On Becoming A Scrum Master

This week I became a Scrum Master I was in fact, certified, through training conducted by the amazingly talented, wise and committed Agile consultant, Tobias Mayer and improv artist and trainer, Matt Smith.

A heady notion to refer to oneself as a master. I keep seeing an image of Yoda... "Master Lucy, Don't try, only do"

What is scrum? Scrum is a systems approach to product development. The term, scrum comes from the game of rugby. By systems, I mean it is based on several foundations of organizational systems change - a sort of change management on steroids that is applied to agile software development. In fact scrum can be applied to all kinds of complex creative work.

The scrum approach reflects at least two elements associated with organizational systems change: team and wholeness.

Scrum is a team-based approach to product development in which:

• all members of the team are valued equally
  
• all team members learn to demonstrate individual and team leadership
  
• all team members are responsible to learn from iterative products development cycles and from each other.

Wholeness is realized in three ways:

1. Greater than the sum of its parts. All members of the team are accountable to each other, rather than to a positional leader.
   
2. Work collaboratively to tackle tough design issues and in so doing exchange skills and knowledge thereby building the team's overall adapt and adjust to forces outside its control.
3. Focus vigilance, while building the product in small iterative increments helps to manage complexity of design, the team should never loses site of the larger vision of the outcome and quality that delivers value to its customers/clients.
   

Scrum demands more of everyone in an organization, not just its team members.

It demands more of product stakeholders because they are actively involved in the process of product and quality acceptance prior to deployment. It requires more of organizational management because scrum surfaces patterns of team and organizational dysfunct and provides opportunities for systemic change.

Scrum, when truly practiced according to its principles, demands much, and in return, it delivers products that meet customer expectations faster, with fewer defects and a a side effect that may be even more valuable that the product itself - a higher performing organization. Primarily used to manage the creative work of software and product development, scrum is capable of simultaneously creating organizational change.

The Myth of Scrum Master:

The scrum master replaces the role of a traditional project manager in software development, yet great scrum masters are not masters because they have been trained and certified. They are masters because they never forget that they are always becoming better masters. They are courageous and invite enough disruption to motivate without overwhelming. They are able to bring out leadership behaviors in others by allowing them to learn and think critically.

One becomes a scrum master by developing practicing the use of the scrum tools, personal mastery and holding a space for organizations to practice supporting scrum with abandon. It is the scrum masters job to educate the organization on the process and its value throughout a project.

Going through scrum master certification was a valuable experience for me, in spite of graduate degree in organizational systems change and years of consulting experience. Organizational change methods look simple but really require the same kind of mastery previously mentioned. Scrum is a concrete application of systems change that can be adapted to deliver real value in my life and profession.

So...with humility I offer Yoda and those who wish to master scrum, be they product owners, certified scrum masters, or part of the development team, “Don’t try, only practice doing, learn and then do some more.”

For more on scrum certification.

New Tools for Change Inevitably Emergent

I've been making use of social media a lot lately to follow the work of people with whom I share common interests. I find the whole emergent nature of social media fascinating and actually quite surprising. My pragmatist nature would normally make me skeptical that real business value could come from the twitter- or blogoshere.

I just found this fun map of social media which points out both the opportunities and the challenges of social media. The creators call it the conversation. Makes sense because social media is about creating relationships in which conversations are possible.

Holy cow! Look how many choices you have. It can be overwhelming! So much so that many people just throw up their hands and say "no way."

The Conversation Prism by Brian Solis and Jesse Thomas

Personally, I believe it's generally a mistake to put your head in the sand and ignore the inevitable. Just yesterday I asked a new colleague if she had a profile on LinkedIn or FaceBook, and she replied:

I avoid such groups because I have entirely too much connection already (via email, etc.) I'm swamped by the people I really have to connect with....I can't quite deal with enlarging that. Perhaps an entirely misguided notion.

I thought this was ironic since I had met her via a Google group listserv (very old social media technology on the internet).

Why is it inevitable that social media will be a tool for change? It's the emergent nature of social media that makes it both difficult to control and a risk to ignore. Consider this.

This vast array of platforms above holds the promise of connecting you to resources that you would otherwise never find. In the past several months I have founded a new enterprise, Radical Inclusion,, discovered someone who can be both a partner for research and a potential client and heard from the President of the United States - all through social media.

There are more examples emerging all the time and not just for me. The new Nora Ephron, Meryl Streep movie, Julie and Julia that opened this past weekend is the story of a young woman who finds herself and a writing career through blogging about French cooking. For everyone who chooses to ignore the inevitable there are hundreds of millions who aren't. For organizations that choose against open collaboration there is a competitive risk.

On a more conventional note, I learned about a pharmaceutical firm posts its lab's most intractable scientific questions anonymously on the the internet. They find solutions to about 30% of these questions, often from scientists outside their discipline. All those solutions have the potential of turning into lucrative innovations. Such results might give you pause to think about the attitude of not invented here.

How To Begin To Embrace The Inevitable Emergent

1. Take some time to think about what you hope to accomplish? Are you using social media for professional aims and just for fun.

2. Ask someone to coach you on how to use a one or two social media tools that interest you. Tip: Don't assume you know what a tool can be used for until you learn to use it. For me the most productive tools for professional purposes have been LinkedIn Groups and Twitter. I also use Facebook, but mostly for connecting with friends and fun, but more and more people use it for professional connections.

3. Use links and connections you come across to find new sources of information and expertise. Just like in the physical world, you need to pay listen and observe to learn.

4. Try using social media to request information, get help, find referrals to others. One of the features of social media is that it can bridge networks of people and connect you to new resources.

I've learned is that if I experiment outside my normal circles of connections and am active I start getting the benefit. If you just sign up and then never interact, not much is likely to happen, and that's the emergent nature of social media; new value emerges through use.

I'm not suggesting that social media is the best thing or the right thing for everyone. I am saying it is a powerful tool for changing yourself and working with others, if you choose to engage.