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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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Now displaying: 2021
Jul 20, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Nancy was working with a team that was high-energy and focused on delivering value. Every sprint they tried to ship software, but there was always something that was preventing them from releasing. Over time, the team and Nancy tried to bring that up with stakeholders, but all they got was “blame” for not delivering to production. And then the team lost it… Listen in to learn how teams may react when external blockers are identified, talked about, but never solved.

Featured Book of the Week: Three books to help you perfect the team’s routines and calendar

In this segment, we talk about 3 books that, as Nancy puts it, bring together 3 important lessons for Scrum Masters that try to help their teams perform. The books are: Drive by Daniel Pink, When by Daniel Pink, and Deep Work by Cal Newport. These books helped Nancy reconsider the cycle she sets up for her teams with the aim to help them perform better. In this segment, we also refer to Ayurveda, and Team Coaching. 

How can Angela (the Agile Coach) quickly build healthy relationships with the teams she’s supposed to help? What were the steps she followed to help the Breeze App team fight off the competition? Find out how Angela helped Naomi and the team go from “behind” to being ahead of Intuition Bank, by focusing on the people! Download the first 4 chapters of the BOOK for FREE while it is in Beta!

About Nancy Beers

Nancy says she is here to change the world one game at a time. She plays with people to learn or unlearn things. This can either be hard skills or soft skills (aka. Human skills)

You can link with Nancy Beers on LinkedIn and connect with Nancy Beers on Twitter.

Jul 19, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Nancy has a background as both a project manager, as well as an Open Source contributor. Through her career, she eventually realized that the Scrum Master role would be a better fit for her because, as she puts it, it is about working with technology and humans, together! In this episode, we focus on that human aspect, and we learn that - sometimes - being transparent can have negative consequences. Listen in to learn how and when transparency can hurt you in the role of the Scrum Master.  

About Nancy Beers

Nancy says she is here to change the world one game at a time. She plays with people to learn or unlearn things. This can either be hard skills or soft skills (aka. Human skills)

You can link with Nancy Beers on LinkedIn and connect with Nancy Beers on Twitter.

Jul 16, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In this episode, we explore how the skill of asking questions is so critical for PO’s, and we learn from Dahm some exercises to show the importance of that skill. 

The Great Product Owner: The Deep Listening PO

Great Product Owners are good at listening to the team, and the stakeholders, but mostly to the customers and the market. In this segment, we talk about how PO’s can practice deep listening, and use that skill to improve their effectiveness in the role. 

The Bad Product Owner: Learning to ask questions with empathy

Bad Product Owners have many lacking features, but in this segment, we focus especially on the inability to ask questions from the team, and the customers. Dahm shares some of his signature workshops, and how he uses those controlled environments to help PO’s learn how to go deeper in the understanding of the team and the customer.

Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

About Dahm Hongchai

Dahm Hongchai is an Agile coach, a Scrum Master, and a business consultant with 5 years experience in high-tech and Startup industries in Silicon Valley, Thailand, and Australia. He was the first Thai to become a Scrum Trainer (ST) with Scrum Inc. Dahm also has 10+ years of experience with other approaches such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. And he is an Agile trainer and helps people to understand Agile via, for example Agile Cooking.

You can link with Dahm Hongchai on LinkedIn and connect with Dahm Hongchai on Twitter.

Jul 15, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

As we dive into the definition of success, we learn about the skill of Deep Listening. Dahm walks us through how that skill can help Scrum Masters bring the team to understand each other better, and learn to collaborate effectively. 

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Continue / Stop / Start

Dahm likes this simple format, because it helps people open up with the help of facilitation. The format is simple to explain and facilitate for Scrum MAsters, and can help them focus on helping the team members start, and continue their conversation. 

Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!  

About Dahm Hongchai

Dahm Hongchai is an Agile coach, a Scrum Master, and a business consultant with 5 years experience in high-tech and Startup industries in Silicon Valley, Thailand, and Australia. He was the first Thai to become a Scrum Trainer (ST) with Scrum Inc. Dahm also has 10+ years of experience with other approaches such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. And he is an Agile trainer and helps people to understand Agile via, for example Agile Cooking.

You can link with Dahm Hongchai on LinkedIn and connect with Dahm Hongchai on Twitter.

Jul 14, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Dahm was working with an exec team, which was not able to collaborate. Scrum Masters are responsible for collaboration in the teams they work with, and executives are just as much a team as any other team.

Dahm explains how we can help teams learn to collaborate, and create a trustful environment. In this segment, we refer to the book: The 5 Dysfunctions Of A Team by Lencioni

About Dahm Hongchai

Dahm Hongchai is an Agile coach, a Scrum Master, and a business consultant with 5 years experience in high-tech and Startup industries in Silicon Valley, Thailand, and Australia. He was the first Thai to become a Scrum Trainer (ST) with Scrum Inc. Dahm also has 10+ years of experience with other approaches such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. And he is an Agile trainer and helps people to understand Agile via, for example Agile Cooking.

You can link with Dahm Hongchai on LinkedIn and connect with Dahm Hongchai on Twitter.

Jul 13, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In this episode, we discuss how teams are often unaware of what is going on around them. Their desire to perform and focus on their work, can lead them to ignore the dependencies around them. Dahm shares one such story, and we discuss what we can do as Scrum Masters to help teams be aware, and react to what other teams need around them. 

Featured Book of the Week: Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams by DeMarco and Lister

In Peopleware, by DeMarco and Lister, Dahm found a call to focus on people, which was missing in his experience. Many businesses are good at technology, but are not so good with co-workers and people in the business. The book covers many insights that help Scrum Masters understand and implement the people focus that is often missing.

How can Angela (the Agile Coach) quickly build healthy relationships with the teams she’s supposed to help? What were the steps she followed to help the Breeze App team fight off the competition? Find out how Angela helped Naomi and the team go from “behind” to being ahead of Intuition Bank, by focusing on the people! Download the first 4 chapters of the BOOK for FREE while it is in Beta!

About Dahm Hongchai

Dahm Hongchai is an Agile coach, a Scrum Master, and a business consultant with 5 years experience in high-tech and Startup industries in Silicon Valley, Thailand, and Australia. He was the first Thai to become a Scrum Trainer (ST) with Scrum Inc. Dahm also has 10+ years of experience with other approaches such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. And he is an Agile trainer and helps people to understand Agile via, for example Agile Cooking.

You can link with Dahm Hongchai on LinkedIn and connect with Dahm Hongchai on Twitter.

Jul 12, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Dahm shares a story from his own journey as a Scrum Master. When Dahm started, he felt comfortable being a facilitator, which is an important skillset for Scrum Masters. However, that’s not enough. When reflecting on that story, Dahm understood that as a facilitator he was missing a critical aspect for the team to succeed: he wanted to facilitate Scrum, but the team was not ready for that. Listen in, to learn how Dahm changed his approach away from a pure-facilitation focus to a more leadership and coaching focus! 

About Dahm Hongchai

Dahm Hongchai is an Agile coach, a Scrum Master, and a business consultant with 5 years experience in high-tech and Startup industries in Silicon Valley, Thailand, and Australia. He was the first Thai to become a Scrum Trainer (ST) with Scrum Inc. Dahm also has 10+ years of experience with other approaches such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. And he is an Agile trainer and helps people to understand Agile via, for example Agile Cooking.

You can link with Dahm Hongchai on LinkedIn and connect with Dahm Hongchai on Twitter.

Jul 9, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Taking responsibility for the success of the product is one of the success characteristics we discuss in this episode, where we also explore what happens the PO thinks they can still code through the User Stories they write! 

The Great Product Owner: The PO that took responsibility for the success of the product

Raj introduces a PO that wanted to understand the product, and do the research. The PO worked to thoroughly understand the stories, and customer needs before putting the stories in front of the team. Another great PO characteristic was the PO’s ability to be patient, and explain the same ideas as many times as necessary. 

The Bad Product Owner: The pseudo-coder PO

This Product Owner missed important meetings, even if they were invited and told they were required. To top it off, this was a PO that wrote the User Stories as if they were pseudo-code. All of this led to the team knowing very little about “why” certain stories were being implemented. 

Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

About Raj Solanki

Raj is a Manager, Technical program manager as well as Scrum master. He focuses on helping the teams learn about Agile, overcoming obstacles, foster a collaborative community, and more. 

He constantly reads about agile and seeks out coaches when he feels stuck. He seeks constant feedback and helps teams be transparent and build trust.

You can link with Raj Solanki on LinkedIn and connect with Raj Solanki on Twitter.

Jul 8, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Raj’s definition of success starts with the team. He defines what success looks like for the team, and how he focuses on helping teams reach that success. In this episode, we also discuss how team-velocity is a factor of many variables, not only the work that team does.

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: The standard “what went well” format with a twist

Raj starts by describing the “What went well/not so well” format and adds a twist, a set of practices to help the team get started with the discussion and ends with an appreciation exercise. Listen in, to learn how Raj improves on the standard retrospective format. 

Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!  

About Raj Solanki

Raj is a Manager, Technical program manager as well as Scrum master. He focuses on helping the teams learn about Agile, overcoming obstacles, foster a collaborative community, and more. 

He constantly reads about agile and seeks out coaches when he feels stuck. He seeks constant feedback and helps teams be transparent and build trust.

You can link with Raj Solanki on LinkedIn and connect with Raj Solanki on Twitter.

Jul 7, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

As Raj started working with a team that had previously used a waterfall process, he realized that the team was not aware that Agile changes some fundamental aspects of how work gets done. An Agile team does not need to depend on “someone else” to understand, and define the product for them (Analysis and Requirements), the team itself (together with the PO) will do that work. This presented some challenges for Agile adoption, and Raj shares how he helped this team transition from waterfall to Scrum!

About Raj Solanki

Raj is a Manager, Technical program manager as well as Scrum master. He focuses on helping the teams learn about Agile, overcoming obstacles, foster a collaborative community, and more. 

He constantly reads about agile and seeks out coaches when he feels stuck. He seeks constant feedback and helps teams be transparent and build trust.

You can link with Raj Solanki on LinkedIn and connect with Raj Solanki on Twitter.

Jul 6, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Raj was working with a team, where some people were just not ready to accept and adopt Agile. Some of the team members did not attend the ceremonies on a regular basis, and presented all kinds of “excuses”. He heard: “it slows down my productivity”, “I have other meetings” and many more. When some team members don’t buy in to the Scrum framework, that starts spreading and creating questions and doubts in those that were previously on board. In this episode, we discuss how to tackle this kind of resistance to Scrum adoption, and Raj shares how he was able to turn this story around, and help the team succeed in their adoption of Scrum. 

Featured Book of the Week: Essential Scrum by Kenneth S. Rubin

In Essential Scrum by Kenneth S. Rubin, Raj found a simple and welcoming description of Scrum for newcomers. The book goes through what is scrum and is easy to understand even if you don’t have a long background in Agile. 

How can Angela (the Agile Coach) quickly build healthy relationships with the teams she’s supposed to help? What were the steps she followed to help the Breeze App team fight off the competition? Find out how Angela helped Naomi and the team go from “behind” to being ahead of Intuition Bank, by focusing on the people! Download the first 4 chapters of the BOOK for FREE while it is in Beta!

 

About Raj Solanki

Raj is a Manager, Technical program manager as well as Scrum master. He focuses on helping the teams learn about Agile, overcoming obstacles, foster a collaborative community, and more. 

He constantly reads about agile and seeks out coaches when he feels stuck. He seeks constant feedback and helps teams be transparent and build trust.

You can link with Raj Solanki on LinkedIn and connect with Raj Solanki on Twitter.

Jul 5, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Raj started his tech career as a test engineer, a role where - as he describes - you work with many different people. This turned out to be a good learning for his future role as a Scrum Master. As he puts it, “Scrum Master is a leadership role”, which is something we’ve also shared and discussed here on the podcast website. In this episode, we talk about how Scrum Masters must focus on the team’s mindset, and ability to understand and adopt Agile and Scrum. Raj shares his tips, and lessons learned about the transformation journey that every team goes through. 

About Raj Solanki

Raj is a Manager, Technical program manager as well as Scrum master. He focuses on helping the teams learn about Agile, overcoming obstacles, foster a collaborative community, and more. 

He constantly reads about agile and seeks out coaches when he feels stuck. He seeks constant feedback and helps teams be transparent and build trust.

You can link with Raj Solanki on LinkedIn and connect with Raj Solanki on Twitter

Jul 2, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In this episode, we talk about the contrast between the PO that only wants more features, and the PO that focuses on understanding and communicating the “big picture”.

The Great Product Owner: The Big Picture PO

Ademar’s example of a great PO, was a person that was able to effectively communicate the Vision and convincingly justify the “why” for the stories presented to the team. This PO was intimately aware of the goals and direction of the business, and was able to regularly and constantly remind the team of the “big picture”. 

The Bad Product Owner: The “more features” anti-pattern

The team was able to work well within the Scrum framework, however the PO only asked for “more features”. For this PO, “shipping more features” was just enough. The PO did not talk or explain the business goals and the outcomes for the work asked from the team. 

Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

About Ademar Perez

Ademar Perez is cultivating high performing product teams as an Agile Coach at Xero. He fell in love with the Agile way of working after seeing 5 to 6 scrum teams collaborate to develop a customer facing application. Since then, Ademar has helped over 30+ teams become self-organizing and high-performing.

You can link with Ademar Perez on LinkedIn.

Jul 1, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Ademar’s perspective on success, brings the idea of unlocking the potential of the team. We discuss what might be the things that need to be in place before we can help the team reach their potential. Finally, we discuss what Scrum Masters can do to help teams along their journey. 

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: The Sailboat Retrospective

In this episode, we revisit the Sailboat Retrospective, a format that is a favorite for many Scrum Masters. We explore how we can use that format to help setup a new project, or analyze something that happened recently. 

Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!  

About Ademar Perez

Ademar Perez is cultivating high performing product teams as an Agile Coach at Xero. He fell in love with the Agile way of working after seeing 5 to 6 scrum teams collaborate to develop a customer facing application. Since then, Ademar has helped over 30+ teams become self-organizing and high-performing.

You can link with Ademar Perez on LinkedIn.

Jun 30, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Ademar was working at a startup, and worked together with the CTO to grow the company, and hire, support and train the Agile teams they were hiring. We explore what are some of the steps we should consider, and the tools we can use to help start-up agile teams. 

In this episode, we refer to Lean Change Management by Jason Little

About Ademar Perez

Ademar Perez is cultivating high performing product teams as an Agile Coach at Xero. He fell in love with the Agile way of working after seeing 5 to 6 scrum teams collaborate to develop a customer facing application. Since then, Ademar has helped over 30+ teams become self-organizing and high-performing.

You can link with Ademar Perez on LinkedIn.

Jun 29, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Ademar joined a team that was dependent on the Product Owner to create and prioritize the User Stories for the team. The team would always wait for the PO to drive the conversation, and would never challenge or question the PO’s ideas. It was a “yes” team. Ademar found out that this team had been told that “the PO is the customer!” But this was hiding a bigger problem, the team did not know who the customer really was. Listen in to learn about the anti-patterns that develop when the team does not think about the customer on their own. 

In this episode we refer to Marty Cagan’s work as well as the Scrum Guide

Featured Book for the Week: The Scrum Fieldbook, by JJ Sutherland

In The Scrum Fieldbook: A Master Class on Accelerating Performance, Getting Results, and Defining the Future, by JJ Sutherland, Ademar learned that Scrum is not only made for software, it can work in any industry and organization. In this segment, we also refer to Coaching Agile Teams, by Lyssa Adkins

How can Angela (the Agile Coach) quickly build healthy relationships with the teams she’s supposed to help? What were the steps she followed to help the Breeze App team fight off the competition? Find out how Angela helped Naomi and the team go from “behind” to being ahead of Intuition Bank, by focusing on the people! Download the first 4 chapters of the BOOK for FREE while it is in Beta!

About Ademar Perez

Ademar Perez is cultivating high performing product teams as an Agile Coach at Xero. He fell in love with the Agile way of working after seeing 5 to 6 scrum teams collaborate to develop a customer facing application. Since then, Ademar has helped over 30+ teams become self-organizing and high-performing.

You can link with Ademar Perez on LinkedIn.

Jun 28, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Ademar started as a project manager. As he tried to find solutions to the problems he was facing, he found Agile. From there it was a short jump to being a Scrum Master and a project manager for Agile projects. The story he has to share, is one where he was brought into a team that was in trouble. The communication with the client wasn’t working. And to top that off, he had to deliver bad news to the client. Listen in to learn about how to deliver bad news, and also how to work as a Scrum Master in a client project, where the stakes were high. 

About Ademar Perez

Ademar Perez is cultivating high performing product teams as an Agile Coach at Xero. He fell in love with the Agile way of working after seeing 5 to 6 scrum teams collaborate to develop a customer facing application. Since then, Ademar has helped over 30+ teams become self-organizing and high-performing.

You can link with Ademar Perez on LinkedIn

Jun 26, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

About Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick

Squirrel has been coding for forty years and has led software teams for twenty. He uses the power of conversations to create dramatic productivity gains in technology organisations of all sizes. Squirrel’s experience includes growing software teams as a CTO in startups from fintech to biotech to music, and everything in between. He lives in Frogholt, England, in a timber-framed cottage built in the year 1450.

You can link with Douglas Squirrel on LinkedIn and connect with Douglas Squirrel on Twitter

Jeffrey Fredrick is an internationally recognized expert in software development and has over twenty-five years’ experience covering both sides of the business/technology divide. An early adopter of XP and Agile practices, Jeffrey has been a conference speaker in the US, Europe, India and Japan. Through his work on the pioneering open-source project CruiseControl, and through his role as co-organizer of the Continuous Integration and Testing Conference (CITCON), he has had a global impact on software development. 

You can link with Jeffrey Fredrick on LinkedIn and connect with Jeffrey Fredrick on Twitter

Jun 25, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

We discuss how the growth mindset can help Product Owners, and also how to work with PO’s that come from a technical background. 

The Great Product Owner: The growth mindset Product Owner

Great Product Owners display the “growth mindset”, as Mustafa describes. They are easy to talk to and often discuss and accept ideas for experiments that the team can implement in the product. The PO focuses on representing the business goals and needs inside the team, and knows what tools to bring to create the right discussions and conversations with the team. Finally, the great PO links the team’s work to the goals and metrics that matter for the company.

The Bad Product Owner: Using Personal Agility Coaching Framework to help PO’s

Some PO’s that have a technical background tend to focus on the “how” part of the work and less on the “why”. This is an anti-pattern in the PO role. We discuss how to bring this topic up with the PRoduct Owner, and refer to the “Personal Agility Coaching Framework” as a way to help PO’s learn about their role. 

Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

About Mustafa Ergun

Mustafa is an experienced Scrum Master. He has a passion for helping individuals and organizations see their potential and make things better. His current focus is on improving teams' performance through insightful facilitation. Mustafa is always eager to learn, share his experience with others and enjoys seeing people succeed.

You can link with Mustafa Ergun on LinkedIn and connect with Mustafa Ergun on Twitter.

Jun 24, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Mustafa looks at three different aspects of the Scrum Master work to define what success looks like. From these aspects he suggests we ask specific questions to evaluate the team’s situation and progress over time. Listen in to learn about these 3 different aspects, and how to incorporate these into your regular reflection as a Scrum Master. 

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Breaking Bad Retrospective

Mustafa focuses on formats that help the team be fully engaged in sharing insights, questions, and learnings. He suggests we focus on helping teams share via games, and suggests a TV series based retrospective: “The Breaking Bad Agile Retrospective”. Listen in to learn how Mustafa introduces and facilitates retrospectives based on TV series. 

Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!  

About Mustafa Ergun

Mustafa is an experienced Scrum Master. He has a passion for helping individuals and organizations see their potential and make things better. His current focus is on improving teams' performance through insightful facilitation. Mustafa is always eager to learn, share his experience with others and enjoys seeing people succeed.

You can link with Mustafa Ergun on LinkedIn and connect with Mustafa Ergun on Twitter.

Jun 23, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In this organization, Mustafa noticed that the prioritization process was not working very well, and was a topic of discussion. The organization tried to use the concept of the MVP (Minimum Viable Product), but the discussion around MVP’s still led to very large increments. Then Mustafa worked with the Product Owner to implement a different approach. They devised the idea of the Minimum Viable Increment (MVI), and helped the team adopt and implement that idea. Listen in to learn how Mustafa helped the team go from MVP to MVI and learn to release/deliver incrementally.

About Mustafa Ergun

Mustafa is an experienced Scrum Master. He has a passion for helping individuals and organizations see their potential and make things better. His current focus is on improving teams' performance through insightful facilitation. Mustafa is always eager to learn, share his experience with others and enjoys seeing people succeed.

You can link with Mustafa Ergun on LinkedIn and connect with Mustafa Ergun on Twitter.

Jun 22, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In many organizations, and teams, there is a strong focus on metrics and measuring everything (e.g. velocity). When Mustafa joined this team, he found the same pattern of focusing very much on the “pointing” of stories, instead of understanding the goal/impact of the story. But this led to the team being “lost” as to how to implement their stories. At this point Mustafa suggested the team focus their attention on understanding the stories first. Listen in to learn how to facilitate a conversation around the stories the team will work on. 

How can Angela (the Agile Coach) quickly build healthy relationships with the teams she’s supposed to help? What were the steps she followed to help the Breeze App team fight off the competition? Find out how Angela helped Naomi and the team go from “behind” to being ahead of Intuition Bank, by focusing on the people! Download the first 4 chapters of the BOOK for FREE while it is in Beta!

Featured Book of the Week: Fixing your Scrum by Ripley and Miller

In Fixing your Scrum by Ripley and Miller, Mustafa found a book that helped him understand the many possible dysfunctions that organizations suffer from when adopting Scrum. 

In this segment we also refer to How Will You Measure Your Life? By Clayton Christensen, a book that helped Mustafa put his work in perspective, and reflect about how he wants his work to help him build the life he wants for himself.

About Mustafa Ergun

Mustafa is an experienced Scrum Master. He has a passion for helping individuals and organizations see their potential and make things better. His current focus is on improving teams' performance through insightful facilitation. Mustafa is always eager to learn, share his experience with others and enjoys seeing people succeed.

You can link with Mustafa Ergun on LinkedIn and connect with Mustafa Ergun on Twitter.

Jun 21, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Mustafa started his Agile journey when he learned about Lean. When he learned about Scrum, he then volunteered to work as a Scrum Master. Soon after that he worked in an organization with several teams. As he, and his colleagues started facilitating a cross-team planning session (aka Big Room Planning), he realized that the team members were “lost”. It was time to pull the handbrake! Listen in to learn how Mustafa and his colleagues turned that situation around. Learned from their failure to setup the session properly, and quickly regrouped to help the teams benefit from that planning session! 

About Mustafa Ergun

Mustafa is an experienced Scrum Master. He has a passion for helping individuals and organizations see their potential and make things better. His current focus is on improving teams' performance through insightful facilitation. Mustafa is always eager to learn, share his experience with others and enjoys seeing people succeed.

You can link with Mustafa Ergun on LinkedIn and connect with Mustafa Ergun on Twitter.

Jun 18, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

The relationship the PO has with stakeholders is key in their ability to say “no” and stay true to the Vision of the product. In this episode, we also discuss how sometimes, standing back and letting the team lead is the wrong thing to do for a PO!

The Great Product Owner: Helping Product Owners master 2 important aspects of the role

This PO was on top of their game when it came to knowing the product and their customers. The PO was able to say “no” to stakeholders, and was clear on the Vision for the product. And most importantly, the PO was very deliberate at checking if they had made the right decision. In this segment, we talk about the “Create a Compelling Product Vision” FREE e-course that helps Scrum Masters work with PO’s and stakeholders to define a clear Vision for the product. 

The Bad Product Owner: When steeping back as a PO is the wrong thing to do

Product Owners do well when they stand back and let the team step up and own the execution of the User Stories. However, sometimes the PO may judge the team to be more autonomous than they really are. In this segment, we talk about how we can assess if the team is ready to work with less PO guidance (which is needed, for example, when scaling up the PO role)

Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

About Pascal Clarkson

Pascal has a bachelor degree in computer science. After years of working as a software engineer and having 8+ years of practical experience with the Scrum Framework, he has shifted his attention towards group facilitation. He uses Systemic Modelling and other methods to support groups in their discovery of how they can be the best version of themselves.

You can link with Pascal Clarkson on LinkedIn and connect with Pascal Clarkson on Twitter

You can also follow Pascal’s writings on Artocraft.nl.

Jun 17, 2021

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world’s largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

In Pascal’s perspective, Scrum Masters can be successful if they help the teams be comfortable with change, and feel accountable for their delivery. In order to get there, we must help teams know what success means (they need to be part of defining it) and measure it (help them do it!) In this segment, we also refer to the “what could go wrong” retrospective exercise. 

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Questions that generate conversations

In this segment, we talk about a simple concept: “helping teams have a conversation”. Pascal shares some of the tips and questions he uses when helping teams get started with the improvement conversation we hope to trigger in every retrospective. 

Pascal also shares a critical tip on how to handle the situation when the team does not go along with your plan in the retrospective. Don’t miss it!  

Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!  

About Pascal Clarkson

Pascal has a bachelor degree in computer science. After years of working as a software engineer and having 8+ years of practical experience with the Scrum Framework, he has shifted his attention towards group facilitation. He uses Systemic Modelling and other methods to support groups in their discovery of how they can be the best version of themselves.

You can link with Pascal Clarkson on LinkedIn and connect with Pascal Clarkson on Twitter

You can also follow Pascal’s writings on Artocraft.nl.

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