Easy As Pie

Choose this exercise

Purpose: Collect, organize, and act on team reflections across five distinct categories to improve work practices in the next cycle.

Use it when: At the conclusion of a sprint, project phase, or milestone when a team needs a balanced look at blockers, wins, and future ideas.

Skip it when: During an active organizational crisis or when team trust is too low for voluntary sharing of missteps.

Group arrangement: Individual reflection, small groups of 3 to 5 (for example, four groups of 4 and one of 5 for 21 people), and whole-room review

Timing: UWT suggested 40-minute duration. The source template has no set schedule; this provides realistic time for individual writing, concurrent sorting, slice review, and action selection.

Materials and tools

• Sticky notes (at least 15 notes per person)
• Markers or pens (1 per person)
• 1 whiteboard or wall poster divided into five labeled pie slices: Humble Pie, Shoo Fly Pie, Cutie Pie, Pie in the Sky, Easy As Pie
• 1 countdown timer
• Team notebook or shared digital document for recording action items

Before participants arrive

1. Draw a large circle on the whiteboard or wall paper and divide it into five labeled slices: Humble Pie, Shoo Fly Pie, Cutie Pie, Pie in the Sky, and Easy As Pie.
2. Write the prompt definitions visibly adjacent to each slice.
3. Distribute pads of sticky notes and markers to every participant seat.

Say this to open

Welcome everyone. Today we are using the Easy As Pie retrospective format. Our board has five slices: Humble Pie for owning a mistake or misstep; Shoo Fly Pie for an obstacle dragging the team down that we want to eliminate; Cutie Pie for appreciations; Pie in the Sky for an ambitious stretch idea; and Easy As Pie for things that ran smoothly and should continue. You will write your notes silently first. Every category is optional, and you decide what you wish to share.

How to run it

1. Introduce the categories 4 minutes

   Deliver the opening script. Point out the prompt definitions on the board. Provide one neutral example: under Shoo Fly Pie, an example note might say 'waiting two days for staging deployment keys.' Emphasize that all categories are optional, and nobody is required to post to Humble Pie if they prefer not to.

2. Write notes silently 6 minutes

   Participants write reflections silently, one idea per sticky note. Participants may contribute to as few or as many slices as they choose. Stop writing when the timer rings.

3. Post and cluster notes 10 minutes

   Divide participants into small groups of 3 to 5. All groups approach the board concurrently to post notes onto the corresponding slices. Group members quickly group duplicate or related notes together into physical clusters without lengthy debate. Participants may post notes silently without speaking.

4. Review themes and choose actions 15 minutes

   Gather the full room facing the board. Spend approximately 10 minutes scanning major clusters, devoting up to 2 minutes each to Shoo Fly Pie (blockers to remove), Easy As Pie (routines to protect), Pie in the Sky (ideas to trial), Cutie Pie (acknowledgments), and Humble Pie (lessons learned). Spend the remaining 5 minutes asking the room to agree on 1 to 3 concrete actions, assigning an owner and timeframe for each in the team notes.

5. Debrief 5 minutes

   Facilitate a brief debrief. Present the debrief questions and invite one volunteer response for each of the two selected questions, keeping total comments to three or fewer to finish on time.

Debrief questions

• Which theme on the board pointed to something we had not openly discussed before?
• What is one practice from Easy As Pie that we must actively safeguard next cycle?
• Who will verify that our agreed Shoo Fly Pie removal action happens?

Finished output: A board populated with grouped retrospective notes across five categories, resulting in 1 to 3 assigned action items documented in team notes.

Remote

Set up an online whiteboard with five columns or circle sections matching the categories. Participants add digital sticky notes during silent writing. In small breakout groups, participants cluster similar cards on the shared canvas. The facilitator then screen-shares the main board while the whole group reviews themes and types agreed action items into the meeting notes.

Hybrid

All participants use the shared digital board directly from their laptops for writing and clustering notes. The in-person room projects the digital board on a wall screen so both remote and in-room participants see identical updates simultaneously. In-person small groups discuss their clusters in their room pods while remote participants form a virtual breakout room.

Access and participation choices

• Participants may submit handwritten notes, type into a shared board, or ask a peer to post on their behalf.
• Humble Pie is strictly optional; anyone may skip it without justification.
• Participants may post notes without reading them aloud and may pass during whole-room verbal discussions.

If the session gets stuck

Team members feel reluctant to post mistakes under Humble Pie.

Remind everyone that Humble Pie is voluntary. Encourage framing notes around system or workflow breakages rather than personal shortcomings, or allow members to contribute only to other categories.

Too many sticky notes are posted to discuss each one individually.

Cluster related notes immediately. Focus whole-room discussion solely on clusters containing three or more notes rather than reading standalone items.

Terms used here

• Humble Pie: An idiomatic phrase meaning to admit a mistake or accept fault.
• Shoo Fly Pie: A traditional molasses pie, used here as wordplay for shooing away or removing annoying obstacles.
• Pie in the Sky: An idiom referring to an ambitious, fanciful, or seemingly impossible stretch goal.