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Middle Managers and Scrum

In a lot of organizations I work with, we need to do a better job of explaining Scrum to the middle managers. Most of the people in the teams get Scrum and see benefits. Most of the senior guys see their metrics get better, and, if they focus on the right feedback, hear and see […]

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Dear Rob – 2

Rob, as some readers may recall from the first post, is a made-up character, representing a typical senior business executive, responsible at a high level for the Agile initiative — among his many other duties. Perhaps the CEO (although probably not a CEO at the Jack Welch level at GE). In this post, we talk […]

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How to rollout Scrum – a summary

In the prior post, I noted that Tom Mellor had a basic objection to this question (How to roll out Scrum). Which was, and I hope I do not misstate it too much, don’t try to roll out something to an organization that does not really want it. He used the other pig metaphor, which […]

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Is there hope?

There is an interesting discussion on the CSM LinkedIn group, about rolling out Scrum to an organization. See here. Tom Mellor gives a realistic but somewhat depressing prognosis for many Scrum implementations. Tom is a good guy and a friend. It is OK if he and I disagree a bit on this one thing? Below […]

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The Dedicated Agile Champion job

If an Agile initiative is to succeed, one of the best patterns (cf. “Fearless Change” by Mary Lynn Manns and Linda Rising) is for someone to be named the Dedicated Champion (their title for the position). (Note to senior managers: If you really want the change to happen, wait until someone volunteers to be Dedicated […]

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Dear Rob – 1

Let’s assume Rob is a senior executive, with some oversight for an Agile initiative. He is a business person, not in any way a techie. What would you say to him? Well, here is the first in a series of posts for Rob; what I want to say to him. Note: Rob is not a […]

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Understanding the customer

In my view, one of the key things about Agile is bringing the customer and the team (the implementers) MUCH closer together. So that, for example, the team starts to understand many (most?) of the marketing issues and activities in effect.  (Note: I am using the word “marketing” in the broad MBA sense of the […]

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Impediments Management – 2

A bunch of us got together in Ottawa recently to discuss different issues for managers. The issue (one of three) chosen was Impediments Management across multiple teams. Including how an management Impediments Removal Team (IRT) would operate. The example we drew is one of four regular Scrum Teams, each with its own impediments list. Each […]

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The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Just finished “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” by Milan Kundera. As a start, see this. I drew a few observations from the book about our work. Surprise! In our work, we too feel everything is unbelievably ‘light’ and transient. At least some of us do, some of the time, and, with all of the change, […]

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Impediment Management

I was talking today with Martin Drapeau at PlanBox.com, brainstorming the question, “What do managers need?” I have let the cat out of the bag: I am not one of those agile guys who thinks all managers are evil. (Yes, I have in my career seen more bad managers than I want to admit — […]

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