Hi all,

And welcome to a new week at www.implementingscrum.com; albeit to most Americans living in the USA it will be a short week here (July 4th is still July 4th everywhere else in the world!).

I need to do some quick research on the French connection since I got some comic strips translated recently where we can make some timely postings (smile). If not, maybe I’ll just make up some history.

That’ll be fun, since we all know whatever we read on the Internet MUST be true, RIGHT?

As most readers of my blog know, I spend a LOT of time on the road (planes, trains, and automobiles).

Right now I am scheduled for almost 20 more public appearances before the end of the year — not including the private clients I am working with (the majority of my work BTW) around the world.

While on a short [very bumpy] coast-to-coast flight today, a realization hit me.

Almost like, “Duh Mike.”

For me, sometimes things like this take time to fully understand.

It was there all the time for me to see. I have been living it without realizing this.

Much like this Scrum stuff we do or are thinking about doing.

On the plane today (and most other flights around the world) I usually spend some very focused time replying to emails that come in every day. And… as people who write me understand… if you send me an email eventually you will get a reply.

I am working on getting better with managing this inflow, so please do not stop.

Most of the replies I create let people know we can use the ‘time change’ to where ever I am in the world to our advantage when I am not home. Does this make sense?

So why is this so different than when I am really just, “Working from home in Richmond, VA?”

So what was the “Realization?”

I BUY time for myself every time I travel.

Think of it this way…

Today is a 27 hour day for me. I gained 3 hours by “going back in time.”

Wow.

Wait.

I know I did not REALLY do that.

But.

Got me thinking.

No matter where we are in the world, most of us thinks the rest of the world is on our time and schedules on a “regular” daily basis. Waking up, eating breakfast, doing the stuff we all do daily, eating dinner, and then going to sleep.”

The job (can we call it that?!) I have allows me to look at it from a MUCH different point of view.

And this is cool.

And has had a serious impact on how I have worked in the past.

Now that I have come to this realization, maybe in fact I will make some serious changes regarding “time” in the future.

Does this make any sense to you, dear reader?

It has had a tremendous impact on my psyche — today — as in WOW.

If there is no impact on you from this insight… keep your head to the grindstone and do what you do. Keep at it. That’s basically what almost everyone else in the world will do anyway.

Otherwise, let’s truly think how this little change on how we look at life and using time can truly change our world.

The world.

Wow.

Truly.

One person at a time.

For me, I will take that accountability and that very uncomfortable first step.

It’s something I work with teams to challenge them to do all the time — have uncomfortable conversations.

Now… It’s time to live that and take it up in my life a notch.

Does this make any sense?

I think, as usual, actions will speak louder than words.

Wanna join me?

I am starting today.

Inspect and Adapt.

Let’s see where it leads.

I am thinking some incredible things will come out of this.

Peace Out.

Thank you!

- mike vizdos
www.michaelvizdos.com
www.implementingscrum.com

p.s. And remember… If you or your friends [or enemies] have not signed up for FREE updates to this blog, please Subscribe to Implementing Scrum via Email!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

OK.

So what was I talking about a few nights ago with the cartoon posting above?

It really truly is not politically correct.

In no sense of any being.

But.

It is HIlarious to me.

Because it can help me make a point.

Actually tonight, eight points.

Eight Points.

Just for you.

How is that for a Thursday night or Friday morning?

Hmm.

Think about it this way.

You are arriving on “Fantasy Island” if you think…

1) You can stock the Product Backlog without a Product Owner present during Planning Poker

2) The definition of “Done” is not important to anyone

3) BurnDown Charts are useless, actually more useless of tracking tasks

4) The CSM Workshop is a waste of your time

5) You can pronounce the last name for

Ricardo

(c’mon Fantasy Island Buffs (or OK… is there even a “buff” reading this?))

6) Documentation is not needed on any agile projects

7) Scrum is a Silver Bullet

8) You can get a date with the “Hot” ScrumMaster replacement (smile) or Jessica Alba or with some hot babe with her Bottom Up.

9) This cartoon is about SCUBA Diving [strangely enough this is one of the most downloaded cartoon on this site)

…. OK.

Enough for now.

Man.

I can go on for a while.

But I think you get the picture.

What have I missed?

Now….

Do you see where you can spend a lot of time on Fantasy Island?

Do you want to leave it?

Really?

Why?

Gotta run… Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

I am a bit worried about some of the things I am seeing out there.

Um.

The night before a Sprint Review meeting, I am seeing people stay late.

Uh.

Really late.

Like into the morning before the Sprint Review meeting.

Sometimes, it is minutes before.

Ug.

Oh no.

What does this remind you of?

What is wrong with that picture?

And what is right with the picture above?

Seriously folks.

Don’t kill Scrum this way.

Just go back to whatever you used to call it.

Really.

Or.

Look at what you are really doing.

Remember the objective of Scrum?

Working Software.

On one machine.

Real working software.

Not vaporware or conference-ware or some scripted bla bla bla.

Please.

Gotta run… Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

I sincerely apologize for the lack of a new posting last week. Sometimes even I need to remind myself that I am human.

And.

The cartoon for this week really says it all.

Keep IT Simple Stupid.

In the past, I have seen the “KISS” stuff look like: “Keep it simple stupid” or “Keep it super simple” or many other variations.

Note the capitalization of “IT”?

That’s where you and I come in a lot of the times.

So.

Really.

Keep IT Simple Stupid.

I am not calling you stupid. If anything, this is a great reminder for “me” to not get stupid.

A few weeks ago I was with a client (actually doing the work thing, which I doooo actually “do”!) and they have been spending a lot of time planning for their agile rollout.

What is a lot of time?

This will vary.

Let’s just say it looked very much like a waterfall process — nothing near agile.

And I had to tell them this.

Will “they” listen?

Who knows.

But.

It was a great reminder to me that taking months and months planning for an agile rollout of more than ten teams at one time is not a good idea for people starting agile stuff.

What is my recommendation?

Get ready for “Captain Obvious.”

Start with one project.

Today.

Now.

And stop the planning game.

Really.

Get good at what you do.

And the only way to do this is to get started.

One project at a time.

Don’t worry about the enterprise rollout today when you have not started even one project.

Scary thought?

Yes.

Reality?

It does work.

Worry about the “enterprise” stuff later.

Start producing working software.

Today.

Think about it and challenge the way you currently do things today.

Results will vary, but all will surprise you.

Gotta run… Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Hi all.

The topic this week is about keeping things simple.

And picking one thing at a time and doing it well.

Very well.

Tonight I am writing a little bit about it.

Let’s see if I can actually get the comic strip up tomorrow (when I make my drive over to Portland, Maine).

You’ll see.

Hmmm…

As complicated as this week seems to me and you.

There is always a simple solution.

Really.

- mike vizdos

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

Remember about a month ago our ScrumMaster got “whacked” and disappeared for a while. Last week he reappeared in the hospital.

Today, he is back at work.

And.

He did not die.

Assuming positive intent, he really wanted to just help the guy in the SUV with directions.

He never got there, as we can see. And is seems like the guy in the SUV made a run for it, not liking what he saw on the ground (what would you do if you saw a fashion forward guy wearing a blue thingee on the ground; wait…. hold that thought…. we also use talking pigs and chickens in this cartoon… never mind).

So what does this have to do with Scrum?

As a consultant, I am constantly working with both prospects (those who have not engaged me for any services yet) and current / past clients. I have a strong relationship with people in the industry, and consider myself a person who is not afraid to speak up and give the honest truth.

Not a lot of people like doing that.

Sometimes, as we saw, clients do not like to hear the truth. They want to keep doing waterfall, and make the conscious decision that in the end they will succumb to what is known as the, “Iterative and Incremental Death March.”

They will then go find someone who will say, “Yes” to anything they ask of them.

And this occurs with most organizations trying to use Scrum on more than one project in an organization.

It is a choice.

What about the small minority of organizations that succeed with implementing Scrum in their organization?

Wow.

Incredible things happen.

To the people as individuals, as team members, and the organization as a whole.

These are the organizations I enjoy working with; however, as you can see, they are a small minority in the world.

You know what I have started doing more and more lately (which uggg is hard for me!)?

Saying “No.”

And working only with organizations and teams and people who sincerely want this Scrum thing to work.

Sometimes I get conned into thinking an organization is truly interested, and get burned. Life happens.

We all learn and move on.

This is not the majority of time though, and yes, even I need to assume positive intent.

Why am I telling you all of this?

First and foremost… think about where you are today on your team and within your organization.

Are you constantly saying, “Yes” even when you know it makes no sense?

Do you need help saying, “No” sometimes?

Where can you go for that help?

And remember… a dead ScrumMaster is a useless one.

DO NOT commit career suicide.

But remember… you DO have a choice.

Always.

Gotta run… Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

About a month ago, our intrepid ScrumMaster seemed to have disappeared and replaced with someone who just agreed with everything everyone said (not really a yes man, especially in the cartoon!).

Well.

He is back.

Or. He never left.

So why is he now sitting in a hospital room with an IV unit, talking to himself?

At least he in conscious and alive.

But now he is saying “No.”

Is this a bad thing?

Remember the entire reason for him getting into this position — or at least why we think he did.

He was saying, “No” to a lot of people, and standing up to the Values of Scrum as he envisioned them.

So we have the Scrum Values.

And.

Each person in the world either knows nothing about them, has heard of them, or is choosing to ignore them.

Which person are You?

Where is your Team?

And your Organization?

Do you see a difference between the current “replacement ScrumMaster” and the one we originally started with?

What do we do next?

Yikes. This is a short posting tonight.

Think about it.

Really.

Think.

Sometimes this can be dangerous.

I call it living.

Something I am continuing to learn how to do.

Gotta run….Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

The Guest Blogger this week is Michele Sliger, a fellow Certified Scrum Trainer and awesome person in general (smile).

A few weeks ago some of the Trainers got together in a super-secret-location-on-Earth for a couple of days.

We had a lot of fun, I learned a ton, and you can be sure I will write more about it in this blog in the future!

Michele posed the question to the Trainers, “What are the Scrum Values?”

And. Gulp. I could not name all of them.

Shame on me.

Or? Are they something I just *do* like a lot of people already?

Either way, I thought this would be a good platform for Michele to discuss the Scrum Values and give some great examples for you to use with your Scrum Teams.

Keep learning… I do daily….

Here is the write-up from Michele:

====================

Like Mike, I’m a Certified Scrum Trainer and I make my living teaching Scrum and coaching Scrum teams.

One of the things I teach is the Scrum values. Do you know what they are? Take a second and see if you can name them all.

I’ll give you a hint: there are five, they are one word in length, and one of them is not Honesty. Now stop reading for a moment and when you think you’ve got them all, come on back.

Ready?

Okay, let’s see how you did.

I’m sure none of you cheated by going to the first Scrum book, “Agile Software Development with Scrum,” and flipping to the last chapter.

(I can hear it now: “Heck, she said that Honesty wasn’t a value, so where’s the problem?”)

The five Scrum values are, in no particular order:

1. Commitment
2. Focus
3. Openness
4. Respect
5. Courage.

Now what do you suppose these mean?

Ask a roomful of people and you’ll get a roomful of answers.

“Openness means that we will tell the product owner ‘no’ when we can’t do any more work in the Sprint.”

“Openness means that we will tell management that we are doing Scrum even though we are afraid they will make us stop.”

“Openness means that when my colleague takes a three-hour lunch break instead of finishing her tasks that I will have a difficult conversation with her.”

“Openness means telling you that I did in fact cheat — I looked up the values in the back of the black book.”

(I once had an argument with a co-worker on what ‘being truthful’ meant. He said that it wasn’t lying if he went to a topless bar and didn’t tell his wife. I said it was a lie, one of omission. We went back and forth, each sure of our morality. So I’m pleased that Ken was careful in his naming with the value of Openness, instead of something like Honesty or Truthfulness, so I don’t have to have arguments over what truth means!)

Because we each interpret the values differently as individuals and as teams, we really need to take a look at each value and decide as a team what that value means to us.

Here are a couple of ways you can do that:

If your group does regular brown-bag lunches, open spaces, or Scrum cocktail hours, pass out copies of that last chapter and say, ‘This is what we’ll be talking about at our next get-together.’

Then have that informal conversation and see what the team thinks about the values.

Are there any that surprised them?

Are there any that weren’t in line with their personal values?

Can they say that the team has been adhering to all the values?

Are there any values that they think should be listed that are not?

And are there any values that they would like to make a bigger, more overt, part of their daily activities?

When working on the facilitation of team working agreements, try this exercise.

List the values, and this simple template that can be used to turn each value into an actionable working agreement:

We believe in [value] therefore we will [do something].

For example, your team might come back with:

“We believe in respect, therefore we will show up on time for all meetings.”

The point is to get those values on the wall somewhere, where they can serve as reminders to the team of the drivers behind the Scrum practices, and of how the team has chosen to work together.

Remember, Scrum is not only value-driven in how it provides the most important features first to the customer, it is also value-driven in how the people choose to work together to get the job done.

====================

Gotta run….Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

So last week the post was a little long, and I put out some real life information that hit home hard for me. I received a ton of great feedback and people offering a lot of great advice. One thing I do want to make clear is that client was not my only client — something I have learned to not do in the past (depend on 1 client 100% of the time). As a consultant, this is a position you want to get yourself into. Really. Look at me as an example!

This week.

Um.

Where is our “old” ScrumMaster?

I kinda liked him. He was a little “off” at times; however, he started to grow on me and help with a lot of examples.

He seems to have disappeared last week.

Seems to have gotten himself whacked by some shady characters.

Oh no.

What has Tony done. What have I done?

At this point, there is now a [hot] ScrumMaster who has no problem saying, “Yes” to anything and everything asked of her.

Um.

Is this dangerous?

One word.

YES.

Notice the usage of capital letters above.

YES I AM YELLING THIS TO YOU THIS IS DANGEROUS.

I am trying to make a point (smile).

And, you may be asking yourself, “Mike… What point are you trying to make this week?”

Really?

You do not see it?

Look hard.

Read the comic strip above again, and again, and again.

Then, send me an e-mail (or write a comment on this blog entry) about what you think it means.

Really.

C’mon.

Take action and do it.

It will take you less than three minutes.

Please.

Gotta run….Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Hi all,

As you saw last week, our fearless ScrumMaster seems to have disappeared.

And.

Been replaced by some hot ScrumMaster who knows how to say yes.

What will happen next???!?!?!?!?

More tonight.

- mike vizdos
[uh…. could not post last night… four words… NYC - St. Patricks Day. Sorry ’bout that!]