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Agile Transformation – 2

I have already started talking, but want again to continue talking about an easy subject: Transforming a company to agile. Well, not so easy. But not as hard as some people think. ‘A journey of a thousand miles starts with one step.’ We are too easily discouraged by what seems a daunting task. We too […]

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The Organzation of our Scrum course – 1

Why is our Scrum course organized the way that it is?     First, is a Scrum Team organized? Well, a good Scrum is usually described more as adaptive than organized. Of course, we can debate the meaning of these words, during a day or during a sprint, or during a release. I would rather […]

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Impediments: Orlando May 2015

During class in Orlando, the following impediments were identified.  Some duplications, I think, perhaps partly due to the way we/they did it. Bulky process Silos Customer rep with no mandate Blame game [Need] one more person on site with Front End [skills] Lack of motivation [Lack of] knowledge of new technology Delivery pressure, customer expectations […]

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Sprint Planning Meeting – The Basics

Note: I wrote a similar but different blog post on this same subject later.  This one says some useful things that one does not, and vice versa.  Might challenge your mind usefully to compare and contrast.  See here. At the beginning of each sprint is a Sprint Planning Meeting (SPM). Minor point: The SPM is […]

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Do we really believe in autonomy at work?

How autonomous should knowledge workers be?  A lot? If we believe this, where does this lead us?  That’s the theme of this post. Earlier the subject line of this post included ‘freedom.’  This word carries more emotional energy, and requires discussion of other issues.  Hence, the change. And do we, the workers and the managers […]

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Proposal: Learn about Open Agile Adoption

Imagine that we, the agile advocates, have agile going a little bit in our organization.  How do we get it more broadly adopted? One challenge is wanting everyone doing something that is consistent and reasonably professional.  (This could be any of several flavors of agile, but for now, imagine Scrum.)  We want this because of […]

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Why the Yogi Berra jokes? Why the music? Why all the questions and sarcasm in class?

I want to explain the techniques I use in the CSM class, or at least something about them. First, some people really like these techniques, and want to know more. Second, sadly, a few people find the techniques annoying, especially the first day.  In general this is a small percentage of people, but in some […]

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Proposal: Scaling Workshop

This is the first in a series on new ideas to make your practice of Agile more successful. Do a scaling workshop The idea is a 2 day workshop with the right people in your company, focused on the scaling topic. First, scaling can mean many different things, and in the workshop we like to […]

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Managers : Impediments

It should not be confusing how to manage in Scrum (agile). Let’s put a scope on this. We are talking about the management of innovation, using Teams. Not the management of BAU or regular production or whatever your firm calls that. I am less sure these principles (below) apply in those cases, but I do […]

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3 Ways a Scrum Team is Managed

We think it is reasonable to manage a Scrum Team in at most 3 ways.  (OK, we mention also a fourth.) (Context: To simplify, we assume a smallish firm with teams that are mostly working independently.  There are lots of other contexts.) There are two main rules. A. Do NOT over-manage or over-control the Team.  […]

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