Retro cosyp · powered by CoSyP

CoSyP — the protocol behind this app.

Communication Synchronization Protocol. A structured, bidirectional exchange for aligning mental models before or at the start of substantive work. Alternating questions, semantic anchoring of high-load terms, reflective verification — the deliberate construction of a shared interpretive floor.

Not therapy, not interrogation, not small talk. Not a feature of this app either — the protocol is older than the code and runs wherever people need to actually mean the same things by the same words before they decide — pairs, teams, rooms. This app’s v1 is the 1:n group shape; 1:1 is a different CoSyP path.

Field-tested by Martin Marinov in September 2020 with ten people across four question archetypes. The protocol is not theoretical.

Преди да можеш да преминеш пропастта, трябва да я видиш.

Before you can bridge the gap, you have to see it.

“I am the best. But I can be better.

The “but” is not surrender — it is the self choosing to reach outward.

If we don’t pause to look inward, we won’t see the problem in ourselves. Tomorrow we’ll be exactly where we are today, blaming someone else for it.
First ask where I am wrong before searching for blame in others.
Then make sure we really mean the same things by the same words — only then is disagreement about something real.
More of the same shape:
I can do it all.  But it’s better if we do it together.
God is always with me.  But I need to listen.
Today is my day.  But it’s better if it’s ours.
I am a winner.  But it’s better if you are a winner too.

The crucial elements — how CoSyP shows up here

Six things this app does that a generic retro tool does not. Each is a concrete realisation of the protocol; each carries its own line of added value the room actually feels.

1 · Make the gap visible.

Q1 ↔ Q2 Gap band

Q1 collects what each person actually does on a daily basis (today). Q2 collects what each person believes should happen tomorrow for the greatest possible outcome / effort input. The Reveal computes the items in Q2 that are absent from Q1 and highlights them as The Gap (bridge it).

Added value: the misalignment between intention and behaviour stops being a feeling and becomes a list of concrete items the room can argue about, assign, and bridge. This is the core CoSyP move — turn drift into a visible artifact.

2 · Force the rhetorical pause.

Q3 · no input

Q3 is the only stage with no input field. The disc shows the Iceberg (what we say · what we mean · what we need) and the CoSyP root-cause quote — "When there’s an engineer to blame, we don’t miss the chance to point the finger... we treat symptoms instead of fixing the root cause." The host pauses. The room looks inward.

Added value: alignment cannot happen if no one stops talking. Q3 is the structural guarantee that 60 seconds of inward attention exists in every retro — even when the team wants to skip it. Skipping Q3 is not allowed; sacrificing Q4 or Q5 is (see #5).

3 · Anonymise to remove defensiveness.

Reveal

The Reveal shows answers grouped per question with no participant attribution. The Gap is "items in Q2 absent from Q1," not "Alice said X, Bob didn’t agree." The host never sees who said what; the room never has someone to defend.

Added value: hierarchy and personality drop out of the conversation. People can say the uncomfortable thing without putting their name on it; the team responds to the content, not the source.

4 · Hand the moderator questions, not scores.

moderator nudges

Three KPIs — Gap share, Airtime skew, Q4 reach — each paired with a one-line prompt the host literally says next. "Pick two gap items. Assign an owner and a first concrete step before the room leaves." The numbers do not judge the team; they tell the host what to ask.

Added value: a KPI is a question, not an answer. The host walks out with three concrete moves to make the next time the number lands in that band — not a dashboard to defend.

5 · Keep the shape host-defined.

Q4 / Q5 · CoSyP-confidence

Q4 and Q5 are free-text at session creation (or live-edited mid-session). Default discs ship the Ginot model and the Levinson model; the host overrides them whenever the room calls for something else. And if alignment already feels strong, the host can skip Q4 or Q5 entirely — the protocol holds with fewer honest questions. CoSyP-confidence.

Added value: the shape of the retro adapts to the room without a config screen. The room signals strength by sacrificing a question slot; the host signals trust by letting them. That is the protocol playing out, not a feature toggle.

6 · Persist for compression over time.

Sessions history

Every retro is saved automatically with its full anonymised answers, gap, and KPI snapshot. Multi-session KPIs — gap closure velocity, tomorrow→today translation, trust drift — light up once a team runs ≥2 retros. The premise: CoSyP works when the gap shrinks over time, with fewer questions needed each iteration. Every KPI is a measure of that compression.

Added value: a single retro is one sample. The protocol pays off across iterations — the room sees its own gap close (or not) over weeks, and the moderator nudges sharpen as the history accumulates.

And the app itself runs on the protocol.

Anyone in the room can submit feedback on the app from the Feedback tab. The operator queues it; a run walks planning → implementing → deploying with per-phase notes the operator can read after the fact. Today the run is a [stub]; v2 wires a real Cursor agent dispatcher that overwrites those notes with its own transcript.

Added value: the room shapes the tool while it is being used. That is meta-CoSyP — same protocol, applied to the relationship between the people in the room and the software in front of them.

Run a Retro.

Pick a Q4 and Q5, share the join code, walk the room through the five stages. The Reveal does the consolidation.

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