Category Archives: Better Agile

Using a “Definition of Agile” in a Large Corporation

Fairly often a large corporation will mandate Agile. One thing to consider is Open Space Agility — more on that before and later. For now, I want to suggest a “Definition of Agile.” This is vaguely similar to the Definition of Done concept. The idea here is that often teams will… make up what Agile […]

Read More »

Is the PO full-time?

“Is the Product Owner a full-time position?” This is a good question. Here’s a partial answer now… First, people and teams typically get more done if things are simpler. So, KISS!!!! This is so important. Do you have to keep it KISS every time? Well, no, at least not to play by the Scrum rules […]

Read More »

The PO Role — some controversy

Here is a quote: This is far different from the Product Owner role in Scrum, which directs the PO to simply hand the development team a prioritized backlog of work to do. This quote is from a post on LinkedIn, and a bunch of senior agile people are fervently discussing it, on at least two […]

Read More »

5 Key Suggestions for Making Change

In agile, we want things to improve.  Improve a lot. Here are my first 5 suggestions: Do something and learn You know how to do something small.  Do it.  Don’t wait; do it now.  And learn from that. Just do Scrum (more) and learn If you do Scrum, the transparency of Scrum will force others […]

Read More »

Games People Play: Courage, Psychological Safety and the SM

Some years ago there was a book called Games People Play, by Eric Berne. The older I get the less certain I am of how people work, and what they really are.  But that people play games (and games they do not explicitly discuss or even consciously are aware of) seems probably true. It is […]

Read More »

The ScrumButt Test – Update

Next week I will be speaking to Agile Midlands about the ScrumButt Test.  And the following day, I will be doing a Webinar on ScrumButt. In part, this is because to me the ScrumButt Test is fun. Here are some key statements: The test enables you to get a reading on a Team quickly It […]

Read More »

A different kind of Scaling problem

In the Lean Agile Open on April 28th, one of the sessions was on “scaling.” And it reminded me that people use the word scaling to mean quite different things.  And often I or we do not think about this.  But each of the different meanings of Scaling is important, at least in some sense.  […]

Read More »

More on the Dedicated Agile Champion role

In 2011 I wrote a blog post about the Dedicated Agile Champion.  This title is a pattern in Manns/Rising’s book: Fearless Change. Bob Lieberman sent in a comment that I should discuss this more.  That the job can be complex in larger organizations. And I completely agree.  In fact, I discussed that complexity in the […]

Read More »

New Courses – Scrum Alliance

As you may know, Scrum Alliance has announced several new courses. The first two to know about are the “Advanced” courses.   The Advanced Certified ScrumMaster (A-CSM) and the Advanced Certified Scrum Product Owner (A-CSPO). They are pretty much what you would expect.  More advanced than the CSM (or CSPO).  With their own certification (eg, the […]

Read More »

Steve Kerr’s advice on developing a great team

Here is an article about an interview with Steve Kerr on developing a great team. Scrum helps.  But Scrum is only part of the story.  There are many skill sets to develop a professional team.  And more skill sets to developing a winning team in any season. http://labs.openviewpartners.com/leadership-lessons-from-steve-kerr/

Read More »