise in Operating Processes, Alfa-Bank, «Alfa-Bank»
DMITRY LAZAREV, Consultant on
organizational development

3. MEETING FOR FEED-
BACK AND FUTURE
ACTIVITIES PLANNING
LAUNCH MEETING
OFFSITE MEETING
PERSONAL
INTERVIEWS
STAGES OF PROJECT RETROSPECTIVE
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and feelings, as well as help them prepare and
articulate what they want to share in the upcoming
retrospective.
The preliminary interview also can eliminate
speculation about the motives of the consultant and
his working methods. Often a retrospective is held
at the end of the project. The success of which is
being questioned at all different levels within the
organization. Moreover, some participants, despite
all the assurances of management remain concerned
about possible «career limitations» as the results
of a retrospective. Individual interviews help, if not
completely dispel these fears, and help prepare
employees to ensure that all discussions during the
retrospective will take place in a safe atmosphere,
and that the participation in retrospective is
completely voluntary.
The two-day retrospective out of
office and out of the city
(July 30-31, 2015)
The event is designed so that at the beginning,
participants perform several exercises designed to
create a comfortable and safe environment to work
together:
1. Working in groups, of which are constantly
changing, so that everyone can communicate
with as many people as possible.
2. Developing a common understanding of the
project’s success.
3. Drawing up the emotional cardiogram project.
4. Competition for the best artifacts.
During the first day, we made a timeline of FLECS
project life by identifying and placing all important
events.
After the retrospective
Two months after the “offsite retrospective” we held
three more meetings to finalize the decisions before
the project implementation. It is important to finish
and put the squeeze on solutions to implementation.
It’s essential to complete the current cycle and send
the team a message that we did not just talk and
have a good time together but were able to improve
our operational performance.
Teamwork helps people to take responsibility for
the implementation of the decisions and to gain the
support from those on who will need to sustain the
changes in the future.
We have noticed some positive behavior:
1. Employees themselves were engaged and
brought their own proposals to the end without
having to be forced.
2. People began to show more initiative and self-
organization on improving workflow.
At the end of the interview
I explained to each partic-
ipant that retrospective is
very similar to the archae-
ological site and asked
participants to look for the important
project artifacts and bring them to the retrospec-
tive. Artifacts are physical objects related to the
project. Most often these objects are documents,
such as the very first project schedule or the first
version of the solution architecture, sketched on
a napkin. I asked for some time to develop in the
IT-archeologists and find important artifacts. Dur-
ing the retrospective, we will arrange a compe-
tition among team members, during which they
need to introduce and describe their artifacts
telling associated stories. Following these pres-
entations, we will have a contest with prizes for
artifacts in three categories: “The most important
project artifact”, “The most unusu-
al project artifact” and “The biggest
collection of project artifacts.
DMITRY LAZAREV, Consultant on
organizational development
The most emotional and memo-
rable moment was the first day of
its completion, when each can say
thanks to the man who helped
and / or still help him / her in
the project. We too often do not have time
to say a sincere thanks to others, and it is
not always acceptable (by inner culturally),
and then it turns out that the only problems
and complaints loudly sound, and good re-
mains in the shadows.
OGANESOV GEORGE, Head of the
Development of Credit Business Processes,
product owner

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WHAT IS A CROSS-FUNCTIONAL RETROSPECTIVE PROJECT?
Purpose: To save time, energy and nerves in the
future for projects implementation.
Result
The collective wisdom of the team, absorbed during
the project, extracted, documented and distributed
to the entire company as a whole.
Duration
Preparation: 3-6 weeks.
The event: 2-2.5 day offsite
Post-event retrospective: 1-3 months.
Maintenance: If necessary, ½-day month.
Number of participants. 8-50 people.
List of participants
All participants of the project, as well as
representatives of external and internal stakeholders
(contractors, customers).
Side effects
Switching communication from allegations to
personal responsibility.
Improve business processes and interactions.
Repair damaged relationships.
When to use
In complex projects with high stakes.
In projects with highly interdependent teams: after
a significant stage or at the end of the project.
If you determine that, you need to find a way to
improve your operation.
When not to use
In projects with low interdependent teams.
When you are trying to find out who is responsible
or guilty.
When you need to influence the team gently to the
pre-defined solutions.
Literature.
Norm Kerth. Retrospective of the project,
M.: Publisher D. Lazarev, 2015
What is a retrospective of the project?
Retrospective of the project – a special ritual
conducted:
1) At regular intervals during the project (eg. Bi-
weekly for 2–3 hours)
2) At the end of a significant phase (timeframe 1
year) or at the end no matter if the project failed or
was successful. (2–2.5 day offsite)
Types of retrospectives:
1) In – command,
2) Cross-functional (inter-team).
In this article, we describe our experience in cross-
functional retrospective teams and what it was like
at the end of a certain stages of the project.
What is the effect of a retrospective on the team’s
performance?
The aim of the retrospective is to save time and
resources in the implementation of future projects.
To complete research within teams from different
sectors1 and show that a company can increase
individual and team productivity by 20-25% by using
properly prepared retrospectives.
Properly prepared retrospectives must meet four
criteria:
1) Active self-learning (rather than passively
accepting information). As a rule, people tend
to learn and develop more progressively when
they are directly involved and experiencing
the learning. Therefore, in order to give a
retrospective effect there should be activities
that include self-training and self-study within the
teams and not just the slide presentations.
2) Developmental intention (rather than
administrative). Creating an environment of
psychological safety where participants are
providing constructive feedback in an appreciative
way that allows for mutual dialogue and allows
everyone to share their experience.
3) Analysis of the specific (not generic) events.
Analysis of specific events will allow deeper
understanding of individual actions and their
relationship to the overall strategy. This approach
allows retrospectives to identify future goals,
action plans and final steps.
4) Multiple (but not the only) sources of information.
A variety of points of view makes it possible to
get the most complete picture of the working
episodes. It is therefore useful to include
a retrospective of external (independent in relation
to the team as a whole) sources of information.
1 Tannenbaum, S.I. & Cerasoli, C.P. (2013). Do team and
individual debriefs enhance performance? A meta-analysis.
Human Factors: The Journal of Human Factors and Ergonomics
Society, 55, 231–245.
3. Relationships, communication and mutual
understanding between employees improved
significantly.
At this point, it is sufficient to meet regularly, to
maintain the focus on improving processes and
redirect people’s attention from the fixing endless
current issues to improvement of the project.
Here are some of our results:
1. Subprojects related to the transfer of cash loans,
were completed a month earlier than planned.
This was due to the improvement of our test
stands: we made changes to the software testing
process and the analysts became more involved
in testing.
2. To improve the quality of software delivered to
the Bank we invited to the team the architect
with the necessary skills to work with the
platform Pega, and worked on his area of
responsibility and authority. Then we have
audited the architecture of the new credit
front office and made a plan for implementing
improvements in it.
3. We conducted additional training for IT
departments and businesses, introducing them
the intricacies of the new platform with the goal
was employees could independently, without
the involvement of vendors to make minor
improvements to the system.
4. Decision to maintain the tradition of celebrating
milestones and victories whether they are large
or small.
The main reflection came on the second day, when we were working on the issues:
1. What worked well, and we do not want to forget it?
2. What is still puzzling us?
3. What still needs to be discussed in more detail?
4. What can we do differently?
5. What have we learned?
The timeline we created on the first day helped us tremendously. We remembered
not only current and recent events, but also looked into the past. For example, those who joined
the project in the middle of it’s life, did not understand why the Pega platform has been selected.
Answers to questions participants were able to get «here and now» from those that were part of
the original project.
DMITRY SIMONYATOV, Head of lending technology
A lot of material has been
collected. Sometimes it
seemed that it would nev-
er end, not only in regard
to the disad-
vantages, problems and
various bottlenecks, but also the good,
useful things.
DMITRY YERMOSHIN,
Head of the testing and implementation
From all data collected, we have
chosen by a vote that four problems
bother the team the most. To focus
efforts this question helped guide
us: what are the five things we
want to spend time resource on to find a solu-
tion for the future?
The most important for us to become:
1. Improving communication between the units.
2. Improving the expertise and expand our knowledge on
the work with the new platform.
3. Simultaneously improving the quality of the software
delivered to the bank, during its development by the two
companies.
4. Improving the quality of testing and reducing the number
of defects.
One of the most surprising results of the joint work was
the fact that 40 people in three hours proposed and agreed
solutions for all five problems. Anyone who has coordinat-
ed this type of collaboration in a large organ-
ization knows the effort it takes to harmonize
the document with all of its endless reminders,
notes and iterations.
Moscow, April 2016
MARIA GARANINA, Head of the Center of
Expertise in Operating Processes, Alfa-Bank, «Alfa-Bank»