Welcome back to yet another week at www.implementingscrum.com.
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
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 Scrum Community to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!
May 29, 2008
Hi all,
After leaving town on Sunday late afternoon I arrive in Atlanta (yeah… it was not a hub for me… an actual destination!) and hopped on the MARTA (their train system) to one of the outward bound stations; I arrived around 9:00 PM. Spent the night in a decent Holiday Inn Express (non-smoking, thank you!) and got started at 7:00 AM to head to the training center via the hotel shuttle.
The first class this week was geared toward, “Agile Project Management” and about 14 people had signed up. We had 8 show up.
So.
Eight it would be.
This course talks a lot of Agile from a much different perspective than just “Scrum” — which of course I normally teach to certify new ScrumMasters.
It was a great two day course that I facilitated discussions about topics such as the origins of Agile, Agile Project Management basics, Lean and Agile, XP, Scrum, and a few other topics. As with most of the courses I teach, the feedback was great (OK… so the projector at this site sucked but I could do nothing about it turning black text into blue text).
One good story that came out of this that I feel like sharing includes a story from a company that is implementing XP (Extreme Programming... remember… the Agile Practice that actually talks about engineering practices — Scrum does not by design!). This is not a Fortune 50 company; instead, it is a company that is looking at revenue (religiously??!!) and had brought in Scrum.
What is happening in their shop?
Hmmm…. Something I did not expect.
See. The development team was/is using a modified version of Scrum and XP; and they are blowing away the quality standards that have been measured in the past (however that was).
And.
People starting seeing that the customer was astounded.
That’s a great thing, right?
Uh.
Not really.
Why?
Well…. the company using this modified version of Scrum and XP became so good at producing software without defects that….
… take a breath please….
…. the support team in operations had nothing to do.
The customers had nothing to report as not working.
Fabulous some people would think.
Including me!
But.
The majority of this organizations revenue comes from support and maintenance contracts.
Uh.
See the problem?
Do you?
Really?
And this was from bringing in Agile / Scrum / XP.
Interesting learnings.
I will cover our Richmond CSM class tomorrow.
It was awesome and I did some co-teaching with a non-CST (Certified Scrum Trainers) who should soon be a trainer. Tomorrow I will tell you more about co-teaching with another instructor and why I feel this is something everyone should try.
And try again.
And again.
Again.
I got home from Atlanta at about midnight so I could prepare the for the next days of classes — a CSM class in my home base of Richmond, Virginia. More on the tomorrow. Gotta keep you in some suspense. Or whatever we call that in geek-speak blog worlds.
Have an incredible Friday!
I will be putting in cabinets into the kitchen with my wife. For all those who have taken the course, I’d rate that a 20+ for story points (smile). Hope you understand that reference!
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.
Wow. Looks like next week will wind up a little different than I anticipated (smile).
Inspect and adapt. How so very agile of me!
I wanted to let you know I *just* got contracted to do a Certified ScrumMaster Workshop in Richmond, Virginia (my home town right now!). It will be on Wednesday and Thursday, January 30-31, 2008.
You can read more about the class (and others) at http://www.michaelvizdos.com/enroll.
I want to try something new here too… if you mention to me you saw this announcement on implementingscrum.com I will take off $100.00 from the price of the workshop… and group discounts are still available.
Please let me know if you have any questions and have a great day!
- mike vizdos
www.michaelvizdos.com
www.implementingscrum.com
Hi all,
At the end of this month a friend of mine (another CST who I co-train with regularly) is hosting a public Certified ScrumMaster Course in Paris, France. The course will be conducted in French on January 28-29, 2008.
If you are interested in attending the course, please contact me and I will get you in contact with them.
Or if you contact them directly, please let them know you saw it on www.implementingscrum.com!
For a full list of my upcoming workshops and public speaking engagements, please visit www.michaelvizdos.com.
Thank you!
- mike
Welcome back to another week at www.implementingscrum.com.
Welcome back!
This is an exercise that has evolved over the years of me teaching the Certified ScrumMaster Workshop (by myself and with others).
First let me explain the “idea” behind this cartoon (smile).
I recently spent some time back down in Boca Raton to see my parents (and have my boys spend time with their grandparents); for those of you who have not heard of it, let’s just say its where a lot of people go to retire — what a place for me to grow up! My father told me about a new law passed in Florida — and I am not kidding — that says a dog can not be considered a “second passenger” for the HOV (High Occupancy Vehicle) Lane (where vehicles with 2 or more people can drive on the highway because it is “faster” in lots of traffic).
Aneeeeway…. this brought me to a funny conclusion of, “What if the dog was a seeing eye dog?”
See the humor in it?
OK. It is pretty weak and not intended to tick off any person who is blind. Really.
The point is (finally Mike!)…. sometimes on a team you will have people that do not have a clue of what is happening around them. They do not see things that have happened in the past.
And.
This happens a lot of times when teams are either forming or add new people onto their existing Scrum Teams.
Wow.
So one of the exercises I do in the Certified ScrumMaster Workshops is the following:
WAIT.
I will post the exercise tomorrow.
Before reading the post tomorrow — THINK about what this can mean to your team, organization, and enterprise!
Wow.
More tomorrow on this.
I promise!
Gotta run�.Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.
You can also enter The Scrum Community to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!
December 10, 2007
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