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Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile storytelling from the trenches

Every week day, Certified Scrum Master, Agile Coach and Business Consultant Vasco Duarte interviews Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches from all over the world to get you actionable advice, new tips and tricks, improve your craft as a Scrum Master with daily doses of inspiring conversations with Scrum Masters from the all over the world. Stay tuned for BONUS episodes when we interview Agile gurus and other thought leaders in the business space to bring you the Agile Business perspective you need to succeed as a Scrum Master. Some of the topics we discuss include: Agile Business, Agile Strategy, Retrospectives, Team motivation, Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, Backlog Refinement, Scaling Scrum, Lean Startup, Test Driven Development (TDD), Behavior Driven Development (BDD), Paper Prototyping, QA in Scrum, the role of agile managers, servant leadership, agile coaching, and more!
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Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile storytelling from the trenches
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Now displaying: December, 2017
Dec 29, 2017

Johanna Rothman is a prolific Agile author with at least 13 books at the time this is being written. She has worked as an Agile manager, and has consulted many Agile managers all over the world. In this episode she shares some of the hard-earned lessons from her very active career. All of that and much more is also available in her book: Create your Successful Agile Project.

We start by reviewing some of the most effective practices that Johanna discovered and developed over her career - and there’s a lot to learn, so dig in!

As an example, Johanna shared how she had little success with Agile Retrospectives until Diana Larsen and Esther Derby’s Agile Retrospectives book came out. Another example is how she discovered the importance of having ~1 day User Stories, a practice that I also discovered and wrote about in the NoEstimates Book.

 

About Johanna Rothman

People know Johanna as the “Pragmatic Manager.” She provides frank advice—often with a little humor—for really tough problems. She helps leaders and managers do reasonable things that work.

She has written many books. At least 13 if my count is right.

She also writes articles for all kinds of places, including Better Software, IEEE Software, and Cutter IT Journal to name just three. She's keynoted on five continents and is not sure (yet) she wants to go to Antarctica.

Johanna can help you create projects, teams, and organizations that work.

You can link with Johanna Rothman on LinkedIn and connect with Johanna Rothman on Twitter.

Dec 28, 2017

Far too many companies act as if Product Development was a shopping trip: they get a list of things to “buy”, typically Features. Then they create documents explaining that shopping list: Roadmaps, Backlogs, PowerPoint presentations, Post-its on walls, you name it. And then they execute. Here’s the thing: if you act as if Product Development is a shopping trip all you will do is spend a lot of money and get lots of Features you don’t really need.

EXTRA BONUS: to get 30% off Barry’s Hypothesis Driven Development course you can go to www.leanagile.study  and use discount code THIRTYCPOFF before the end of December 2017.

About Barry O’Reilly

Barry O’Reilly is a business advisor, entrepreneur, and author who has pioneered the intersection of business model innovation, product development, organizational design, and culture transformation.

Barry works with business leaders and teams from global organizations that seek to invent the future, not fear it. Every day, Barry works with many of the world’s leading companies to break the vicious cycles that spiral businesses toward death by enabling experimentation and learning to unlock the insights required for better decision making and higher performance and results.

Barry is co-author of the international bestseller Lean Enterprise: How High Performance Organizations Innovate at Scale—included in the Eric Ries Lean series, and a Harvard Business Review must read for CEOs and business leaders.

You can link with Barry O’Reilly on LinkedIn and connect with Barry O’Reilly on Twitter.

You can also contact Barry O’Reilly through his site, and sign up to his newsletter to get the latest news about Hypothesis Driven Development.

Dec 27, 2017

Karl starts this episode by describing how he discovered the need to bring Agile to the level of strategic decision making. He tells the story of a team that was, by all measures, successful. They were delivering software, they were achieving their technology goals, but the business was not booming. What was wrong? This was the start of a long journey for Karl. During that journey he discovered that there were a lot more topics that required an Agile approach. Not the least of which Strategy. Which had to become Agile Strategy.

 

About Karl Scotland

Over the last 15 years he’s been an advocate of Lean and Agile approaches to achieve this, working with companies including the BBC, Yahoo!, EMC Consulting, Rally Software, Cisco and SDL. During this time, he was a pioneer of using Kanban Systems and Strategy Deployment for product development, a founding member of both the Lean Systems Society and Limited WIP Society, as well as being active in the community and a regular conference speaker. He has been awarded the honorary Brickell Key Community Contribution Award at the 2013 Lean Kanban North America conference.

You can link with Karl Scotland on LinkedIn and connect with Karl Scotland on Twitter.

Dec 26, 2017

In this special episode we welcome JB Rainsberger. An experienced Agilist from Extreme Programing background. We start the episode discussing what are the patterns of Agile adoption that work in practice. During that conversation we discuss also a good way to help others “get” what Agile is about. JB has developed this approach over the years, and learned from many failed attempts to “sell” Agile. We also refer to the work by Gerry Weinberg on how to be a consultant to your organization.

 

About JB Rainsberger

B. Rainsberger (Twitter @jbrains, http://www.jbrains.ca) helps software companies better satisfy their customers and the businesses they support. He’s an Extreme Programming fundamentalist, but in a *good* way. He helps software professionals increase their capacity to deliver value for their employer, their teammates, and most importantly for themselves. When he isn’t wandering Europe helping clients and attending conferences, he helps clients from the comfort of his home in Atlantic Canada, one conversation at a time.

You can link with JB Rainsberger on LinkedIn and connect with JB Rainsberger on Twitter.

If you want to know more about JB’s work you can check his web-site, or ask JB Rainsberger  question on ask.jbrains.ca. Invite your developers to visit JB Rainsberger’s Test Driven Development course. JB Rainsberger blog is at: http://blog.thecodewhisperer.com

Dec 25, 2017

In this episode we cover the very broad topic of coaching. We dive deeper in the meaning of the term, and what that means for Scrum Masters.

We start by defining what coaching is, and Ryan makes the case for Coaching as a profession and a career path. Coaching is in the end - citing Ryan - about “revealing insights about the systems of work without actually resolving them.”

Ryan describes the process we can use to live up to this statement, and shares his own hard-earned insights about the role of a coach working the Agile teams and organizations

EXTRA BONUS!: an episode from Ryan’s own podcast, Agile For Humans

In this podcast we include Ryan’s Agile for Humans podcast episode #65. Listen to the end to get this special extra bonus!

About Ryan Ripley

Ryan Ripley loves helping people do great work. He is a servant leader at heart and is passionate about fostering safety and trust in the workplace. Ryan created the Agile for Humans podcast to put the focus back on the individuals and interactions that make agile work.

You can link up with Ryan Ripley on LinkedIn and connect with Ryan Ripley on Twitter.

Ryan also hosts a popular Agile podcast: Agile for Humans. Be sure to check it out!

Dec 22, 2017

System conditions are patterns that happen over and over again in organizations but the teams can’t solve on their own. With Susan we explore an approach that can help us detect those anti-patterns that can be traced back to the system, the policies and rules setup in that organization. In this episode we discuss a pattern of behavior in teams that can help us pinpoint the system conditions they struggle with.

 

About Susan McIntosh

Susan McIntosh is an agile coach and scrum master, especially interested in training and agile transformations - both fast and slow. She finds analogies to improving workplace culture in her experience in theater, teaching, cooking, and parenting. Susan is an active participant in the agile community in Denver, Colorado.

You can link with Susan McIntosh on LinkedIn and connect with Susan McIntosh on Twitter.

Dec 21, 2017

Our role as Scrum Masters is to help teams develop. Specifically, we need to help them become high-performing. Accomplish their mission in a way that they can be proud of. But how do we get there? How do we help teams develop that level of competence and action? In this episode we review how we can help teams grow and develop. We also discuss the tools we can use to help teams reach a high-level of performance.

Featured Retrospective format: The Starfish Exercise

For those moments when Start/Stop/Continue is not enough. The Starfish exercise can also think about what you want to do more of (amplify) and the things you need to continue to do, but may need to reduce (dampen). Check this episode for the detailed facilitation ideas.

 

About Susan McIntosh

Susan McIntosh is an agile coach and scrum master, especially interested in training and agile transformations - both fast and slow. She finds analogies to improving workplace culture in her experience in theater, teaching, cooking, and parenting. Susan is an active participant in the agile community in Denver, Colorado.

You can link with Susan McIntosh on LinkedIn and connect with Susan McIntosh on Twitter.

Dec 20, 2017

When we have a huge change in front of us. The organization is growing. It can’t be stopped. How do we handle the change that is inevitable? How do we help the organization evolve and change?

In this episode we review how conversations can help us in our role as change agent. Where to use conversations, what they are good for, and how to spark the right kind of conversations.

 

About Susan McIntosh

Susan McIntosh is an agile coach and scrum master, especially interested in training and agile transformations - both fast and slow. She finds analogies to improving workplace culture in her experience in theater, teaching, cooking, and parenting. Susan is an active participant in the agile community in Denver, Colorado.

You can link with Susan McIntosh on LinkedIn and connect with Susan McIntosh on Twitter.

 

Dec 19, 2017

Sometimes we don’t need a super-smart, get things done person. Sometimes we just need a person in the team that can help the team grow. But what happens when we don’t have that kind of person? How do we handle those super smart people that want to direct the whole team? Listen in to learn what happened in Susan’s story, and what she learned from those events.

 

About Susan McIntosh

Susan McIntosh is an agile coach and scrum master, especially interested in training and agile transformations - both fast and slow. She finds analogies to improving workplace culture in her experience in theater, teaching, cooking, and parenting. Susan is an active participant in the agile community in Denver, Colorado.

You can link with Susan McIntosh on LinkedIn and connect with Susan McIntosh on Twitter.

Dec 18, 2017

The story that Susan has to share with us starts off as usual, a team, struggling. What happened next? Susan acted in a way that made her understand what psychological safety means in practice. No mumbo jumbo, no buzzwords. What it means for you! Listen in and share the journey with Susan. You’ll learn a lot!

 

About Susan McIntosh

Susan McIntosh is an agile coach and scrum master, especially interested in training and agile transformations - both fast and slow. She finds analogies to improving workplace culture in her experience in theater, teaching, cooking, and parenting. Susan is an active participant in the agile community in Denver, Colorado.

You can link with Susan McIntosh on LinkedIn and connect with Susan McIntosh on Twitter.

Dec 15, 2017

System conditions come in many shapes and forms. In this episode we talk about the impact of communication (or lack thereof) on the system. We discuss the case of a team that had information withheld from them, and what that led to. And Sebastian shares some great teams on how to handle the expectations of stakeholders and the teams we work with.

 

About Sebastian Hitzler

Sebastian works as a dedicated Scrum Master for two delivery teams at Fidor Solutions in Munich. The team members are from 10 different countries and spread into 3 different locations in Germany, Spain and Ukraine. Fidor enables clients to become digital banks based on their ecosystem. Sebastian also works with the wider organisation to help them transform with lean and agile.

You can link with Sebastian Hitzler on LinkedIn and connect with Sebastian Hitzler on XING.

Dec 14, 2017

The “obsolete” Scrum Master is a definition of success that many of our guests have described in the past: the Scrum Master isn’t needed anymore. But Sebastian has a different take on it. And he also shares concrete tips on how to assess if a team has indeed out-grown their Scrum Master.

 

Featured Retrospective format: Sad/Neutral/Happy

In this episode we review Sebastian’s go-to retrospective format when working with the teams he supports. Listen in to learn how he runs this quick, yet effective retrospective format.

 

About Sebastian Hitzler

Sebastian works as a dedicated Scrum Master for two delivery teams at Fidor Solutions in Munich. The team members are from 10 different countries and spread into 3 different locations in Germany, Spain and Ukraine. Fidor enables clients to become digital banks based on their ecosystem. Sebastian also works with the wider organisation to help them transform with lean and agile.

You can link with Sebastian Hitzler on LinkedIn and connect with Sebastian Hitzler on XING.

Dec 13, 2017

In this episode we explore some of the anti-patterns that Roadmaps can create in a team. We discuss the process of change and some ideas on how to make the Roadmaps better for team and stakeholders.

In this episode we also refer to a book that gives concrete visual tools that can be used also for Roadmapping. The book is Actionable Agile Tools by Jeff Campbell, and is published by Oikosofy, which also publishes this podcast.

 

About Sebastian Hitzler

Sebastian works as a dedicated Scrum Master for two delivery teams at Fidor Solutions in Munich. The team members are from 10 different countries and spread into 3 different locations in Germany, Spain and Ukraine. Fidor enables clients to become digital banks based on their ecosystem. Sebastian also works with the wider organisation to help them transform with lean and agile.

You can link with Sebastian Hitzler on LinkedIn and connect with Sebastian Hitzler on XING.

Dec 12, 2017

Being in a rush is a common anti-pattern in software development. When deadlines are tight, and there’s a lot to do people enter the “rush” mode. They start taking short-cuts, drop communication, and complain about meetings. In this episode we discuss the anti-patterns coming from being a hurry and what to do about them.

 

About Sebastian Hitzler

Sebastian works as a dedicated Scrum Master for two delivery teams at Fidor Solutions in Munich. The team members are from 10 different countries and spread into 3 different locations in Germany, Spain and Ukraine. Fidor enables clients to become digital banks based on their ecosystem. Sebastian also works with the wider organisation to help them transform with lean and agile.

You can link with Sebastian Hitzler on LinkedIn and connect with Sebastian Hitzler on XING.

Dec 11, 2017

Product Owner is a critical role in Scrum. When it is missing there’s many things that don’t work. Prioritization, answering questions about the product quickly, you name it. But what is a Scrum Master to do? Listen in and explore with us the many anti-patterns that emerge when the Product Owner is missing in a Scrum team.

In this episode we refer to the Oikosofy Story Mapping Workshop facilitation guide.

 

About Sebastian Hitzler

Sebastian works as a dedicated Scrum Master for two delivery teams at Fidor Solutions in Munich. The team members are from 10 different countries and spread into 3 different locations in Germany, Spain and Ukraine. Fidor enables clients to become digital banks based on their ecosystem. Sebastian also works with the wider organisation to help them transform with lean and agile.

You can link with Sebastian Hitzler on LinkedIn and connect with Sebastian Hitzler on XING.

Dec 8, 2017

Scrum Masters are familiar with the 3 pillars of Scrum or the values that are at the core of Scrum. In this episode we discuss how focusing on those 3 pillars of scrum, the Scrum Masters can help make the system conditions visible. The system conditions are the things we must focus on uncovering and help change to enable the adoption of Agile and Scrum in the organization. After all, Scrum and Agile transformation are not easy!

Dec 7, 2017

What is success for a Scrum Master? This is the #1 question Barry gets in his trainings. In this episode we talk about his answer to that question and how we can enable one of they key patterns in Scrum: team self-organization.

Barry shares his own success checklist so that you can use it yourself and assess your path to success.

Dec 6, 2017

Many organizations are stuck in the “let’s write a document, then a contract before we even get started” anti-pattern. Here’s the problem: no matter how careful you are with the original contract, there will be problems because the understanding of the contract will diverge over time. In this episode we talk about a different approach. And with Barry we review the steps he used to move from Big Upfront Contract to Co-creating with the Customer! A radical new approach enabled by the adoption of Scrum.

Dec 5, 2017

Scrum Masters are typically people committed to the success of the teams they work with. That’s great, but it can lead to problems. It may lead, for example, to the teams not making decisions on their own! In this episode we discuss anti-patterns that develop in teams where the Scrum Masters act more like a team captain than a servant leader. Most importantly, we discuss what we need to do to transition from captain to servant leader.

In this episode we talk about Scrum, a Pocket Guide by Gunther Verheyen, a previous guest of the podcast. We also talk about Scrum Mastery: From Good To Great Servant-Leadership by Geoff Watts.

Dec 4, 2017

There are many paths to the Scrum Master role. One that is quite common in the IT industry is that of moving from Project Management to being a Scrum Master. As you’d expect there are quite big differences. In this episode we talk about those differences and what Project Mangers must take into account when changing their role to Scrum Master.

In this episode we talk about a paper that Barry authored where he describes the 8 stances of a Scrum Master. A good list to have in mind, especially when transitioning from Project Management to Scrum Master.

If you are on your journey from Project Management to Scrum Master you might be interested on this episode with Danilo Tambone who made that transition himself!

Dec 1, 2017

“Culture eats process for breakfast” goes the quote. Culture is one of the big aspects of the system of work we interact with, so we need to be aware of what are the cultural trends in the organizations and teams we work with. What are those? Joe discusses with us methods and practices to identify the “cultural markers” that can help us, as Scrum Masters, understand the system we need to interact with.

 

About Joe Anderson

Joe is a Scrum Master at a small travel technology company with a passion for bringing out the best in people and building deep relationships. He works hard to foster an environment of safety, fun and learning with a focus on relentless improvement.

You can link with Joe Anderson on LinkedIn and connect with Joe Anderson on Twitter.

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