Tag: Scrum Alliance

Developing Scrum Teams to Wipe Out Toxic Work Culture

If you are feeling repulsive every day to get back to work and to avoid the toxic work culture, you are not alone. Hostile work environment and workplace harassment exists even in Fortune 500 companies. Scrum teams and agile methodologies are a perfect solution to wipe out instability and insecurity in the teams.

Toxic Work Culture

Toxic work culture is common in organizations and definitely in all insecure teams. It is as evident as bullying in schools and ragging in colleges. You can only suck it up so much! Using your peers against you has become a norm for Human Resources and Project Managers. The insecurity and instability have led to more repulsive and reclusive teams.

You can differentiate toxic work culture in the first week itself. Everything is so rosy until you join and while you are getting acquainted with the new environment, the onset of personal attacks will begin. By the way, this has nothing to do with how well you are educated, how hard you are working, or how much you are willing to change to match the company’s expectations. It is just like that.

Scrum Teams

On the other hand, Scrum teams are proving to more empowering teams by self-organizing and cross-functional methods. All teams are agile and are welcoming input for continuous improvement. We all learn from each other and that is true for organizations as well. New hires who are Scrum certified are now becoming mandatory for teams. Even your organization is not following agile scrum, getting certified will provide new ways of working and enabling each other.

Modern organizations like NewBoCo #newboco are training the youth in both software as well as agile scrum certifications and placing them in client place. Getting certified is the best way to understand why the clients are preferring Agile Scrum trained professionals. While some may think the Scrum certifications are unnecessary and only technical certifications are needed. But, how the technical certifications are helpful if your thought process is small and basic work habits are toxic. I think more than the technical certifications, Scrum certifications will help to improve the teams. Technical skills can be learned in a short time but the time taken to modify an entire organization mindset is more. Certified Scrum Master and Certified Scrum Product Owner are the two certifications, to begin with. Even if your organization is not developing software, your teams can get benefitted by Scrum knowledge. This will help in the optimization of resources and time.

Scrum teams help each other and become high performing teams. They are continuously helping each other in technical and/or any personal issues. If one team member is having a problem, others are willing to pitch in instead of putting them further down. Helping will multiply further and foster a healthy workplace. All staffing companies must ask their consultants to get Scrum certified if the Client company is having Agile Scrum in their policy. This will help in a smooth transition and avoid unnecessary situations.

Certified Scrum Master: Say Nothing and Let the Development Team Figure it Out

Yes, in ideal development scrum teams, Scrum Master does not provide a solution but facilitates the discussions towards the solution. Certified Scrum Master is the servant leader in Agile Scrum teams to help achieve their goals. Scrum Master helps improve the business value and assists in the implementation of Scrum both at the team level as well as at the organization level.

Scrum Master

Scrum Master is one of the key roles in the Scrum team who ensures the relationships in the team are smooth for the operation of the Scrum team. Scrum Master definitely teaches, explains, shares experiences, and has a positive outlook toward the implementation of the Scrum. Whenever a difficult situation arises in the team, Scrum Master does the coaching and raises awareness so the team members are able to find the solution themselves. Scrum Master removes any external impediments the team is facing and in certain cases help the team to remove the impediments themselves.

Facilitation is one of the key responsibility of the Scrum Master. They help organize the Scrum events such as Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Sprint Retrospective. Scrum Master works with the Product Owner to ensure the team has everything needed to achieve their goals.

Scaling Scrum

Scrum Master plays a key role in Scaling Scrum at an organization level. Large Scale Scrum is a challenge in the big organizations and coordinating the multiple Scrum teams is needed. Scrum Master helps the team realize the team capacity and backlog refinement. Scrum Master guides the teams in the Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing stages of the Scrum Team.

Scrum Master initially works at the team level to make them self-organizing and high-performing. Next, Scrum Master observes the team from a broader perspective. Next, Scrum Master expands the coaching at an organization level to inculcate a culture change. Working with other Scrum Masters is crucial for a Scrum Masters to understand the best practices.

At times, Scrum Master lets the team fail and understand the situation and adapt in the next Sprint. Even when the team becomes self-organized, the Scrum Master is needed for continuous improvement and performing teams. A Scrum Master is open to experimenting, asking questions, encourage conversations, and finding out better ways to get things done.

Scrum Master can introduce fun games and conduct cupcake get-togethers to encourage conversations. Offering small gifts and appreciating the team on achievements helps in team engagement.

Certification

To get Scrum Master certification, you need to attend a two-day paid workshop by a Certified Scrum Trainer. ( Only about 300 worldwide). After completing the class, you can take the test online from your home or office. The test is a 50 question multiple choice test and you have one hour to complete it. In order to receive the certification, you need to get 74%. You have 90 days to take one more time without paying fees.

The test has most questions from the Agile Manifesto and the Scrum Guide. It is an open book test and hence you can have the material by you for reference during the test. However, the time limit is crucial. Some questions on the Scrum roles may be confusing but it is okay. You have an option to get back to a skipped question if you are unsure. The test is included with the training fees for the first two attempts.

Getting the certification definitely helps boost the resume and understand the Scrum concepts. To maintain the certification, you need to keep earning the educational units. Every organization has a different way of adopting Scrum. Some Scrum Masters might perform dual roles as a developer or a tester. Scrum Masters can work on multiple teams and definitely help in backlog refinement in certain Scrum adaptations. Often developers are frustrated as to why the Scrum Masters are following up outside of the Scrum events. Ideally, Scrum Master is helping change the mindset of the organization to improve the business value.

Scrum Teams: Powerful Way of Getting Things Done

Scrum alliance is a modern technique to improve team work and customer collaboration. With reduced levels of intermediate communication, Scrum teams are revolutionizing how things are done. Mainly created for software development teams, Scrum principles and Agile methodologies are being incorporated in to all businesses.

Scrum

Scrum is a framework of Agile model for software development. Mainly focusing on face-to-face interactions, delivering working software at frequent intervals, incorporating change at any time during development, and customer collaboration, Scrum teams are increasing in many Fortune 500 companies.

Scrum Teams

The Scrum teams are self organizing and are a group of five to nine people. The small size lets them focus more on the tasks and communication. Product owner, Scrum Master, and the development team are three main roles of Scrum teams.

  1. Product owner: Responsible for gathering requirements from customer and acts as a main collaborator.
  2. Scrum Master: Oversees the sprint and makes sure the Scrum principles are being followed.
  3. Development team: Self organizing team members focused on the development of the product.

Team members focus on empowering each other and get things done in an efficient manner. Developing, testing, implementing, and incorporating customer requested changes are all completed within a short period of time called Sprint, which is typically two to four weeks.  The teams compete to increase their velocity with each sprint. Special tools such as Jira, Rally, Trello, and so on are used to record and measure the Sprints.

Scrum teams help to avoid ongoing distractions and smart phone addictions. The daily scrum meetings and face to face communication gives every one a chance of participation and a feeling of being important. Daily scrum meetings let the scrum teams discuss tasks done, tasks ahead, any obstacles within ten to fifteen minutes. This will set the focus of the Scrum teams and team members can watch out for each other.

Team members are able to develop Scrum values such as focus, commitment, courage, openness, and respect by working in Scrum teams. Overall efficiency and work environment are seeing an improvement through the Scrum teams.

Certifications

Scrum Certifications are helping teams get familiar with the Scrum principles, key terms, mandatory meetings, and so on. You can register at any local event and get certified. The certifications provide a guidance on the implementation of the Scrum in any business.

  1. CSPO: Scrum Certified Product Owner
  2. CSM: Scrum Certified Master
  3. CSD: Certified Scrum Developer
  4. CSP: Scrum Certified Professional
  5. CST: Scrum Certified Trainer
  6. CEC: Certified Enterprise Coach
  7. CTC: Certified Team Coach

Various requirements have to be met for advanced certifications while some require an interest to work in Agile Scrum teams. Ongoing participation in Scrum events and re-certification is recommended. Find a certification event near you and get started today!

Scrum Teams in Real Life

Scrum teams have proved to be efficient in many small businesses and even at family level, Scrum teams are performing better. Typical attitude of working in a silent secluded manner are being overtaken with a more collaborative and interactive approach of Scrum.

Small businesses are mostly practicing Scrum and are Agile without being aware. However, if they practice the Scrum teams, they can be more self regulating and self organizing. Everybody appreciate the daily scrum and are in loop of whats happening. Customer appreciates the working models and can let the Scrum teams know any changes needed. The Scrum teams are also feeling empowered with the regular communication and feedback from Customer.

There are some new terms and way of working that Scrum teams must get familiarized. Once, the habit is formed, there is no stopping for the Scrum teams in software development, conducting business, as well as in daily lives!