Community Blog

I have made 3 videos available in the popular "In 5 Minutes" series. Bundle the following 3 videos and learn in 15 minutes about Scrum, Open Space and Lean Coffee.   

Executives: there are many reasons for agility. You already know this.

Scrum es un marco flexible que ofrece muchas ventajas para el desarrollo de productos complejos, pero puede ser fácilmente mal interpretado. Justamente esa libertad puede llevar a distorsiones en su uso.

When we talk about Scrum for complex Product Development, it starts from Vision and Product Backlog.

More "Cha-Ching!" if your Scrum Values are alive!

In this blog, we’ll dive deeper into the topic: “Scrum Master vs Project Manager”. If you’re having a similar question about the Product Owner vs the Project Manager.

Openness is one of the 5 Scrum Values and in this blog post we want to take a closer look at this particular Scrum Value and how it relates to Agile Transformations when it is elevated from a Scrum Team level to an organizational level.

Earlier this year, I released the complimentary Scrum Poster with the goal to give Scrum Teams around the world a medium to see the Scrum Guide in visual form.

Some people just happen to learn more from short movie clips. And they can be a great way to bring some humor in. Also available as a Youtube Playlist.

Earlier this year, we had released the complimentary Scrum Poster and the response was way beyond positive. We love that teams around the world use the poster to make Scrum transparent.

Many thanks to attendees at my PAL-E workshop in London on 26-27 October who reviewed & debugged my change story for "what is organizational agility?"

Just to set the scene, I haven’t figured this out yet. I can tell you my story, in all its ugliness. It’s based on a real story, but it’s changed significantly from reality to protect the innocent. I hope you still find my account useful.

I often wonder about the Trustpilot reviews straight after a workshop. Did I entertain? Did I perform? Were attendees satisfied? Are attendees inspired? It matters. I just think it matters more if the workshop made a difference to the work lives of attendees. I can't take credit. The client does the hard yards.

I'd like to share another story with you... Thank you Paul and Charlie for sharing your story. It moved me and left me with huge smile on my face. 

Many Scrum Teams are not very familiar with the Scrum Values as described in the Scrum Guide, and if, they have their own interpretation of it. We have also met many teams that were able to name the values, but not many live by them.

I have my own biases,  having seen co-located teams work very well and having struggled with “dislocated” teams, I often recommend my clients to reconsider “dislocated” teams. 

En Scrum cada Sprint tiene como objetivo producir un incremento de producto completamente terminado y que potencialmente puede ser lanzado al mercado. La inspección de este incremento permite la adaptación del Product Backlog, así como evaluar el progreso hacia el objetivo del Sprint y los objetivos de negocio.

Scrum se basa en un proceso empírico. El empirismo se basa en tomar decisiones basados en la información concreta obtenida de la observación que muestra el progreso del desarrollo de producto, el empirismo se basa en la experimentación para validar las hipótesis.

Software developers are mostly guys, happy to work by themselves at night in dark rooms. And they turn coffee, cola and pizza into code. Right?

The unpredictability of the market and competitors are the main reasons of traditional management is not enough/fit to reach success.

How common misunderstandings about the Scrum Roles prevent Scrum Teams to become effective

Hard to believe but we have only two weeks left in our Scrummer quiz. But still two more chances to win a copy of Software in 30 Days, authored and autographed by Ken Schwaber himself.

Last Monday I started the 5-week long Scrummer Quiz, a Summer Quiz that is all about Scrum. We give you 3 quiz questions every Monday morning and raffle off 2 Software in 30 Days books autographed by Ken Schwaber on Friday.

Last Monday I started the 5-week long Scrummer Quiz, a Summer Quiz that is all about Scrum. We give you 3 quiz questions every Monday morning and raffle off 2 Software in 30 Days books autographed by Ken Schwaber on Friday.

"You are not doing Scrum." How many times have you heard that? Scrum Police are a legion.

For the next 5 weeks we are trying to have a little bit of fun during the summer month of July. I will be asking you three questions every Monday in the Scrummer Quiz and raffle off two books written by Ken Schwaber Software in 30 Days.

Many Scrum teams have a regular meeting scheduled on everyone’s calendar, even though it is not an official Scrum event.

Changing the way we work is extremely difficult — we all know this. It requires us to find novel solutions to wicked challenges, to deal with cultural baggage (‘the way we do things here’) and to bring along the people needed to make a change successful.

A Sprint Goal is an objective set for the Sprint that can be met through the implementation of Product Backlog (cit. Scrum Guide). Have you clearly defined a Sprint Goal at the end of your Sprint Planning? Is this Sprint Goal understandable and transparent to everyone? Is it defined in a way that provides guidance and flexibility to the Development Team? The aim of this article is to raise awareness on the importance of having a Sprint Goal defined and to provide some suggestions on how to create one.

I always assume that the people I work with are professionals - and not children. This is why I don’t like maturity models in whatever shape or form. And we’ve got a lot of those in our industry.

Flow of work and, most importantly, value is paramount. There are times when you keep looking at the process and don’t understand what is going on, what is wrong, and why stuff is not getting to done. Read to learn how flow can help while limiting work in progress.

The House of Scrum metaphor and sketch seemed to have piqued some interest last year. In this video I go over the 3-5-3 framework, giving a high level overview of Scrum..

This is the first part of a 2-part blog post series about dealing with very large Product Backlog items. Part 1 intends to focus on the Scrum Team, Part 2 will be released shortly after our Webinar on April 29th and will focus on the “Epic” challenges agile leaders are facing.

A common phrase that I use in my classes is that Scrum is like the poker game Texas Hold’em; it only takes a few minutes to learn but a lifetime to master.  The “few minutes” may be a bit of a stretch but my students get the point. 

What is Scrum Team Velocity? This is a tricky one, and you need to be answering it in the context of the organization you are interviewing with and its complementary practices.

This question "What is the duration of a Sprint" is seemingly simple, but depending on the interviewing situation, company, interviewer, and their familiarity with Scrum you might need to give them more or less details and answer additional questions your answer might bring up.

Struggling to integrate UX Designers into Scrum? Use these actions to make Scrum teams more user-centric and UX Designers full-time members of the Scrum Team!

Interested in receiving a visual aid to interpret the Scrum Guide? Grab a free copy of a very cool Scrum Poster and show off among your colleagues and friends. In the spirit of transparency, this poster can be a learning aid (for example when listening or reading the Scrum Guide) or a tool for Scrum Masters to explain Scrum to the organization, Product Owner or Development Team.

Most organizations are using Scrum, however, many of them feel like the agility of their organization has degraded, and they might be right! Often, using Scrum starts out as a way to improve development efforts coordinated within an IT division or department, but that is not the most effective organization structure to potentially get maximum benefit from Scrum.

As of November 2018, there are 181,000 certified Professional Scrum Masters (PSM I) around the globe, but only 2,400 individuals that went for the next level Scrum Master certificate, often referred to it as an advanced Professional Scrum Master or PSM II.

Why do I think team coaching is a bad idea? Don't get me wrong, I believe team coaching can have a great amount of added value. It’s just that I often find that teams receive coaching while they should not even be a team.

Priorizar puede indicar una posición de un item dentro del Product Backlog basado en algún tipo de técnica como por ejemplo ROI. El Product Owner no debería limitarse a usar el resultado priorizado mecánicamente. Existen muchas técnicas para priorizar el Product Backlog.

I first met Sally,and then later Francis her husband, at a local user group - Agile in Leeds, where Sally delivered a fantastic 10 minute talk on how she implemented Scrum to help Francis with ADHD. 

I have an important favor to ask to Scrum practitioners who are asking their team to commit themselves to their sprint backlog at sprint planning.

Imagine this, you are at the weekly company meeting in a room of 60 people. All of them are co-workers who you have been working with for several years. You feel engaged and committed to the goal set by your company. 

Nothing better than to use your profession and passion for 'Scrum' for a much higher goal: improving education so that our youth is better prepared for the demands that current society places on our knowledge and especially on our skills.

As an Agile Coach, you frequently encounter situations which demand quick thinking to get things moving in the right direction. Over time I have found few techniques which come in handy and always keep these in my playbook in case needs arise. This is the third part in the series of tools that I have found useful in my role as Agile Coach – Asking Powerful Questions.

By Jochen (Joe) Krebs (jkrebs@incrementor.com) and Nils Oud (noud@incrementor.com) 

By Jochen Krebs (jkrebs@incrementor.com) and Nils Oud (noud@incrementor.com)  The most timid girl in the class confided me (as did several other students):

Un Scrum Master que le dice al equipo de desarrollo y al Product Owner que según alguna experiencia cada miembro del equipo de desarrollo solo puede desarrollar...