WRAP Retrospective Template: Wishes, Risks, Appreciations and Puzzles

WRAP stands for Wishes, Risks, Appreciations and Puzzles. Two columns look ahead (what you'd like, what could go wrong) and two look back (who helped, what nobody understands yet). There's no column for complaints, so it's a good reset for a team whose retros have become a list of grievances. You close by reading the appreciations aloud.

The four columns

Puzzles are questions, not complaints. "Search is a mess" is a complaint. "Who decides what goes into the search index now?" is a puzzle, and someone can go and find the answer.

Where it comes from. Nick Oostvogels described the exercise in his 2009 post Boring retrospectives, part 2. He called it "Actions centered": Appreciations, Puzzles, Risks and Wishes around a small square where the actions go. He based it on the Temperature Reading, a group check-in developed by Virginia Satir. The WRAP acronym came later, and nobody is credited with it.

When to use it (and when not to)

Use it when:

• your retros have become complaint sessions and you want one that asks for thanks and questions instead
• you're halfway through a project and want to look ahead without losing the last few weeks
• the team is about to plan a big piece of work. Wishes and risks feed straight into planning.
• something is unclear (a reorg, new ownership, a new tool) and people have questions they haven't asked

Pick something else when:

• the sprint went badly and people need to say so. Frustration ends up disguised as risks. Run Mad Sad Glad first.
• one problem needs its cause found. Use 5 Whys.
• the risks deserve a whole session before a launch. Run a Pre-Mortem.

How to run it live (45 minutes)

1. Check last retro's actions. Open the Previous Retro tab in the Action Items panel, and Old / Unresolved Items for anything older. Did last retro's risks hit?
2. Write silently. Set the shared timer for 10 minutes. Ask everyone for at least one appreciation that names a person.
3. Group. Puzzles cluster fast. Three people asking who owns the same thing is one group, and a strong signal.
4. Vote. Three dot votes each, on Wishes, Risks and Puzzles only.
5. Discuss Puzzles first. They're the quickest to clear. Answer what you can and turn the rest into "find out by Friday" actions. Then the top risks (what's the plan?) and one wish (what's the first step?).
6. Put actions in the middle, as in Oostvogels' original board. Every top risk, open puzzle and chosen wish ends with an owner.
7. End with thanks. Read every appreciation aloud.

How to run it async over a sprint

WRAP suits async because two columns go stale fast: a risk is most useful the day you spot it, and a late thank-you loses its detail.

1. Day 1: the board is ready as soon as someone clicks Start New Retro after the last retro. The facilitator adds one open question from sprint planning to Puzzles.
2. During the sprint: add a risk when you spot it and an appreciation when someone helps you, on the board, in Quick Notes on the Team Room page, or with /retro your note if the team uses Slack.
3. Mid-sprint: the facilitator reads the Puzzles. If someone can answer one now, ask them to. That's one less item for the meeting.
4. Two days before the end: everyone votes. If Appreciations is thin, ask each person for one.
5. The day before: the facilitator groups notes and reads the CarrotIQ Sprint Summary.
6. Retro day: a 25-minute call on the top risks and puzzles, ending with the appreciations. Or go fully async: each risk owner posts a plan in writing.

See how to run an async retrospective for the full playbook.

12 example prompts

Wishes

1. If you could change one thing about how we ship, what would it be?
2. What would make next sprint the best one this year?
3. What does another team have that you wish we had?

Risks 4. What could make us miss the next milestone? 5. Where do we depend on one person? 6. What are we assuming another team will deliver on time?

Appreciations 7. Who helped you this sprint, and how? 8. What did someone do that nobody else saw? 9. Which decision or tool saved you time?

Puzzles 10. What question have you been putting off asking? 11. What did we decide that you still don't fully understand? 12. Where are you unsure who owns something?

More in 60 sprint retrospective questions.

Facilitator tip and a common pitfall

Tip: make appreciations specific. "Thanks, team" doesn't land. Ask for a name, what they did and what it made possible: "Thanks, Kofi, for the deploy runbook. It got me through my first on-call." Specific thanks also tell the team what to keep doing.

Pitfall: complaints dressed up as risks. "Risk: product keeps changing scope" is about the past. Ask the author what could happen next, and when. "If the invoice spec changes again after Wednesday, we miss the release" is a risk the team can plan for. If most risks read like the first version, the team needed a venting retro first.

How AI helps with this format

On Pro AI (and during the free trial), CarrotIQ handles the admin around the board:

• Group names. Puzzles often cluster around ownership. Drag "Who owns search now?" onto "Who do I ask about the indexer?" and CarrotIQ names the group, for example "Search Ownership".
• Summaries. The Sprint Summary covers each column and the whole retro. Paste the Risks summary into the notes for the next planning session.
• Suggested action items. CarrotIQ Suggest drafts an action from the notes, weighting the most-voted ones, so your top Risks and Puzzles lead. Edit it and assign an owner.

Example action items

Risks get a plan, puzzles get someone to find out, and one wish gets a first step.

At the next retro, these show in the Previous Retro tab. More in retrospective action items that actually get done and the complete guide to sprint retrospectives.

Use this template in Retro Rabbit

1. Start a 14-day free trial. No card is needed.
2. Pick WRAP from the format library: choose "Browse all formats" when you create your Team Room, or later in the Team Room's Settings.
3. Ask everyone to add an appreciation the day someone helps them, while the details are fresh.

See pricing for plans.

Related formats

• Sailboat: risks plus a shared goal to steer toward
• Pre-Mortem: a full risk session before a launch
• Appreciation Round: just the thank-yous, in 15 minutes
• Mad Sad Glad: when people need to say how the sprint felt first
• More formats in Remote and async
• All retrospective templates