RetroLift / Tools / Lean Coffee
Free online Lean Coffee board with voting and timer
A meeting with no agenda until it starts. Everyone adds topics, votes on them, and the top topic gets a timebox. When time is up, the group decides whether to keep going. Free, with no sign-up.
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When to use it
- Team meetings that have lost their energy
- Communities of practice and open forums
- When the agenda never matches what people want to discuss
What it does
- Dot voting, and you can stack dots on one topic
- A shared timer, and a keep-going vote
- Notes and action items, ready to copy or download
How to use it
- Collect. Create a session, share the link, and everyone adds topics they want to talk about.
- Vote. Spend your dots on the topics you care about most. You can stack several on one.
- Discuss. The top topic moves to Discussing and a shared timer starts.
- Decide. When time is up, everyone votes: keep going for a few more minutes, or move on.
- Wrap up. Capture notes and actions as you go, then copy or download the summary.
Tips
- Keep topics short, like a headline. The person who wrote it gets a minute to explain it first.
- Five to seven minutes per topic works well. Short timeboxes keep the energy up.
- Turn a note into an action item and give it an owner before moving on.
Open Lean Coffee free →
Frequently asked questions
How long should each topic take?
Five to seven minutes works well. Short timeboxes keep the energy up.
What if nobody adds a topic?
Give people two silent minutes to write one first. It usually gets things moving.
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Also from RetroLift: Retrospective templates · Team games · Icebreaker questions