In this episode Josh shares with us a story of a failure. A moment where the team was not performing, and Josh realised that he was part of the problem. What was the problem? How did he solve it? And what did he learn? Listen in to learn a major lesson we all need to learn as Scrum Masters.
Josh, together with Bob Galen also host an Agile podcast, the Meta-Cast podcast. Check it out!
About Josh Anderson
With four large-scale agile transformations under his belt, Josh Anderson has seen it all. Good agile, bad agile, and other things sometimes referred to as agile. As the VP of product development at Broadvine, Josh is responsible for the company's agile adoption and all aspects of software engineering. He gives back to the community by speaking regularly at industry conferences and co-hosting the agile-centric podcast called Meta-Cast.
Josh, together with Bob Galen host an Agile podcast, the Meta-Cast podcast. Check it out!
You can link with Josh Anderson on LinkedIn and connect with Josh Anderson on Twitter.
Pourquoi est-il si difficile de quitter le carcan du command & control? Pourquoi peinons-nous encore en 2017, à transmettre l’idée du servant leadership? Oana Juncu apporte sa pierre à cet édifice. Elle nous parle de biais cognitif et de culture industrielle mais aussi de bénéfices et d’impact. Elle nous confie également les deux outils qu’elle considère comme les plus efficaces pour aligner une culture d’entreprise avec le servant-leadership.
About Oana Juncu and Tim Bourguignon
Oana likes to present herself as a Business DJ, mixing whatever practices, from Agile and Lean(Startup) to storytelling , User Experience and neuroscience. In her day to day Oana helps teams and organisations unfold creativity, become proud of their achievements, and delight their customers.
You can connect with Oana Juncu on LinkedIn, or follow Oana Juncu on Twitter. Oana’s website can be seen at coemerge.com and her blog at Agile thoughts and things.
Tim Bourguignon is a full time geek, agile developer and BS-hunter. International speaker and avid writer, he is curious- and creative-minded, eager to search, teach and talk… and has been doing this for as long as he remembers. Tim is the author of the Developer’s Journey podcast where he interviews developers from all around the world to find out what it takes to become a better developer. Tim is the occasional host of other podcasts like the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast.
You can connect with Tim Bourguignon on twitter or visit Tim Bourguignon’s website to see what he is up to.
When we start as Scrum Masters we have a lot in our plate just focusing on the team, and their deliveries. However, over time, we identify obstacles to the team’s work that are coming from the organization’s lack of adoption. In this Episode we describe a model (AgilityLadder.nl) that describes two types of Agile adoption. The IT value perspectives, and the Business value perspective. Jens uses this model to help identify possible obstacles to the team that come from the wider organization.
About Jens Broos
Since 2011 Jens Broos helps building successful projects for customers of Mayflower in Munich. Studying computer and media science and being a boy scout for many years helps him understand the technical, organizational and social challenges of agile software development. As an Agile Coach he is guiding co-located and distributed teams to set up agile processes, building trust and self-organising. His passion is to bring people together to enable collaboration.
You can link with Jens Broos on LinkedIn and connect with Jens Broos on Twitter.
Jens shares with us a tool they’ve created to define and assess Scrum Master’s success and contribution to their organization. This tool includes an associated peer review process that they use to be able to help Scrum Masters grow their skills and knowledge over time.
In this episode we refer to the Kano Model, a model that classified different kinds of skills according to their impact.
About Jens Broos
Since 2011 Jens Broos helps building successful projects for customers of Mayflower in Munich. Studying computer and media science and being a boy scout for many years helps him understand the technical, organizational and social challenges of agile software development. As an Agile Coach he is guiding co-located and distributed teams to set up agile processes, building trust and self-organising. His passion is to bring people together to enable collaboration.
You can link with Jens Broos on LinkedIn and connect with Jens Broos on Twitter.
Salaries are rarely shared. Why is that? In the company Jens works, Mayflower GmbH, they also didn’t share their salaries until Jens and some of his colleagues started a change process in their organization. It all started as a Gin Tasting Workshop, where they created The Secret Society of Transparent Salaries. Listen in to learn more about how you can use “cultural hacking” to trigger change in your organization.
About Jens Broos
Since 2011 Jens Broos helps building successful projects for customers of Mayflower in Munich. Studying computer and media science and being a boy scout for many years helps him understand the technical, organizational and social challenges of agile software development. As an Agile Coach he is guiding co-located and distributed teams to set up agile processes, building trust and self-organising. His passion is to bring people together to enable collaboration.
You can link with Jens Broos on LinkedIn and connect with Jens Broos on Twitter.
Conflict is a looming threat for all Agile teams, unless we learn how to manage those situations with our teams. In this episode, Jens shares with us the story of a team member that was the focus of this particular conflict, how that conflict emerged and how they handled that situation in the end.
In this episode we mention The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team, a book that every Scrum Master should read. We also mention a great resource for team building. The Team Canvas tool that helps surface possible conflicts early on.
About Jens Broos
Since 2011 Jens Broos helps building successful projects for customers of Mayflower in Munich. Studying computer and media science and being a boy scout for many years helps him understand the technical, organizational and social challenges of agile software development. As an Agile Coach he is guiding co-located and distributed teams to set up agile processes, building trust and self-organising. His passion is to bring people together to enable collaboration.
You can link with Jens Broos on LinkedIn and connect with Jens Broos on Twitter.
What can we learn from the Boy Scouts about being a Scrum Master? Jens, who spent a long time with the Boy Scouts as a child shares what he learned from those years that he applies today in his role as a Scrum Master.
In this episode we refer to a good resource for remote/distributed Retrospectives: Groupmap.com.
About Jens Broos
Since 2011 Jens Broos helps building successful projects for customers of Mayflower in Munich. Studying computer and media science and being a boy scout for many years helps him understand the technical, organizational and social challenges of agile software development. As an Agile Coach he is guiding co-located and distributed teams to set up agile processes, building trust and self-organising. His passion is to bring people together to enable collaboration.
You can link with Jens Broos on LinkedIn and connect with Jens Broos on Twitter.
Est-ce qu’un projet fonctionnant exactement comme le dit le Scrum Guide, est agile? Dans cet épisode, Nicolas Umiastowski nous partage son expérience de coaching. Une expérience faite de tâtonnement, d’observation, et de beaucoup de bon sens. Nicolas prône de laisser la place à l'expérimentation, à l’initiative. Il encourage à lire entre les lignes et privilégier l’humain.
About Nicolas Umiastowski and Tim Bourguignon
Nicolas is 40 year old. He is a French agile coach, specialized in Scrum and Kanban with a strong experiences in Digital and web projects. He likes Design thinking, storyboarding (especially paper prototypes), getting real feedback from real users, and helping the team to reach symbiosis, and to find meaning in what they do. He is absolutely passionate about agility, but aware that depending on the context (as a consultant), agility can be different from one company to another.
You can find Nicolas Umiastowski on twitter, and follow his blog in french: Nicolas Umiastowski in french.
Tim Bourguignon is a full time geek, agile developer and BS-hunter. International speaker and avid writer, he is curious- and creative-minded, eager to search, teach and talk… and has been doing this for as long as he remembers. Tim is the author of the Developer’s Journey podcast where he interviews developers from all around the world to find out what it takes to become a better developer. Tim is the occasional host of other podcasts like the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast.
You can connect with Tim Bourguignon on twitter or visit Tim Bourguignon’s website to see what he is up to.
During this week we review the most downloaded regular show episodes for the first half of 2017. Here's the most downloaded show, TOP 1 for the first six months of 2016!
The #NoEstimates hashtag has been very active on twitter, and many people in the Agile community are pitching in with their thoughts. But what is #NoEstimates about for the author of the first #NoEstimates book? What can we learn from Vasco’s journey that led him to find #NoEstimates? Join us for this active and passionate conversation between Gunther and Vasco.
About Gunther Verheyen
Gunther left consulting in 2013 to partner with Ken Schwaber, Scrum co-creator, at Scrum.org. He represented Ken and Scrum.org in Europe. Gunther left Scrum.org in 2016 to continue his journey of Scrum as an independent Scrum Caretaker. Gunther believes that Scrum - the most applied software development framework - will not only increase the value that software delivers to organizations but is also a way to re-humanise the workplace for people.
Gunther is co-creator to Agility Path and the Nexus framework for Scaled Professional Scrum.
You can link with Gunther Verheyen on LinkedIn and connect with Gunther Verheyen on Twitter.
This week we review the top downloaded shows for 2017, at number 2 we have David Williams with a JUMBO episode on change management and visual task boards
This is a JUMBO episode with David where we talk about change management, how to engage with teams that are involved in change as well as how to help them overcome their fear of change.
But this is also a JUMBO episode because David shares with us many tips on how to help teams take the most out of Visual Task Boards. Listen in to get many, many ideas on how to improve the way your teams use physical Task Boards.
In this episode we mention the book Lean Change Management by Jason Little.
About David Williams
David is an experienced manager with excellent product management and project management skills using agile principles. Extensive experience managing teams and developing for embedded, PC and web based software and electronics for scientific and industrial applications.
He is passionate about creating teams with innovative cultures that are fully engaged in their work that is aligned to the company’s strategy for success.
His focus points are:
Delivering projects with the highest business value
Building high performance teams, that work hard and are passionate and fully engaged
Creating an innovative culture that everyone wants to be part of so that we can make a difference
Understanding people and getting them to work together in a safe environment where they can take risks.
Designing products that exceed the customer’s wildest dreams.
Embracing and driving change
You can link with David Williams on LinkedIn and connect with David Williams on Twitter.
This week we review the top downloaded shows for 2017, at number 3 we have Philip Eisbacher sharing his views on the role of the Scrum Master as a conversation facilitator.
We’ve reviewed the importance of fostering and having the right conversations in a team or organization. This is one of our critical roles as Scrum Masters: conversation facilitators. In this episode we talk about conversations as the main work-materialization tool based on the work by Finnish management writer Esko Kilpi. His articles are well worth reading if you are interested in how to foster the right conversations in your organization.
About Philipp Eisbacher
Philip works as a ScrumMaster and Lead. Recently moved to Berlin to face a new challenge in setting up a new site for his company and building up teams from scratch. His current challenges are remote collaboration, corporate growth and finding a good butcher in Berlin for the next Barbecue Season. He wants to share his problems, but also insights that he gets on a daily basis.
You can link with Philipp Eisbacher on LinkedIn and connect with Philipp Eisbacher on Twitter.
This week we review the top downloaded shows for the first six months of 2017. At number 4 we have Guther Verheyen's episode on limiting (or not) the role of the Scrum Master
Is Scrum a team framework? Gunther disagrees, and explains why he thinks that Scrum is fundamentally a framework for the whole organization. Maybe starting from the team (check out the upcoming BONUS episode with Gunther on this topic), but then it goes beyond. If we limit the role of the Scrum Master to the team, we are missing one of the largest contributions of Scrum to Agile organizations.
About Gunther Verheyen
Gunther left consulting in 2013 to partner with Ken Schwaber, Scrum co-creator, at Scrum.org. He represented Ken and Scrum.org in Europe. Gunther left Scrum.org in 2016 to continue his journey of Scrum as an independent Scrum Caretaker.
He calls himself a connector, writer, speaker, humaniser. Gunther assists, serves, advices teams, individuals and executives.
Gunther believes that Scrum - the most applied software development framework - will not only increase the value that software delivers to organizations but is also a way to re-humanise the workplace for people. Gunther likes to inspire individuals, teams, departments, and organizations to realize their potential.
Beyond Scrum, Gunther is all about his family, life, books, and music. He communicates in Dutch and in English. Gunther is co-creator to Agility Path and the Nexus framework for Scaled Professional Scrum.
You can link with Gunther Verheyen on LinkedIn and connect with Gunther Verheyen on Twitter.
This week we review the TOP 5 downloaded episodes for the first six months of 2017. Here's number 5 for 2017!
Distributed teams are hard to work with, but if you add cultural differences to the mix things get complicated pretty quickly. In this episode, we hear a story of a team that was scattered and a Scrum Master that did not know about the nuances of the team’s national culture. Listen to learn what happened and how to avoid it from happening to you.
About Mark Thuun
Mark started as a software developer when he learned some basic PASCAL from his dad taught. He was then 7-8 years old. Mark has been working as a Scrum Master since january 2015. For 2 years he worked with teams in the biggest telco in Denmark, and currently works for the danish national lottery.
You can link with Mark Thuun on LinkedIn
This show, in French, is hosted by our very special friend of the show Tim Bourguignon
Que faire quand un projet cannibalise un produit? Quand le Product-Owner joue le rôle d’un project-owner? Dans cet épisode, Issame El Kharbili nous emmène dans le monde du produit, de la vision et de la génération de valeur. Il nous présente quelques outils permettant de remettre la valeur au centre de la discussion. De créer une vision claire et précise pour toute l’équipe. Et de recentrer un produit sur son/ses atouts principaux.
About Issame El Kharbili and Tim Bourguignon
Issame El Kharbili worked as a software architecture consultant for 5 years before seeing the light and switching gears toward agile coaching. Issame has been a coach for 3 years now, developing more passion for it day after day.
You can link with Issame El Kharbili on LinkedIn and connect with Issame El Kharbili on Twitter.
Tim Bourguignon is a full time geek, agile developer and BS-hunter. International speaker and avid writer, he is curious- and creative-minded, eager to search, teach and talk… and has been doing this for as long as he remembers. Tim is the author of the Developer’s Journey podcast where he interviews developers from all around the world to find out what it takes to become a better developer. Tim is the occasional host of other podcasts like the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast.
You can connect with Tim Bourguignon on twitter or visit Tim Bourguignon’s website to see what he is up to.
Conversations and dialogue are the tools that Hemant uses to study the system where he works. He has specific questions he asks from the team and the stakeholders that guide his investigation of the system. These questions are critical to start the dialogue in the right direction.
About Hemant Khati
Hemant is working as an Agile Coach, scrum Master and Scrum trainer since 2005. Hemant loves to help companies explore the 'scrum 360' approach wherein the power of scrum is extended to vendors, partners and the support functions. Hemant has a Masters in Computer Science and is a professional Scrum Trainer and currently works for Cognizant Technologies.
You can link with Hemant Khati on LinkedIn and connect with Hemant Khati on Twitter.
Hemant uses 3 questions to guide the review of his own work as a Scrum Master. In these 3 benchmarks he includes the team, the stakeholders and the integration of the team with the rest of the organization. Listen in to hear Hemant’s 3 questions as well as the way he measures his own performance in these 3 questions.
About Hemant Khati
Hemant is working as an Agile Coach, scrum Master and Scrum trainer since 2005. Hemant loves to help companies explore the 'scrum 360' approach wherein the power of scrum is extended to vendors, partners and the support functions. Hemant has a Masters in Computer Science and is a professional Scrum Trainer and currently works for Cognizant Technologies.
You can link with Hemant Khati on LinkedIn and connect with Hemant Khati on Twitter.
Succeeding with Agile is not about the team, or a group of teams. In this story Hemant shares a story of a large organization going Agile and what happened. As we talk about this context we also discuss how to get the business side of the organization to get involved, and what else is necessary to succeed with Agile in a large organization.
About Hemant Khati
Hemant is working as an Agile Coach, scrum Master and Scrum trainer since 2005. Hemant loves to help companies explore the 'scrum 360' approach wherein the power of scrum is extended to vendors, partners and the support functions. Hemant has a Masters in Computer Science and is a professional Scrum Trainer and currently works for Cognizant Technologies.
You can link with Hemant Khati on LinkedIn and connect with Hemant Khati on Twitter.
What happens when nothing is wrong? The sharp Scrum Master should keep an eye for this possible anti-pattern. After all no one is perfect, much less a team. What happened to this team? What was the problem and how to get out of the “perfect” anti-pattern? Listen in to hear about this story. In this episode we also refer to the Tuckman team development model and The 5 Dysfunctions of a team by Lencioni.
About Hemant Khati
Hemant is working as an Agile Coach, scrum Master and Scrum trainer since 2005. Hemant loves to help companies explore the 'scrum 360' approach wherein the power of scrum is extended to vendors, partners and the support functions. Hemant has a Masters in Computer Science and is a professional Scrum Trainer and currently works for Cognizant Technologies.
You can link with Hemant Khati on LinkedIn and connect with Hemant Khati on Twitter.
At the end of the Sprint, the Product Owner sits with the team and gives them a rating. And that’s not all, the team is a contractor and does not get paid when the rating is not “enough”. All know what the “enough” rating is in advance. So what could go wrong? Listen in to hear Hemant’s experience with the Team Rating Anti-pattern in one of his first Scrum Master jobs, no less!
About Hemant Khati
Hemant is working as an Agile Coach, scrum Master and Scrum trainer since 2005. Hemant loves to help companies explore the 'scrum 360' approach wherein the power of scrum is extended to vendors, partners and the support functions. Hemant has a Masters in Computer Science and is a professional Scrum Trainer and currently works for Cognizant Technologies.
You can link with Hemant Khati on LinkedIn and connect with Hemant Khati on Twitter.
This show, in French, is hosted by our very special friend of the show Tim Bourguignon
Avez-vous déjà repéré des situations qui, lorsqu’elles apparaissent, vous donnent immédiatement l’impression que quelque chose de néfaste couve? Une sorte d’anti-pattern dans vos équipes? Dans cet épisode, Alexandre Thibault vient nous montrer quelques cicatrices, et nous conter son expérience passée à coacher des équipes agiles.
About Alexandre Thibault and Tim Bourguignon
Alexandre is a Canadian computer scientist that became ScrumMaster and Agile Coach after 15 years as a programmer. For 4 years now, he helps directors and managers creating work environments where team members are engaged in their work using intrinsic motivation.
You can link with Alexandre Thibault on LinkedIn and connect with Alexandre Thibault on Twitter.
Tim is a full time geek, agile developer and BS-hunter. International speaker and avid writer, he is curious- and creative-minded, eager to search, teach and talk... and has been doing this for as long as he remembers. Tim has been working on a project called Developer's Journey (www.devjourney.info) lately, where regularly sharpens his podcasting skills talking to whoever is willing to about what it takes to become a better developer.
You can connect with Tim Bourguignon on twitter or visit Tim Bourguignon’s website to see what he is up to.
When looking at the systems we work within, it is imperative to understand and build the necessary feedback loops that help us understand what is going on. It is not enough to have feedback loops at the team level. The product feedback loops as well as the organizational feedback loops are the tools that enable us to understand what is going on and how to achieve what we seek. Tom shares some caveats for metrics we often use and several tools we can use to understand the system we work within. After all, feedback loops are information, not the whole picture.
About Tom Taylor
With interests like Tai Chi and Stand-up Paddleboarding, Tom’s always been attracted to concepts of flow and balance. As an Agilist at Pegasystems, Tom applies these interests directly as a Scrum Master with our Engineering teams, and fosters organizational excellence throughout Pega. He's been a Certified Scrum Master for over 4 years, and is also a certified as an Agile Facilitator/Coach, as well as a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist.
You can link with Tom Taylor on LinkedIn, or shoot him at email at tomas.taylor@pega.com.
We often ask questions or do surveys to assess our success as Scrum Masters. Those tools are powerful and useful if used in the right way. But very often we also have to go on a gut feel. An intuitive understanding of what the situation is at the present moment. When we do, we have to be able to turn that gut feeling into something concrete. An action that leads to the expected results. Tom discusses how we can do that, and build the necessary feedback loops for our actions.
About Tom Taylor
With interests like Tai Chi and Stand-up Paddleboarding, Tom’s always been attracted to concepts of flow and balance. As an Agilist at Pegasystems, Tom applies these interests directly as a Scrum Master with our Engineering teams, and fosters organizational excellence throughout Pega. He's been a Certified Scrum Master for over 4 years, and is also a certified as an Agile Facilitator/Coach, as well as a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist.
You can link with Tom Taylor on LinkedIn, or shoot him at email at tomas.taylor@pega.com.
In this episode Tom shares an important story from a time when Scrum was not yet the method used at his company. It is the story of a pitch by one of his colleagues that helped his organization get the right momentum to adopt Agile. This story has many insights as to how to present such an important change to management and the rest of the organization. In this episode, Tom also shares his view on what are the 3 most important change-related questions that a Scrum Masters should ask.
About Tom Taylor
With interests like Tai Chi and Stand-up Paddleboarding, Tom’s always been attracted to concepts of flow and balance. As an Agilist at Pegasystems, Tom applies these interests directly as a Scrum Master with our Engineering teams, and fosters organizational excellence throughout Pega. He's been a Certified Scrum Master for over 4 years, and is also a certified as an Agile Facilitator/Coach, as well as a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist.
You can link with Tom Taylor on LinkedIn, or shoot him at email at tomas.taylor@pega.com.
Teams face difficulties of all kinds. Technical, social, political, knowledge… The list goes on. But what is the Team’s most important enemy? In this episode we explore that question and some of the techniques that Tom has used to face and often defeat that most important enemy.
About Tom Taylor
With interests like Tai Chi and Stand-up Paddleboarding, Tom’s always been attracted to concepts of flow and balance. As an Agilist at Pegasystems, Tom applies these interests directly as a Scrum Master with our Engineering teams, and fosters organizational excellence throughout Pega. He's been a Certified Scrum Master for over 4 years, and is also a certified as an Agile Facilitator/Coach, as well as a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist.
You can link with Tom Taylor on LinkedIn, or shoot him at email at tomas.taylor@pega.com.
Failure is a forbidden word in many corporate cultures. So much so that it becomes impossible to talk about what is happening for real. We develop sophisticated language tricks to avoid discussing failure. But is that the right approach, the approach that fosters learning and growth? Listen in as we discuss the importance of trust, and how to approach failure with Agile Teams.
During the show we discuss “The 3 questions”, a short story by Tolstoy, a short story that has a very important message for all Scrum Masters.
In this episode we mention one of my favourite radio shows of all times: Car Talk by Click and Clack the Tappet brothers.
About Tom Taylor
With interests like Tai Chi and Stand-up Paddleboarding, Tom’s always been attracted to concepts of flow and balance. As an Agilist at Pegasystems, Tom applies these interests directly as a Scrum Master with our Engineering teams, and fosters organizational excellence throughout Pega. He's been a Certified Scrum Master for over 4 years, and is also a certified as an Agile Facilitator/Coach, as well as a Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist.
You can link with Tom Taylor on LinkedIn, or shoot him at email at tomas.taylor@pega.com.