Energy Check retrospective template
A retro about sustainable pace, aimed squarely at burnout risk.
Also known as: Energy Check retrospective, Energy audit, Burnout retro.
The Energy Check asks what gave people energy and what drained it, then what the team will rebalance. It is deliberately about capacity rather than delivery, which makes it the format to reach for when velocity looks fine on paper and the team does not.
The columns, and what goes in each
- Energising
- What gave you energy this sprint — work, people, or moments?
- Draining
- What drained you, wore you down, or you dreaded coming back to?
- Rebalance
- What would we change to shift the balance, starting next sprint?
When to use the Energy Check retrospective
- After a sustained crunch, a long on-call rotation, or several releases back to back
- Teams where people are quietly working late and nobody has raised it
- Regular use — quarterly, alongside a team health check, to spot a trend before it becomes attrition
How to run a Energy Check retrospective
- Say up front that this session is about capacity, not output, and that nothing here becomes a performance conversation.
- Write silently for five minutes.
- Read Draining second and resist solving each card as it is read — collect first, decide later.
- Fill Rebalance as a group and pick one change the team can make without asking anyone’s permission.
Run this retrospective in RetroCanvas
Energy Check is built in — pick it when you create a board, or set it to recur automatically every sprint. Free, with no credit card required.