[lobotryas]

You may have missed the part where the author says that problems should be addressed as they come up and not just once at the end of the week.

A retro obligates people to find and/or bring up issues. In my opinion an open door policy would push people to bring up things that actually matter.

[munchbunny]

This is a situation that really depends on the team. If your team isn't surfacing issues, then either you're creating an environment where people don't feel comfortable surfacing issues, or your team is mostly just not the type that is proactive about it.

If it's the latter, then "priming the pump" is a useful exercise, and a regular retrospective makes tons of sense.

That's also generally true of processes: every team has its quirks, and you fit the processes to the team's quirks.

[s73v3r_]

Retros are also for bringing up what went well, discussing why it went well, and how to do that in the future.