“Are We Agile Yet??”
Scott MacIntyre
Growing up, I was that kind of kid. Any long car ride and I was the first to ask my parents, “Are we there yet?” “How much further?” I’m not sure what they were thinking taking my brother and I across the country in the back of a Suburban, but I’m sure they re-thought it each time we pestered them. I hear the same question asked from team members, ScrumMasters, Product Owners, and managers. “Are we Agile yet?” or worse: “We’re doing (insert Scrum practice here), so we’re Agile.” Of course most teams are well aware that if you do a Daily Scrum and a Retro, that does not necessarily mean you’re practicing Scrum. A team may have the outward appearance of “doing Scrum”, but without holding true to practices they’re a bunch of what Ken Schwaber coined as, “Scrum-Buts”. “We do Scrum, but we don’t estimate stories.” “We do Scrum, but we don’t need retrospectives.” In order to maximize the benefits of Scrum, you need to follow through on the practices. If you put on your workout clothes and slap on some headphones, but never lift a weight, you’re not going to get stronger. If you don’t follow through on Core Scrum, you’re SINO. Scrum In Name Only. I know, I’ve been there. Never miss fantastic posts such as this one.
A previous employer of mine had become so good at SINO that they truly believed they were practicing Scrum in all its glory. Teams would have a daily 15 minute (usually 20-25) meeting where nothing of value was discussed and side conversations ruled, they would leave, develop for one week and 4 days, throw everything at QA on the last day, then blame the testers for not getting stories to ‘done’. A two-week waterfall is still a waterfall.
The team tried to protest and make ludicrous requests like, “Hey, do you mind if we only commit to the number of stories we believe we can accomplish as a team within one sprint?” “Any chance we can take a few hours today to just stop and reset, have a meeting where we talk about what’s going wrong and how to fix it?” But as all-knowing as all upper level management is, these requests were brushed aside, because what does the team know? They just develop.
I am currently in a different world and teams are given the freedom to make decisions for themselves with leadership understanding the best decisions come from those doing the work. And at first glance I don’t see much SINO here. But- I hope I do soon.
:-O Scrum. If your team follows Core Scrum practices 100% all of the time, they will most likely do very well. But are you happy with ‘very well’? Why not try for ‘Blow your socks off, holy $#*! amazing.’? I believe you can get there. If your team is highly mature and is practicing core Scrum with great success, innovate and improve. Talk with the team, see what they believe adds value, and what doesn’t, and then act on it. Does the team think tasking is necessary? No? Give it a shot and don’t task out stories for a sprint or two, see what happens. Do you believe story points provide no value? Ditch ‘em and see if you’re right. Always adjust the process to fit the way your team works best, never the other way around.
I want to be very clear that I’m not advocating for teams to throw out Scrum and fall into chaos (or worse yet, back to waterfall). All I want is for teams to challenge themselves and the status-quo to ensure that they are continuously improving. If your team can continue to uphold the Agile Manifesto and the 12 Principles behind it, try something new, scare yourself (and those around you), and push your team to be more Agile.
Right now, Scrum is a best practice in development. No question. But, are best practices always good enough? There are 4 lines in the Agile Manifesto, but what if there were a 5th?
Individuals and Interactions over Processes and Tools
Working Software over Comprehensive Documentation
Customer Collaboration over Contract Negotiation.
Responding to Change over Following a Plan
Continuous Improvement over Best Practices
Here’s what I’m working on right now: Starting with our next sprint we are departing from Scrum and moving to a Lean-Kanban process with a focus on story flow and just-in-time grooming. Each morning we will look at our (WIP-limited) stories and as a team discuss what is being done to move each one to “Done” (as teams do in a standard Daily Scrum). After this we ask, “Does anyone not have enough work for the day?” If someone informs the team that they will be completing their story today and at that point will not have a story to work on, the meeting transitions directly to a one-story grooming session. As a team, we will stay put and groom the highest priority story in the “Grooming” column until the team member is comfortable working on it. As soon as this happens, the meeting is adjourned and the team begins their day. We’ll keep the Retrospective every other week, but other than that, no ceremonies. No Planning meetings, no backlog refinement meetings.
Our goal is shortening the time from story creation to acceptance by our Product Owner and reducing the overhead of too many meetings on our calendar. Maybe it’ll work, maybe we’ll crash and burn. Either way, it’s a win in my mind. My teams are pushing themselves to think beyond Scrum and open to working in new ways. We’re inspecting our current processes and looking for how we can improve; isn’t that what Agile is all about?
Scott MacIntyre is a Scrum Master and Agile Coach at Capital One. Scott is passionate about coaching teams to bring Agile beyond “by the book Scrum” and helping teams to focus on continuous improvement in lieu of the complacency of best practices. Scott has coached teams using Scrum, Kanban, and is currently iterating on a Lean-Kanban method with a focus on continuous flow and just-in-time grooming. Recently Scott wrapped up a coaching engagement bringing Agile practices to tellers and branch managers of Capital One physical branches to improve communication and workflow. Outside of work, Scott is pursuing his MBA and using Kanban to plan his wedding.
Scott MacIntyre is a Scrum Master and Agile Coach at Capital One. Scott is passionate about coaching teams to bring Agile beyond “by the book Scrum” and helping teams to focus on continuous improvement in lieu of the complacency of best practices. Scott has coached teams using Scrum, Kanban, and is currently iterating on a Lean-Kanban method with a focus on continuous flow and just-in-time grooming. Recently Scott wrapped up a coaching engagement bringing Agile practices to tellers and branch managers of Capital One physical branches to improve communication and workflow. Outside of work, Scott is pursuing his MBA and using Kanban to plan his wedding.