Scrum Master = People Oriented Master

One of the main task for any Scrum Master is to manage and motivate the development team (do not forget the Product Owner) to deliver the best-in-class output with outcome to the respective end-users / stakeholders. Pure Agile / Scrum processes will not achieve this, A Scrum Master above all else should be a people person.

During the life of the product development, Scrum Master would enable / facilitate creating a range of tangible deliverables that are critical to the meeting of DoD and release to the production. These would include Impediment board, risks, teaming agreement, cadence of sprint and so on… The funny part of the story is that when the product is delivered all the tangible outputs that we are speaking about would be of no use (atleast to the end-user community). They have little or no value outside the life of the product.

It is important for us to understand that Scrum is all about people, who help to create beautiful and meaningful outputs that serve the needs of the stakeholders and market in general.

The main task for the Scrum Master is to ensure that the development team can deliver and all blockages that occur in the journey of theirs are removed or assisted to be removed.

Over next few paragraphs, we shall de-mystify the needs and requirements on what and how a Scrum Master should enact the approach.

Step # 1 – Get the basics right – Right People, Right Skills, Right Tasks.

As a Scrum Master, help, guide and assist / facilitate the development team to get the right skilled people -with adequate dose of attitude and aptitude. Do not focus on technical skills, focus on learnability, ability to survive in a tough environment, how to respect, being open, have the right level of commitment to the team and others.

There would always be some gap between your needs / wants vs. what talent is available. Remember a perfect match may not be available, try to manage this as a risk and work towards mitigating the same. Try to always get a balanced set of capabilities and skills, do not fall in the trap of choosing all the folks that favor you or you like. Infact look for people who can work with others and create magic for your customers.

Also find a balance between internal and external resources, several times you may be forced by the Leadership to take an internal person (in order to save on cost) but evaluate the person as you would when you take any external resource and ensure it fits in your culture band that you are building in your team.

Step # 2 – Go for Quality rather than Quantity.

More resources may not always be the right approach, but the right resources is what matters. Life and experiences have always suggested that a small set of motivated people have delivered far more than a much larger group of able people. Be the master negotiator with the leadership or the resource allocating person to get the best talent for your team, you may have to act as a salesman to get the right quality in your team (Scrum does not talk about this … but it is critical)

Step # 3 – Clear Roles and Responsibilities.

For any team and individual – we all look for clarity of our roles and expectations, how shall we be judged. Yes, there are no defined / allocated roles in Scrum, but it does not hurt to have pseudo approaches for the initial few sprints and then educate the team to self-allocate, self-define how they want to work out. Scrum Master is like parenting job, initially we would be required to do babysitting, but the as team grows, becomes more mature , our role should be limited to guidance and coaching.

Step # 4 – Building the team

Do not take for granted that Team is automatically built – You need to invest your sweat equity into it.

There is no right or wrong way to build a team, different cultures, different set of people will bond in different lengths of time. To build the team with right values, try these elements:

• Ensure roles are clearly understood
• Ensure communication channels are open between you and the team and amongst the team
• Bring people together (More physically)
• Give people time to know each other
• Have the Product Owner address the team on the needs, vision, big picture, roadmap of the product in focus

Step # 5 – Focus on personal development of team members

It may not be the core objective of Scrum Master, but not focusing on the same would have adverse impact.

Face this task much earlier in the life cycle, ideally when people first get involved in the team, As a part of their initial induction have an understanding of their career needs and wants. The areas where they want to grow and contribute. If their expectations are out of line or un-reasonable, then put it straight on the record.

Help the Product Owner agree to have about 4-6 Hrs / Sprint (Assuming 2 weeks of Sprint cycle) to get it invested in growth, learning of new tools, more on the product development, team building, exploration of new ideas (like using Gen AI to help in the development) and so on … this is a bit of selling exercise with the PO and team (also!)

However, make sure that the training / workshops or getting people involved in specific things do not derail the product development, it should not deviate from the core objective with which the team was formed.

Step # 6 – Be aware of team dynamics and politics

When people work together, they develop their own style of communication. Working together, as a Scrum Master your ability to understand the team dynamics is going to become more critical and critical.

Note: There is no right or wrong team working style or responding to team dynamics. Team dynamics will never remain static, it changes over a period – and when the team matures or new team members join, old ones move on, this can help you rebalance the approach for the team.

Implement PI (Predictive Index Assessment) for everyone on your team. Identify their personalities and ensure you and others in the team understand how to deal with a given personality. This is no rocket science, but not knowing how to deal with a Collaborative vs. Strategists can cause unwarranted losses and damage to the morale of the team and thereby to the product.

Encourage openness and honesty – when these elements are in place, then the team would have few barriers to open communications.

Remember to lead by example if you do not want politics in the team, then do not politic yourself. You want to be trusted by the team.

Final note on this one – Team is more important than any individual, In Agile it is the team that would deliver and not an individual.

Step # 7 – Managing Part time resources 

At times, you may not get a fully dedicated person to work on your product development. You would have to work with Shared resources, when such a situation arises, ensure:

• To get fixed and measurable time from shared folks
• Make sure you have sufficient skills and talent and working hands, remember it is not the number of people in your team, but it is the amount time that these folks are ready to devote to you.
• Recommend your team to build a little slack and inefficiency in the approach (this acts like a risk mitigation strategy)
• Your approach to managing the time utilization (not saying to act like a project manager- but watch the game) would be critical to the success of the delivery

Step # 8 – Working with the Wider Organization 

Remember your team, the product’s existence is never in isolation. There is always a requirement with some other function, department to get your product out of door, it could be the marketing or the sales team or the travel team (to book your tickets, hotels) or some other platform team whose output would be critical for integration and working of your product.

There is always to a need to manage relationships with the wider organization, and it would vary depending on context and content of the product as developed, Therefore as Scrum Master is it important to guide and assist the team to manage these relationship internally in the system.

Providing adequate and timely notice to dependency would help them plan their side of the work and provide sufficient time allocation for your work.

Step # 9 – Have a sense of humor  

The ability to generate and enjoy humor is an extremely positive trait for a Scrum Master. Developing products / projects can at times be quite stressful – the ability to laugh and crack jokes (not on any individual) would help the team manage the stress.

If you are not natural at this … do not worry, just smile a lot. People love to see a smiling face, do not underestimate the power of a simple smile. A well-placed smile of yours can completely change the dynamics of the conversation, can lift an individual from a negative stance to a positive frame of mind.

These are a few ideas that has potentially given me the required results and mind you – it has always worked.

Try it – and then Inspect and Adapt.

Work Life Balance – Is it a Myth or a HR Jargon or Practiced in reality?

Work-life balance in the IT world / industry can be a complex and a difficult issue, as the nature of the work often involves long hours, tight deadlines, and high-pressure situations. While achieving work-life balance in the IT industry can be challenging, it is not impossible, work-life balance is an essential concept, it can sometimes be challenging to implement effectively in real-life organizational setting, but many organizations within the industry are actively working to create a more balanced environment.

I remember during the pandemic, when the entire (I would say about 98% of us) were working from home, It was very worrying for me, if someone called me and I was not in front of my laptop (could be a washroom break, or gone to answer the doorbell), it was assumed that I am not working, Where as when you are in office and people see you once and then you are not on the seat / or your place, it is acceptable – I can spend a whole 1 hr. chatting with someone in cafeteria and that would be considered just fine. My issues are a little different as people behave differently as the policies and the leadership approaches are erratic.

Why do we have challenges in maintaining the Work-Life Balances at our workplace, with my decent experiences of working across the globe and for different types of organizations, I have got some interesting thoughts here – which may resonate with you, Do check them:

Inadequate Project Management and Planning: Poor project management and planning can play a significant role in work-life balance. Unclear communication, unrealistic deadlines, and no proper resource allocation – all these aid to excessive workloads and the need for constant overtime. Prioritization and efficient time management are crucial in maintaining a healthy work-life balance. The 1^st principle for good work and time management – here goes for a toss.

Lack of Boundaries: In some work environments, there is a blurring of boundaries between work and personal life. With advancements in technology, employees may find it difficult to disconnect from work, as they are constantly connected to their devices and expected to be available outside of regular working hours. This lack of boundaries can erode work-life balance and lead to a sense of being “always available.”

Limited Support Systems: Despite having work-life balance policies in many companies, organizations may not provide the necessary support systems to help employees achieve balance. For example, inadequate childcare support or limited access to wellness programs can make it challenging for employees to effectively manage their personal commitments alongside their work responsibilities.

Cultural Expectations and Peer Pressure: In certain workplace cultures, there can be unwritten expectations that employees need to constantly be available and put work above everything else. Peer pressure and cultural norms within the organization may discourage employees from prioritizing their personal lives or taking time off, even when work-life balance policies are theoretically are existing. It is just a hoax to have such policies in the 1^st place – Not sure how employee (including me) falls in such trap.

Long Working Hours Culture: A variant of the above mentioned point, many industries and organizations have a prevalent culture of long working hours, where employees are expected to work well beyond their designated hours. This culture often undermines work-life balance, leading to increased stress, burnout, and a lack of time for personal commitments or leisure activities. Organizational culture and expectations can make it difficult for employees to truly achieve balance as needed in life.

Demand for 24/7 Operations: The IT industry often operates in a 24/7 environment, particularly in areas such as software development, cybersecurity, and IT support (this is the nature of business). As we go global, the customer wants solutions and resolutions to their challenges and problems during their day-time – which could be off-hours for people working in different time zone.  This can lead to employees being on call or working irregular hours, which can impact work-life balance. However, organizations can implement measures such as shift rotations, adequate staffing, and clear expectations around availability to help mitigate the negative effects. (I would state a few organizations have performed Shift approaches, extra cash, transport facilities and others to help their employees work effectively)

Final Approach:

It is important to note that while these elements as stated exist, there are also organizations that prioritize work-life balance and successfully implement policies and practices that support their employees’ well-being. However, the challenges mentioned above highlight the need for organizations to go beyond policies and actively create a culture and environment that values work-life balance, promotes flexibility, and supports employees in achieving harmony between their personal and professional lives.

While work-life balance in the IT industry may present unique challenges, organizations are increasingly recognizing its importance and taking steps to address it. By implementing policies and practices that support flexibility, well-being, and effective project management, the industry can create an environment that enables employees to achieve a healthier work-life balance. However, it is important to note that the extent to which work-life balance is achievable can vary between organizations within the industry, and it may require individual efforts as well.

Project Manager Cum Scrum Master? OR Scrum Master Cum Project Manager – Choose the Bigger or the lesser evil?

The demand for Scrum Masters to also have project management skills can be attributed to several factors and trends in the industry. While it is not a universal requirement, some organizations may prefer or require their Scrum Masters to possess project management capabilities. Here are a few reasons as per me to why this demand is existing in the market?

1. Overlapping responsibilities: Scrum Masters and project managers share certain responsibilities, such as facilitating communication, removing obstacles, and ensuring the smooth progress of product development or execution of the projects. By combining both roles, organizations can streamline their processes and avoid duplication of efforts.
2. Hybrid approaches: Many organizations adopt a hybrid approach to project management, combining agile methodologies like Scrum with traditional project management practices. In such cases, having a Scrum Master who is also familiar with project management can be advantageous, as they can bridge the gap between the two approaches and facilitate effective collaboration (question: Are the organizations getting the monies worth by doing this approach – would love to see a few case studies and experience sharing from others)
3. Project coordination: In larger organizations or complex projects involving multiple teams, a Scrum Master with project management skills can help coordinate and align the efforts of different teams or departments. They can ensure that the work being done by various Scrum teams is in sync and aligned with the overall project objectives (but is this not the pure role of a Scrum Master – Have we ever given a thought and management / leadership understand the pure meaning of the role called – Scrum Master)
4. Stakeholder management: Project managers often deal with various stakeholders, including clients, executives, and team members. Having a Scrum Master with project management skills can enhance their ability to manage stakeholders effectively, ensuring clear communication, managing expectations, and resolving conflicts (but again here we had Product Owner to deal with the stakeholders and manage their expectations, for resolving conflicts within the team – Scrum Master can handle the job)
5. Career progression: For individuals working in agile environments, gaining project management skills can offer opportunities for career advancement. By acquiring a broader skill set, Scrum Masters can expand their roles and take on project management responsibilities, leading to increased career prospects within the organization (but when the world is moving towards Agile and Agile adoption is increasing by the day – Not sure if any Scrum Master would care to become a career project manager – any takers?)

It is worth noting that while the demand exists to have a combo offer of Scrum Master Cum Project Manager, not all organizations require Scrum Masters to be project managers. The specific requirements may vary depending on the organization’s structure, size, and project management approach. Agile methodologies like Scrum prioritize flexibility and adaptability, so organizations may choose to have separate roles for Scrum Masters and project managers, depending on their specific needs and preferences.

Have we ever heard that Organizations are looking for Project Manager Cum Scrum Master? You would say Yes ….if you notice industry is looking for Scrum Master Cum Project Manager – Mind you there is a see change of difference between the two demands that the market is looking out for.

When such demands are placed, It gives me a lot more food for thought … in terms if the organization really wants to adopt Agile and do the implementation or it is just a new card that the leadership wants to use in the organization.

Has the management thought on these lines:

1. Conflicting priorities: Scrum Masters and Project Managers often have different priorities and approaches. Scrum Masters focus on facilitating the agile process, promoting self-organization, and removing impediments for the development team. Project Managers, on the other hand, may prioritize adherence to schedules, budgets, and overall project objectives. Balancing these potentially conflicting priorities can be challenging – It is like Chalk and Cheese, we mixing two elements together – Are we aware of the reactions and impact it would have on the moral of the person and the approach of agile adoption.
2. Time management: Both roles require significant time and effort to fulfill their responsibilities effectively. Juggling the tasks of a Scrum Master, such as organizing and facilitating ceremonies, coaching the team, and ensuring adherence to agile principles, along with the project management responsibilities like planning, tracking progress, and managing stakeholders, can be demanding and time-consuming (when a SM acts like a PM then the whole concept of Self-Organizing, Self-Managed goes out of the window, there is no concept of team autonomy – Time management for me would be a secondary thought)
3. Role clarity and expectations: Combining the roles of a Scrum Master and a Project Manager can lead to ambiguity in responsibilities and expectations. Team members may become uncertain about whom to approach for specific issues, and there could be confusion about the boundaries of each role. It is crucial to establish clear expectations and communicate them effectively to avoid role confusion. More than the team, I believe it would utter confusion for the person to play dual role – This is also an indication that Leadership of the organization does not even understand the concept of Agile and have little or no clue on how the work of a Scrum Master is performed. For them we all are just resources available to get some job done.
4. Skill set requirements: Being an effective Scrum Master and also a Project Manager requires a diverse skill set. Scrum Masters need expertise in agile methodologies, facilitation, coaching, and team dynamics. Project Managers require skills in project planning, risk management, budgeting, and stakeholder management. Finding individuals who excel in both areas can be challenging, as the skill sets required for each role may not overlap entirely. This is an interesting problem to have … if this logic can be applied for Scrum Master and Project Managers … then the same logic should be applied for all roles in the organization, like COO and CFO could be same or COO and CIO could be the same individuals and similar more. I hope the management wakes up and smells the coffee.
5. Potential burnout: Taking on the responsibilities of both a Scrum Master and a Project Manager can lead to increased workload and potential burnout. Both roles can be demanding individually and combining them may intensify the pressure. It is important to manage workload effectively, delegate tasks when possible, and prioritize self-care to prevent burnout. – Now the important question that I would have is where the HR policies of “Work Life Balance”, are these concept confined to the policies and to be used when recruiting people, later they have little or no meaning
6. Conflict of interest: Scrum Masters are advocates for the team, ensuring that they have the autonomy and support needed to deliver value. Project Managers, on the other hand, may have obligations to meet specific project objectives, timelines, and stakeholder expectations. Balancing these sometimes conflicting interests can be challenging and may require careful negotiation and communication. Meeting the timelines should be everyone’s job in the project or organization, At times we do not right resources (meaning skills), tools are missing, dependencies do not respond, client behaves abnormally, team members at times are moved across projects, no proper or adequate KT is done for the new joiners to the team – and with all these challenges, one expects ON TIME Delivery !!!

With my hand folded, I request leadership and decision makers across the globe to carefully consider these challenges and assess whether combining the roles of a Scrum Master and a Project Manager aligns with their specific needs and context. It is important to ensure that individuals in these dual roles receive the necessary support, training, and resources to succeed in fulfilling their responsibilities effectively. In a better world – one would not combine these two roles.

A small query – How many of us on a daily basis would combine / mix our tea and coffee together and enjoy the same – Any takers – On a daily basis (not experiment)?

Scrum Master Effectiveness – Improve your People Management Skills and work the Magic

This article is based and drawn on my Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Agile Coach experiences over a period of many years across different domains and industries and not to forget the geographies that I have worked in.

Beyond my fundamental training on Scrum and Agile, I had the privilege of working with and learning from highly competent, ethical professionals who had provided me ample opportunities to learn, make mistakes, and re-apply my learnings. People with whom I have been associated have practiced “Fail Fast” and showed me directions on how to prepare for the future. They have guided me to deal with stakeholders who need to be managed at a different level (as each of them was a different personality – No One size that fits all)

Everyone wants to succeed, but regardless of many forms of success, one must also be successful in dealing with others.

While there are many attributes that contribute to the growth and behavior of an individual, I have listed down what worked for me and helped me in my agile coaching journey.

Positive personal effectiveness is achieved when we can ethically win confidence, respect, and cooperation in our dealings with others (they could be your Seniors or Juniors).

Scrum Master’s job is to work with others; they cannot delegate this nor can they avoid the required interaction. For Scrum Masters to be successful, they should practice the below mentioned nine people skills for ‘Self-Improvement and Effectiveness’.

1. Personal Ethics
2. Adaptability
3. Tact
4. Creditability
5. Intercommunication
6. Persuasiveness
7. Objectivity
8. Initiative
9. Self-Discipline

From the above one would spot over-lapping approaches across many skills like Intercommunication and Persuasiveness vs. Tact.

Personal Ethics

It is thefirst people related skill that any individual should develop, and it applies to a Scrum Master also. It is basic to establish and maintain a high standard of excellence in the practice, life and behavior. Good character, stemming from good ethics, is a quality of leadership and it distinguishes any leader from others. It inspires well-founded and reciprocal confidence and trust of others in you.

I learnt in my career that the best and most successful people at the top (like Ratan Tata) were those who displayed and practiced personal ethics and took personal responsibilities toward their own people, project, organizations, employees, and society at large.

Consistent reliance on personal ethics should be our guiding principle in our personal encounters, which would inspire others to follow the same pattern and principles.

This should be the default element of any Scrum Master and bare minimum traits to have. There cannot be any compromise on this front.

Adaptability

Not everything would always go as per plan. It is important for us to be adaptable, especially in our project environment, where requirements can change, scope gets impacted, estimates go for a toss, – and the delivery of the MVP is at risk. This is the place where adaptability as a people skill would help us bring harmony to our attitudes and actions in our dealings with the situation and economic environment.

The required degree of adaptability varies with the situation, at times it would be temporary or minor in nature and at others, it would cause a major impact in our dealings and thought processes.

Experience has taught me that however crucial the circumstances may be, adaptability with a cool and collected mindset helps in managing the situation better.

The product owner could be putting pressure on the team, teams may have internal conflicts and challenges to deal with, or the market situation may not be as per our needs or plans. To deal with all these situations, adaptability is required. There is no substitute for the same.

Every project would demand a certain amount of adaptability, as its needs and goals would be different than your prior experiences. As a scrum master one would play multiple roles in a day-to-day affair of the product development. Depending on the need, one would act as a wise counselor or demonstrate as an inspiring mentor or display compassion. Scrum Master should know that change is inevitable and would have an overarching impact. A Scrum Master who can adapt to   these changing situations would be able to survive and thrive in the business.

Tact

Scrum Master needs to master the art of tact in dealing with the team, PO and stakeholders including the leadership and show genuine concern for their situation and feelings. Tact as an approach cannot work alone, it has to be used with other personal effectiveness traits and people skills.

Lacking tact can be a costly impediment to personal effectiveness. How can we avoid conflict with someone who takes a totally arbitrary posture of disagreement? Now look at these 2 statements –

“Please tell me a little more about how you came to this conclusion.”

“I don’t agree with you.”

The first one might prevent antagonism, but the latter  one would more likely cause it.

This is what we call tact – an important parameter in our approach to dealing with people. Self-control under pressure is a powerful tool of discretion. Lacking tact as a skill could be a costly impediment to personal effectiveness. A practical guide to improving your handling of situations with “tact” should consider these three elements:

• Perception
• Discretion
• Empathy

Tact is more about mutual respect for other parties involved in the situation or discussions.

Credibility

Credibility is an essential attribute that is built upon elements of Trust, Integrity, Reliability, and Commitments. Credibility lends its power to personal effectiveness as it helps you earn the genuine respect, trust, and confidence of others.

Imagine a Scrum Master with credibility issues. Will they be able to lead the team, or will the team respect such a person?

Commitment and promises are a necessity in every part and type of job that we do. Breach of these would have issues on credibility of the person, whether it is in the society, organization, project, or family. A person’s past performance creates a track record which builds up credibility.

Intercommunications

Intercommunication is a synthesizer to all the other elements as discussed in this article. Intercommunication capabilities create the power to use all the skills more effectively. A good communicator conveys messages, ideas, thoughts, suggestions, and intentions clearly and concisely, while displaying the reciprocal interactions – listening, hearing, and evaluating the comments and feelings of others. This is a common element of Scrum Master’s daily job.

The effectiveness of Scrum Master’s communication is always reflected in the responses they receive, whether in action or attitude or words. These responses are an excellent ongoing opportunity for evaluating the style of our communication. If the Scrum team’s performance matters, it needs to have excellent communication from Scrum Master. Scrum is a high-intensity team sport. Good communication is one of the essential elements to build a robust Scrum team. Lack of communication or poor communication will invariably cause your Scrum team to fall apart.

Signs of poor communication

Here are the most common indicators of improper communication that you as a Scrum Master should be careful about:

1. Using a monologue over a dialogue
2. Disregarding the feelings of others
3. Being subjective/vague
4. Resisting feedback
5. Lack of shared language of communication

Persuasiveness

It is an art of gaining approval, acceptance or agreement when presenting your thoughts, ideas, plans, suggestions, and opinions to others.

It is one of the most valuable skills for the scrum master to have, as it leads to gaining cooperation, and a greater success in our dealing with the situations and people.

Quite often, traditional managers can be very autocratic when they delegate their authority. Scrum supports empowerment. Self-analyzing and self-organizing teams decide the best course of action. At times, it becomes necessary to advise the team to follow the Scrum process or carry out a particular activity. Generally, the teams respond positively by listening to the scrum master and engaging with the task. However, if the team fails to respond in time, or fails to respond positively, it may be required to engage with the team so it can comply. This is where the attitude comes in – the Scrum Master can either instruct the team or discuss the issue and persuade the team to respond positively.

An autocratic attitude is frowned upon by the team, and at an individual level, it may become difficult to avail the team member’s cooperation. The servant-leader role suggests that a scrum master should refrain from delegating his or her authority. Instead, the person should persuade the team member to cooperate.

Persuasiveness forms an integral part of well-defined communication. It is derived from competence, convictions, and ethically driven behavior.

Objectivity

Being objective helps to evaluate the situation, data, information which would be un-influenced by emotions, beliefs, or any personal preference. For a Scrum Master maintaining objectivity – an unbiased perspective when dealing with others and doing so fairly – is vital to achieving personal effectiveness. Objectivity is closely linked to credibility.

For objectivity to survive, an open mind is required, or should I say, it is the bare minimum requirement. An open mind would allow the Scrum Master to have the freedom to evaluate possible choices. A closed mind would rob us of these advantages.

Scrum Masters should be careful about objectivity as per social science research. This is difficult and arises out of the adverse influences of the following:

• Personal prejudices and bias
• Value judgement
• Ethical dilemma  
• Complexity of social phenomena

A clear objective of Scrum Master should be to focus on the development and dissemination of knowledge and skills which are required to exploit the potential of the latest technologies and have collaborative design and working environment.

Initiative

This is an approach or a skill, where the Scrum Master converts an idea into action. The focus is to find if the idea would work, and whether we should pivot or throw away the thought.

A good product is well-crafted when engineering practices are in place with good effect.  Scrum Master should arrange workshops on coding guidelines, designs, tools, and different engineering practices. Arrange a workshop for the team members where you can discuss or try a new tool, current architecture, latest technology, build-process, and do much more. This can be implemented by reserving time for the workshop and organizing an arbitrator who can be from the team.

Never have a laid-back attitude with your team or product, or when dealing with the stakeholders. Play on your front foot and move forward.

Self-Discipline

It is the ability to control one’s impulses, emotions, desires, and behavior. Agile transformation is all about self-disciplined team members. When we find discipline is missing, we do not get the value flow from the team to the end users. Self-discipline is important because it gives the Scrum Master the opportunity to excel in their professional life. It helps establish a set work routine and holds one accountable for the goals by pushing them to pursue advanced job opportunities.

Self-control is discipline in the face of pressure from an immediate urge, desire, or compulsion. It relates to delaying immediate gratification of the senses. Its struggle is the conflict between intellectual knowing and emotional desiring. It is the choice between physical and psychological satisfaction now vs. the hope or expectation of something better later.

A Scrum Master is required and expected that they would maintain a high degree of self-control and discipline.

Because self-discipline is a learned behavior, Scrum Master should make the choice to develop it. It’s important to set clear goals and have a solid plan for how they’ll achieve them. Knowing where we’re headed makes it easier to stay focused and avoid distractions. Here are a few steps you can follow to become self-disciplined:

• Know your current situation
• Define your expectations and set goals for yourself
• Push yourself to meet your goals
• Measure your progress
• Learn from the situation
• Reward yourself when you accomplish it
• Identify your areas of improvement
• Repeat the cycle – have a defined frequency

Remember there is no magic – it is all about you, your behavior and ability to handle complex, difficult situations, when the career and aspirations of people are involved. It is a delicate balance and Scrum Master needs to walk the tight rope.

Always inspect and adapt.  Be the servant leader that Agile expects you to be.

How to maintain and sustain a Scrum Team – The Secret Sauce (Engage the Scrum Team Member)

People engagement is a minimum expectation for any team, product, project, and organization. It is a never-ending journey, yet many projects or organizations go awry and lose the required focus. Many organizations fail to embark on that journey. As a result, they’re setting their people (and their bottom lines) up for failure.

Why is people engagement crucial? How do you measure it? Improvements can only come when you know what needs to be done and why, along with the relevant impact or desired change.

What is People engagement?

Many Scrum Masters recognize that engaging the team members plays a critical role in Agile success. But far fewer can define engagement and why it’s so important. What is the so-called engagement? What is the role of Scrum Master in this front?

Team Member engagement is the measure of how motivated a person is within their job, team, and organization. When someone is highly engaged, it means they’re invested in their work, energized by their peers, and committed to their product and/or company’s long-term mission and vision. 

Put simply, engagement measures an employee’s level of satisfaction at a given point in the employment lifecycle. The higher the level of engagement, the greater the likelihood that the person is enjoying a positive experience. By engaging your hard-working folks and low-performers alike, you ensure your people can come to work energized—and deliver their best.

Why is an engaged Scrum Team important?

Flip this question on its head: What happens when your team or a few members of the team are not engaged?

When team members feel disconnected their work begins to suffer which ultimately impacts the product / increment delivery. Team member is less likely to go the extra mile for their others and is going to do the bare minimum to stay afloat in their role. And when they decide their organization can no longer support their growth (professionally, monetarily, or otherwise), they’ll leave for a company that can.

Now imagine that effect multiplied across an entire workforce, and the dangers of disengagement become amply clear.

An engaged Scrum Team is critical to productivity—and, by that definition, it would impact your profitability and customers (directly). 

We do not even count the losses that we have made by hiring the wrong person or backfilling the position. If we start to calculate the amount of time, effort, and energy that is wasted, more so from the management level, our growth in terms of EBITA would be going north. But, alas, it is considered an element of doing business. No doubt that people would leave, but by retaining them for a longer duration, you are increasing your margins, as well as customer satisfaction.

Improvements to the employee experience can also carry over to the customer experience. If you’re taking steps to improve employee satisfaction, chances are your customer satisfaction ratings will get a boost, too. 

Habits of engaged employees and companies.

Engaged team members would have some habits you simply won’t find in other employees. They show up to work with energy and often a genuine smile. They go the extra mile in their role—by working late occasionally or offering to help employees with too much on their plate. Above all else, they’re excellent teammates who contribute to a healthy team dynamic. 

Benefits of engaged team members.

When a team member is engaged, that inner fire tends to spread. Others feel the energy. They spend more discretionary effort and aspire to be better team players. Given are a few of the many benefits of engagement:

• Higher productivity
• Greater profitability
• Lower employee turnover
• Fewer safety incidents
• Stronger customer loyalty
• Lower employee absenteeism

Consider this list of benefits, and the takeaway is clear: Employee engagement can transform your business. 

Make no mistake: A ping-pong table and office snacks aren’t enough to entice today’s talent. More than ever, people want a fail-safe environment—one where they can be their authentic selves, and work in a way that’s both stimulating and sustainable. 

The different levels of engagement

You may know an employee is highly disengaged, but unless you know what is driving disengagement, how are you supposed to take action?

There are four drivers of employee engagement:

• Job fit: Alignment between an employee’s responsibilities and their natural tendencies and career aspirations 
• Manager fit: The relationship between the employee and their manager.
• Team fit: Chemistry with teammates, and overall team cohesion
• Organizational fit: connection to senior leadership and the company culture

When a team member achieves fitment across all four factors of engagement, they’re more likely to be engaged overall. By contrast, when one or more factors are lacking—a person doesn’t gel with their team, the culture, etc.—they’re more likely to become disengaged over time. 

One size doesn’t fit all when it comes to engagement. Job satisfaction may look wildly different to one team member as compared to another—it all depends on each person’s natural behavioral drives. By understanding how to motivate your scrum team members based on their unique needs, Scrum Master can ensure that they are taking an active approach to prevent disengagement and improving the experience.

Don’t try to boil the ocean. When in doubt, look for ways—even if seemingly small—to improve one or more of the four drivers of engagement. 

Here are some examples of ways to improve engagement:

• Have regular career pathing discussions with your team members.
• Build awareness as a Scrum Master and address relationship gaps.
• Encourage a healthy work-life balance (and lead by example).
• Build trust by leading remote-friendly team-building activities.
• Recognize your Scrum Team Members for a job well done, or when a Sprint has gone well (more so publicly than privately).
• Write personalized “thank you” cards for your team members.
• Embrace hybrid work by allowing people to choose where they work (as long as the work is getting done, the goals and objectives are achieved of the product/sprint).

Once the Scrum Master discovers effective employee engagement best practices, it’s time to think about the bigger picture with the strategy. Scrum Master should take a proactive approach by surveying the team members about their experiences with the project/organization. Identify the biggest opportunity areas, so one can swiftly act on their feedback.

Investing in and measuring engagement

Investing in engagement today can pay dividends in the long term—but only if you know how to measure your progress.

Collecting employee feedback has always been important, but now it’s mission critical. Organizations live in a post-COVID world—one dominated by discussions about mental health, social equity, and personal freedom. Throw economic uncertainty into the mix, and you could make a strong argument that employee engagement is in a recession of its own.

The impact of managers and leadership on engagement

As a Scrum Master, you have an outsized impact on engagement. It’s incumbent that you don’t just listen to your people, but that you advocate and fight for them.

Taking action is a collaborative process. Give your people the forum to voice their opinions and propose ideas for change. Once you’ve agreed upon a plan of action, see to it that you follow through on that plan. Lead by example and encourage other leaders / Scrum Masters across the organization to follow suit.

The role of engaged employees in your hiring process.

Engagement doesn’t just make for a great employee experience—it makes for a great hiring experience, too.

One of the best ways to create a world-class onboarding experience is to involve existing employees, preferably high performers already in the role. Doing so can help accelerate a new hire’s training while providing invaluable mentors they can lean on in their first 30 days.

By having engaged team members, you ensure new hires are exposed to the very best your organization has to offer. By contrast, if you let disengaged team members run the show, you risk discouraging new talent before they even wrap up their first day.

Identifying disengaged employees at your workplace 

A proactive approach to engagement isn’t without its flaws. Employees can still fall through the cracks and become disengaged.

Put simply, the four factors of engagement can double as “four forces of disengagement.” 

You can probe for these negative forces with the right conversations. If you sense morale is low among a group of employees, bring it up privately during your next one-on-one meeting. Consider asking the following questions:

• Are you enjoying your current role?
• Do you feel supported by the team?
• In what ways can I improve as a Scrum Master?
• How do you feel about the state of the company?

Disengaged employees are never a lost cause. Equip yourself with effective tools—and a positive mindset—and you’ll ensure you’re setting up your people for success.

Look forward for your feedback and comments … your personal experience on this front, we all can share and learn from each other’s experience

Empathy – A tool for better understanding of our end users and solution users

Several times in my career, I have heard many people / gurus say to use Empathy as a tool to better understand your customers and their needs, their behaviors’, their pains, and their future outlook. The idea is empathy would only provide the experience from the past and not give any new insights in the needs and requirements of the future.

A lot of us (including me) get confused, when we speak about Persona and Empathy … are they similar concepts, do they capture and provide similar information, how are they to be used, when are they to be used, what is the value proposition of using them, which one is a better approach?

This document of mine would try and shed some light on the Empathy part and hopefully in future we shall explore the depth of Persona also.

Empathy map is a tool for target audience analysis. It is used to identify feelings, thoughts and attitudes of existing or potential users / customers and understand their needs, The idea is to obtain in-depth insights on potential users by means of what, why and how questions. Empathy maps focus more on the emotional state of customers.

Let’s first focus on the usage and value that Empathy would provide:

• It would help us better understand and appreciate insights from testing or observations with the users and capture different perspectives
• Helps understand where the user has problems or potential benefits
• Helps to collect findings to build Persona

Empathy map as a tool should be used in conjunction with other tools like Customer Journey mapping, Persona / User Profiling and Value proposition canvas

When doing Empathy mapping with the customer, ensure that we have 2 people, one person documents and records the information while the other would-be posing questions. Typically, this should max 30-45 mins of session

Use a template for Empathy map where you record everything about the customer such as:

• Think & feel
• Hear
• See
• Say & Do
• Pains
• Gains

Use questions such as:

• Where is the customer? What do they see?
• Who influences them, with whom do they interact / communicate?
• What emotions are driving the customer
• What does it say about their attitude?
• Where does the customer behave in a contractionary manner?
• What are their biggest challenges / pain areas?
• What are the opportunities and benefits they may have?

While doing this exercise, focus on human values – like thoughts, opinions, feelings, emotions (at times these may not be directly available, you have may to infer based on their body language, tone, word selection).

Pay special attention to contradictions, often we can identify something new from what the customer says and the way they behave.

Using this data, analysis all the edge cases, dig into unique behaviors and identify what are we building … why are we building, will it serve the purpose?

Empathy mapping is a unique tool that a Product Owner or a Business Analyst should have in their armory to better serve and engage the End User community, better your tools, product and services are aligned to the end user … higher is the potential for your products to dominate the market.

Again it should never be one size that fits all.

OLD WINE, IN OLD BOTTLE – BUT WITH NEW LENS

Agile and its variants / frameworks like Scrum, Kanban’s has been around us for more than 2 decades now, but very few organizations have been able to apply and reap the benefits of the same to the degree of investments made by each organization.

We want to be Agile, but do not want to embrace the value and eco system of Agile, I see a lot of organizations wanting to do Spotify ways of doing things, they have gone ahead and labeled their teams as Squads, Tribes and Chapters … but has anything changed, has the approach changed? Or the culture undergone a transformation? Has labelling teams made them adopt the Spotify ways of working …. I do not believe so.

Any change needs to be driven, its needs to anchored, its needs support and needs to be groomed for survival. It needs time, patience and attention from the Leadership or the sponsors who are putting the hard dollars ($$$) on the table, but alas dollars ($$$) are available, but the sponsors or the leadership team is missing from action.

Why is it so difficult to follow in practice 14 pages of PDF called Scrum Guide? Have we understood the intent of the document? Or it was just a new buzz word or a new kid on the block?

Historically if we see we had 7S theory, Lean, ISO, CMMI, Six Sigma’s and many more … where they now, if organizations have used them, have they got tangible cum measurable benefits? Why would an organization adopt ISO and CMMI and also Six Sigma (either together or one after other) … at the end of the day all speak the same language but with a slight difference, the end result is supposed to the same, the outcome needs to be the same. Why would any organization need improvement approaches using different models and methods, well the harsh truth is that we never implemented the initial one in the true spirit, therefore news ones would be required.

I would like to present an analogy over here … Each day when I get out of my bed, I would brush my teeth (well – Let’s say I use Colgate as a toothpaste), once done and dusted with Colgate, would I use Close-Up as new toothpaste for doing the same job, well my response would be a BIG “NO”, why No … Well, if I have done my job clearly and well with Colgate / 1^st option, I should not be needing the second option.

Over a period of years based on my experience, I am jotting down a few elements to be implemented or practiced to gain the true value of using Agile as a framework for developing solutions and products.

As mentioned in of my earlier post, we need a beginner’s mindset and attitude to be succeeding in Agile. Beyond this a few more elements as food for thought:

Start with understanding the problem statement:

Whenever we develop any product, solutions, or any output, it is critical to understand the user base, end user behavior, their needs, their requirements, their current pain areas, problem statements. By doing this we as a Scrum Team would start to understand the big picture of our purpose and create the right vision and objectives for development. In order for the team to create a solution, it needs to internalize the problem, understand the depth of the need, impact of the wrong solution or no solution.

Visualize how our developed solutions and products would change the working pattern or the social behaviors of the society and people who would use it or be impacted by it.

I would like to sound critical here … In real life our Product Owners directly jump to the explaining the user story … but the science behind the story is missing for the team, they are unable to see the vision and visualize the trances of their incremental solution on how it would lead to the potential solution.

Start with Human Beings

Remember our solutions would be used by real people, we need to start engaging and interacting with potential end users for understanding the needs, possibilities, experience, knowledge for creating a deeper understanding. End Users know their pains and gains of the system better than anybody else.

Interdisciplinary Teams

Collaboration is a key element of working on any project (irrespective of using Agile or not), Projects cannot be done by a single source or an entity, we would require collaboration of skills and talent to come together and ensure there is a healthy chemistry of working and all of us are working towards a common goal. Teams with varied skills and talent help in developing a creative process and continuous reflect on the same to see its feasibility of applicability

Our current challenge is that our teams are having different objectives, vision, goals and KRA. Each of us are focused on getting our KRA done to meet the performance appraisal objective. We are conveniently missing the client goals and objectives

Experiments and Prototypes

Only final product when used by the real end users would we know if our development has been successful or not, but to get intermediatory feedback, Scrum team should heavily depend upon experiments and prototypes, this is a quick way to get feedback and understand if our course of direction needs to change. Reviews should always be at 2 levels, one at the Product Owner level and other with the team that would be in touch with the end user community. Both the reviews should be looking at the holistic approach. One should always practice that “Less is More”. Emphasize that solutions have to be proven, ones that have got feedback should be actioned upon … Important – do not focus on only negative elements (actually there should be no negative element, it is more about a feedback).

Be mindful of the process

As in project, there would be some degree of process, that is either pre-defined or the scrum team would define it for itself. Process could be on how the Product Backlog Refinement would occur, Of Defining and agreeing on Definition of Ready/Done, What approach the team would adopt on Daily Standup / Scrum and so on … It could also lead into how conflicts have to be managed, how issues / impediment management would be taken care of.

The idea is to have simple and effective processes that would enable the team to work on a cruise control mode and deliver value

Accept Complexity

At times our solutions would be very complex even for a simple set of problem statement, we may have to integrate multiple 3^rd party tools and products, that itself would raise a level of complexity, sometimes working in some cultures could have its own set of challenges, the stakeholder community is changing regularly, this puts additional burden on getting re-aligned with the ever-changing thought process and new stakeholders.

 Co-Create and Grow with the concept of Co-Create

Agile is to solve problems, create new solutions, have happy customers. All this cannot be done in isolation, we need to engage multiple vendors, stakeholders, partners, business models, financial elements.

At times systems thinking along with Lean Start up approaches would be critical. Agile recommends collaboration with the stakeholders and the best approach would always be to co-create, It would help us pose right questions to the right people at the right time to get feedback and enable our journey to the next logical stop.

We need to regularly converge and diverge to reconverge back. This is a constant process and should be helping and assisting scrum team along with the decision makers.

All that is described above is nothing new, we all know it, we have read it, heard it, but are unable to put all of these elements in practice.

It takes 3 things to make Agile work in any organization …

1. Willingness of the Leadership to embrace agile (it cannot be just a lip service)
2. Attitude of the Scrum Team towards Agile
3. Aptitude of all involved stakeholders to respect the agile ways of working.

How many of us are willing to say that all 3 happen in our respective organization.

It is time that Leadership wakes up and smells the coffee … before its too late (remember they close the Check In Counters at the Airport 45 mins before the scheduled take off) … we being late would only impact us … as the flight has got its money and flown without you, with this analogy, Industry and Users would move forward and provide their dollars and business to your competitors, if you are not there.

Choice is always yours. Exercise the right one.

What Is Fail Safe approach at Work?

Scrum Teams are made up of people with different life experiences bringing together many valuable and different perspectives. Diverse groups are better able to recognize problems and offer more creative solutions than group of people with similar experiences.

But what if some team members don’t feel comfortable speaking up? What if they’re afraid to share their concerns or resisted asking challenging questions? What if they avoid suggesting innovative ideas because they’re worried about rejection? – this is an indication of Technical Debt (in our Environment – Not in our code, remember to refactor your working environment also)

A lack of safe environment at work has major business implications.  When employees do not feel comfortable talking about initiatives that aren’t working, if the organization does not listen to these conversations, then it isn’t equipped to prevent failure. When employees aren’t fully committed to your new project or ideas or initiatives, the organization has lost an opportunity to leverage the strengths of all its talent.

People need to feel comfortable speaking up, asking basic questions, and disagreeing with the way things are in order to create ideas that make a real difference.

This also means as an employee we embrace conflict and speak up, knowing that your team has your back, and you have their backs.

Defining Safety at Work

Fail Safe environment is a belief that nobody would be punished or seen down or insulted for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes.

When we have such safety in our projects and organization, one would feel comfortable being themselves. Employees would bring their full-selves to work and feel okay laying all of themselves on the line.

How to create a Fail Safe Environment in our Scrum Teams?

When a scrum team is characterized by interpersonal trust and a climate of respect, members feel free to collaborate and they feel safe taking risks, which ultimately enables them to implement rapid innovation.

A fail safe workplace begins with a feeling of belonging. Like all theories of human needs — which shows that all humans require their basic needs to be met before they can reach their full potential — employees must feel accepted before they’re able to improve their organizations.

Step 1: Inclusive Safety

Inclusive safety satisfies the basic human need to connect and belong with peers and superiors. In this stage, you feel safe to be yourself and are accepted for who you are, including your unique attributes and defining characteristics.

Step 2: Learnability Safety

Learnability safety satisfies the need to learn and grow. In this stage, you feel safe to exchange in the learning process, by asking questions, giving and receiving feedback, experimenting, and making mistakes. None should feel that any questions are non-value add.

Step 3: Do-er Safety

Do-er safety satisfies the need to make a difference. Each person should feel safe to use their skills and abilities to make a meaningful contribution.

Step 4: Challenging Status Quo Safety

Challenging any status quo inspires the need to make things better. One should feel safe to speak up and challenge the status quo when you think there’s an opportunity to change or improve or you believe something is not done the right way.

How can Scrum Master and Product Owner create a Fail Safe approach in their respective teams?

Think about it in terms of making incremental changes that yield incremental wins. Scrum Masters can set the stage for incremental change by facilitating the Scrum Team to set expectations for factors that contribute to safety of thoughts and ideas. Doing so will help encourage innovation and radically different thought process.

With your team, discuss the following questions:

• How will team members communicate their concerns about something that is not working?
• How will you respond to failure or bad news?
• How do we raise sensitive issues?
• What are the norms for managing conflict with in the team?
• Are you willing to accept creative, out-of-the-box ideas that are not well-formulated?

How can developers nurture Safety at Work?

While Scrum Masters and Product Owners play a role in shaping their team’s culture, it’s up to each team member to contribute to a fail-safe environment.

A culture is defined by “the way we do things around here” and we all have a role to play in how we do things at work — both on our teams and in our organization.

Developers can take the following steps to promote productive dialog and debate:

• Ask powerful, open-ended questions, and then listen actively and intently to understand feelings and values, as well as facts.
• Agree to share failures, recognizing that mistakes are an opportunity to learn and grow.
• Ask for help, and freely give help when asked.
• Embrace expertise among many, versus a “hero” mentality.
• Encourage and express gratitude, which reinforces team members’ sense of self.

Most importantly, positive interactions and conversations between individuals are built on trust. Show empathy in the workplace by giving your team members the benefit of the doubt when they take a risk, ask for help, or admit a mistake. In turn, trust that they will do the same for you.

Scrum Masters should be investing in strengthening the quality of dialogue across the team and the organization. Remember, better conversations will lead to a better culture. Improved conversational skills, combined with a fail-safe environment, will yield employees who are more willing to share unspoken reservations and proposed solutions that are stress-tested more rigorously before implementation.

What happens when the Work Is Virtual?

At first, it may seem that it’s harder to promote fail safe approach when employees are working remotely. How do you establish trust when interpersonal conversations have to be scheduled in advance and conducted through a screen?

On a LIVE virtual call, one has the ability to look intently at people, not just listening to their words, but seeing and feeling their emotions. In many cultures, it can be awkward to stare at someone for 30 seconds or certainly minutes at a time. But on a LIVE Virtual approach no one knows who you’re looking at, and your ability to apply your emotional intelligence can be enhanced.

Conclusion:

Remember, the goal is to create a safe place to work where team members aren’t worried about feeling rejected for speaking up. When that’s the case, not only does interpersonal risk-taking become the norm, but team members are also more adaptable in the face of change. In other words, they understand the challenges and opportunities that exist throughout the organization — and they see their role in making it a better place.

Scrum Masters – Take a lead in creating such an environment … Product Owners need to be supporting the Scrum Master to nurture such an environment … remember a team that is encouraged to take risk, speak freely, keep innovating without worry about failures, will produce the value that your customers would love. Leave the concept of improving your velocity (seems like this is the only metrics and KRA every one in life has – I mean all agilists), rather focus on the environment, culture, collaboration, communication (I know these are dirty and bad words – but believe me they will help you in your journey towards excellence) and would help you improve / increase our required throughput / cycle time / velocity

Tips to mess up your Agile Transformation / Adoption

We, for ages have been attending a lot of workshops, trainings, getting coached, reading a lot of material on the internet, wherein all of them are providing guidance on how to implement / adopt the right and the correct practices of agile / scrum / Kanban.

My blog today is a high level summary (not all points) of anti-patterns for everything that the world is preaching, teaching and more importantly NOT IMPLEMENTING

My guidance would help all the organization and respective managers to know and learn how to mess and manufacture a disaster for their agile ways of working.

We all know 3 important roles in Agile or should I say Scrum (in specific) – We shall today take the most neglected role of Agile – “THE PRODUCT OWNER”

Off-late watching and experiencing the world and the behavior with the product owner, I have become more educated on ideas, thoughts and tips to mess around with the role of Product owner and thereby understand methods and ways in which the value of Agile adoption goes / can go down the drain.

Fasten your seat belts, Here we go …

TIP # 1

Never Empower your Product Owner: Giving power for decision making to a product owner could be injurious to the health and wealth of the Line Manager / Sr. Manager. Always tell the PO what to do, how to do, ask them to document each backlog item with every possible scenario (in the same PBI – even though the PBI would now qualify to be a large feature or an EPIC by itself).

Never give liberty to the PO to decide how to maximize the value of the product, the order of the product backlog items, making their only job is to do documentation of the requirements in complete fashion / manner as we desire, they should not be able to move an inch without our approvals. We are more interested that our PO act and behave as SCRIBES … rather than as Product Owners.

If you do what I am recommending here … Bingo you have achieved Level 1 Maturity of Messing up with the agile ways of working …

TIP # 2

Have your PO also double up as Scrum Master: Well every organization that I know is always short of right resources and talent. If one FTE can double up and do the job of two, nothing like it – a bird in hand is worth two in the bush. It would always help the team as they know they have to look up to one person only and it saves a few dollars of the table (nothing like saving money), it prevents challenges and issues or managing the expectations of 2 people, conflicts are reduced (as we have 1 person only – never heard of a single person is having conflict with themselves).

If you implement and adopt this approach as recommended here … Bravado – you have achieved messing up with Scrum Guide itself … and that deserves kudos and a bravery award to those who take, implement such decisions.

TIP # 3

Have a Proxy Product Owner (who is powerless): Our true North Star “THE PRODUCT OWNER” is across the oceans and in those time zones, that is difficult for any sane person to be wake and sit late at nights and interact with the team (when the team is working). Every problem has a solution and this case it would be to create a replica of the actual product owner in our own location and call them as Proxy PO’s (well we have just introduced a new role in Scrum – Who cares of the Scrum Guide).

Using a Proxy PO is an attempt to superficially treat a systemic issue and push the actual problem below the carpet. One should never allow the Proxy PO to take decisions, they are like glorified Postman / Post Woman here … they only have to take orders from one side of the coin and communicate (with gaps of course) to the other side (aka Development team).

In case you implement and adopt this approach as given above … You have installed insecurity, confusion which effectively breaks down communication in Agile, well who cares for Agile Manifesto statement… Individuals and Interactions over Processes and Tools

TIP # 4

The Partial Product Owner (Allocated to more than 2 teams): One nice way to making our product owners ineffective is to give them multiple products / projects to take care of … So that more than 50% of their time will be spent in doing Scrum events (Sprint planning, Sprint Reviews, Retrospectives and so on …) across all the teams, they should never get time to do quality work on the Product Backlog, think about prioritization and ordering of PBI’s or discussing important elements with relevant stakeholders or end-users. Always work with the approach that – we shall cross the bridge when we come to it.

If we have created such situation, we are at the prime of not messing one but multiple projects, we have actually graduated in our approach and thought process and we deserve a pat on our back

TIP # 5

The Over worked Product Owner (working for more than 14 hrs / day): Working in normal times would get you a rating of 3/5 in your appraisal system, which states – Meets Expectations. These days all organizations need people who would work beyond the normal hours. We have unrealistic deadlines and commitments. Management and Sales folks make an unachievable commitment and then the development team (along with the PO) has to deliver … in order to do this we have to work beyond a normal timeline or cut corners – we end up doing both.

This results in Technical Debt, Poor quality of product and services, dis-satisfied team and unhappy customers – but guess what – we are hitting the clock more harder than before …

If your products / projects have managed to have this situation, then we should be proud of our achievements, any-which ways client and management do not understand the concept of Technical Debt (so it is cool and fine).

Conclusion:

I believe these 5 tips are great source of Anti-Patterns (should I say – Industry ways of working – Anti Pattern would sound rude). If you want Agile to be messed up, use these ideas (they are free and no copy right issues – you can take and update them to be become more fancier).

Nothing that I have said today, is new or rubbish – it is actually practiced in our world by all the agilists – who have great certificates and knowledge, but we buckle under the pressure of having a job, regular income, management, peer pressure and so on …

For ages I have failed to understand why management wants to spend money and hard dollars and still not receive value … well the answer lies that nobody wants to implement AGILE. It is just a buzz word in the system.

If you believe in doing the things right and in the right approach, follow the reverse of all the tips given here … you would notice a more productive, safe, guilt free implementation of Agile.

Try for the true Agile for 4-6 months – do it in the true spirit of the game … if you still do not see results … go back to your old ways – nobody would stop you (anyways nobody is stopping you today also). I would be coming out with such blogs as a series on all roles of Agile / Scrum and then move to events and outputs.

Teamwork – The ultimate approach to succeed

I am writing this blog, as I watch the World Hockey League Finals (India vs. Australia). It is a classic game, where the coordination, anticipation of the team members is required, one needs to know, when to pass the ball, whom to pass the ball, which would result in team work that is of utmost importance, it is a game of 11 team members (how cool, even Scrum team’s maximum size is also 11, 9 development team members, supported by Scrum Master and Product Owner).

No vision or strategy or technology can help an organization meet their operational goals and business objectives, if teamwork is not in place. Team work remains the ultimate competitive advantage for any organization to succeed and delight their customers. With this fact known to one and all, not sure, why it is the most neglected element of the system, we are all focused on productivity, velocity (oh this can be gamed). If you could have all the employees of the organization align and work towards the achievement of the vision and move forward in the same direction, one could rule / dominate any industry, in any geography, any market against any competition at any time.

For all the attention that this topic has received over the years from Guru’s of various industries and from the Agile Guru’s since last 2 decades, it is still one of the rarest commodities in any company. The fact remains that teams, because they are made up of imperfect human beings are inherently dysfunctional. It is not to say that is a doomed concept, but building an effective team with synergy and ethics in place requires patience, trust, empowerment and time. Building great teamwork is both possible and simple, but is painfully difficult.

Team members should remember that they would get respect or recognition not because of their individual brilliance or degrees each member would carry, but because they would have performed well as a team and delivered the desired results.

Managers and organizations should realize that building a team is like building a delicate eco-system of powerful force. It needs to be crafted with strategy and care and every piece counts as it brings you closer to the vision of your company. I believe that people join an organization and its journey to do their best and perform at their own peak. So as a Scrum Master your role is to trust them, provide them with safety net and be their cheer leader as they grow. A motivated work force can do wonders.

Effective teams don’t originate randomly. They are the result of Scrum Masters who lead by example and build healthy habits into the team’s dynamics. But sometimes things happen outside of the Scrum Master’s control, and some problems are harder to spot than others — a lack of diverse perspectives on a team, for example, means a team may be too comfortable to innovate.

All teams, even the great ones, often face challenges, periods of time when everyone finds it harder to work together effectively to create splendid work. There are several ways a team might become dysfunctional and usually, there are multiple reasons. Contributing factors might include burnout, personnel changes, a loss of key people, or unexpected changes in the market.

Let’s be clear, dysfunction refers to a deterioration of performance, inability to perform effectively as a team.

What are some signs your team could be nearing dysfunction? If you can recognize the symptoms of the problem, you can take steps to get your team back on track.

A Communication Breakdown 

A breakdown in communication is a clear sign of team dysfunction. It can manifest itself in sidebar conversations, low morale, decreased engagement, and even workplace bullying. The first step of a Scrum Master is take to the correct course to gain a clear understanding of the challenges — and its team members.

Absence of Trust 

Trust is the foundation of all successful teams and the absence of trust is a roadmap to dysfunction. Teams that don’t trust each other assume negative intentions, dread spending time together, and don’t ask for help from each other. Scrum Master should start cultivating trust by creating a culture of vulnerability, rewarding honesty, and most importantly, leading by example.

Unresolved Conflict 

People working together on teams will have conflict. However, if they don’t seem to be working it through and are holding on to resentments, it will lead to a failure to perform. Some signs to watch for: missing deadlines, gossiping, forming of cliques, complaining, and sub-par work products. Scrum Masters need to be watching for early warning signs and intervening as necessary.

A Mass Exodus of Talent 

If your turnover is very high, something is dysfunctional within the team. It could mean there is a lack of trust, the culture is oppressive, or the pay is not competitive. Create a formalized exit interview process to capture the sentiments of exiting employees and use this data to create change within the organization. Schedule regular employee meetings to assess needs and build engagement.

Withdrawal 

As teams turn dysfunctional, members start to withdraw — often before they’re even aware they’re doing it. They’re just not as invested in the process or the outcome. Scrum Master who sees less creativity, enthusiasm and communication needs to re-engage the team. Share project ownership. Help team members see how they each strengthen the team. Be generous with positive feedback.

Becoming Too Comfortable 

Teams become comfortable. Instead of diverse ideas, they “Groupthink.” This is ineffective. Productive teams need multiple perspectives. Team members must understand distinct roles, and respectfully challenge others. When teams “Groupthink” they avoid debate to the detriment of the team. Scrum Masters  can remind the team of their roles, review why the team is in place, and explain how it can best operate.

Lack of Decision-Making 

The inability to make decisions reflects the lack of cohesion and trust within a team. Conflict over decisions builds cohesion and transparency. When teams are stuck, they fail to move forward. Decisions are delayed, accountability is reduced due to lack of buy-in, which leads to delays, low productivity, and low morale. Lack of decision-making is a symptom of dysfunction and impedes all team progress.

The role of the Scrum Master – In Team building

One of the most difficult challenges for a Scrum Master would be to instill the concept of accountability in a team. At times strong Scrum Masters naturally create an accountability vacuum within the team, leaving themselves as the only source of discipline, this creates an environment where team members assume that the Scrum Master is holding others accountable, and so they hold back even they see something is not right.

Once a Scrum Master has created a culture of accountability on the team, however, he or she must be willing to serve as the ultimate arbiter of discipline when the team itself fails, though this should be a rare occurrence. It must be made clear to the team that accountability has not been relegated to a consensus approach, but merely to shared team responsibility, and that the Scrum Master would not hesitate to step in when it is necessary.

Perhaps more than with any of the other dysfunctions, Scrum Master should set the tone for a focus and result oriented approach. When the team members start to sense that the Scrum Master values anything other than the results, they will take that as permission to do the same for themselves. Scrum Masters must be selfless and with goal oriented mindset with success as the only target.

Success is not a matter of mastering subtle, highly bookish theory, but rather embrace common-sense with uncommon levels of discipline and persistence.

Interestingly, teams succeed because they are human, by acknowledging their imperfections, members of the team overcome natural tendencies that make trust, conflict, commitments, accountability and a focus on results so elusive.

I am yet trying to understand as to why organizations find it difficult to create an atmosphere where teamwork can flourish.