What Is an Advanced Scrum Master?

Posted on May 10, 2013 by Tobias Fors

Being a scrum master is more than just reminding a team to perform certain ceremonies, it's about growing the best possible workplace.

To begin with, let's clarify this whole thing about the "scrum master". It's the name of a role. It's a relatively new and pretty ridiculous name by intent, because a change was needed in how we lead development work.

Every now and then we shake things up by inventing new names. Just remember that behind the term "scrum master" is the timeless idea of the servant leader. Someone who is there not to exert power over others, but to give power to others. To empower them.

I don't know how long the term scrum master will hang around. I do know that I want what it represents to stick for the long run. For now, I'll allow myself the use of the possibly even sillier expression "advanced scrum master", but bear with me, at least for the length of this post.

After having served as the scrum master for a team some years ago, a newly hired person was assigned to pick up the task after I moved on. We talked often during the transition period, but I really only remember one of those conversations.

We were sitting comfortably and discussing the way we were working, when my new colleague asked me something that surprised me. He said:

"Tobias – I don't understand how this scrum master thing can possibly be a full time job. I can see how I need to invite people to the meetings, and work a bit with the product owner – but that will hardly take upp all my time. What am I supposed to be doing?"

I was a bit stunned, because that thought had never struck me. From my perspective, the list of things you can choose to work on as a scrum master is endless. After all – how many teams have you met that were as productive, creative, and happy as they could possibly be? There's always one more thing to address (including pacing the rate of change).

What I'm saying is this: the scrum master role is as challenging and rewarding as you make it. You can definitely improve your ability to create positive results by gaining deeper skill and insight. Here are some things that I can think of that I would expect from a more advanced scrum master. I'm sure you could add many more to my list:

  • Mindfully asking powerful questions to assist learning
  • Helping the team find the time for learning
  • Supporting the team in increasing its skill
  • Working with the team to grow clear and simple processes and agreements that truly help
  • Looking far outside the scrum and agile canon to find new things to learn and try in fields such as agile engineering practices, psychology, organizations, testing, change, teams, learning, culture, consulting, systems, problem solving, and design (to name just a few)
  • Spending a whole lot of time working with the people in the organization surrounding the team, since that's often the most powerful force shaping the team's behavior and results
  • Gradually helping more parts of the organization to understand and make use of the scrum mindset of cross-functional and transparent work
  • Helping managers understand how to serve better
  • Constantly working on developing him- or herself, realizing that the most powerful tool you have at your disposal is yourself

Last but not least, I would expect to see the advanced scrum master working on helping others learn how to do all of the above, so that the power to lead can spread. After all, we can't let the organization's future depend solely on somebody called a "scrum master", can we now?

How would you know that you had just seen an "advanced scrum master" in action? What would that person be doing, and how would it make things different?

Posted in Agile, English, Leadership, Scrum | Leave a comment

Broken Software

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Tobias Fors

I sometimes hear the agile manifesto being criticized for focusing on “just working software”. It’s said that working software is not enough, that we need to reach further. I agree that we need change, but not in the wording.

If your definition of working software is “if it compiles, ship it”, then the manifesto’s words won’t seem like they change much. For you, the manifesto sounds like business as usual.

Twelve years after first reading it, the agile manifesto still doesn’t sound like business as usual to my ears.

Here’s the thing. I really like software. Really. I always have, ever since I used my first computers as a small kid. I guess computers and software filled a spot for me.

I don’t like all software. I like software that does its job and is a pleasure to use. I’m on a continuous quest to find more software like that, but many of the apps I try suck.

It’s not working software if it doesn’t work for me. Then it’s broken software.

As a user, I’m not content with software that works in the sense that “all functions are there, but that’s about it”. If it does the job, but is a pain to use, I don’t think of it as working software. I may even come to hate it, because now I know that the software could have worked, but its creators didn’t care enough to make it lovely to use.

When developers lack a passion for the user, the result can never be working software. Instead, we get broken software. Broken software is not working software.

For me, the problem is not the expression “working software”. That makes perfect sense. The problem is that some software makers still have a broken definition of what working means.

Posted in Agile, English, Product Development, Usability | 1 Comment

Check-in in a Circle

Posted on August 22, 2012 by Tobias Fors

When I kick off a class or workshop, I want participants to engage as soon as possible after entering the room. I do work through some practical bits first, but after that I quickly hand things over to participants.

For a long time, I’ve been using an opening exercise I learned from Ken Schwaber. In it, I ask participants to sort themselves along a line in the room, according to different criteria.

First, I ask the group to sort itself according to how effective and efficient their current project is (in Swedish, a single word has the connotation of both “effective” and “efficient”). Once sorted, people take turns sharing their situation. Doing this, participants come to see what a wide range of different experiences are present in the room.

After this, participants get to sort themselves again, this time according to the level of energy they perceive in that same project. Really low energy in one end, and high in the other. We talk about it again.

Finally, we do the same thing, this time based on how much experience and knowledge of Scrum the participants feel they have.

Earlier this summer, I participated in a terrific one-week workshop with organizational development pioneers Charles and Edie Seashore. The name of the workshop was “Intentional Use of Self”.

In one part of the workshop, we talked about how check-ins are an important part of helping a workshop group come together. We also did check-ins every morning. One format we used was based on a fishbowl. Charles and Edie would ask one small part of the group to step into the middle, and tell each other about some thing.

Today, I decided to try this format out. I asked people in the class to step into the fishbowl based on how long they had been using Scrum.

First, I asked those with no experience to step in and talk to each other about their current situation and their expectations for the course. After that, those with a few months of experience got to share. Then those with up to a couple of years experience.

Finally, those of us with longer experience (I joined the fishbowl myself here) stepped into the inner circle a told each other about our experiences and expectations.

Here’s what I like about Charles’ and Edie’s check-in:

  • Participants face each other, not just me
  • In a circle, it’s easier to speak up
  • When you do speak, you speak with a smaller group
  • Everyone else can still hear you
  • The fishbowl circle puts more emphasis on the likenesses we share, whereas the line creates an exposed situation for those on the ends of a line.
  • We still get to see the different experiences available in the group

It’s a simple but powerful check-in format. I’m fascinated by the fact that I had to travel half-way around the world to pick it up. I’m glad I did.

Do you facilitate workshops or teach classes? Do you use check-ins? What kinds of check-ins have you tried so far?

Posted in English, Exercises, Retrospectives, Scrum | 1 Comment

The Freedom to Solve Problems

Posted on August 7, 2012 by Tobias Fors

Isn’t it really sad that employees in some companies aren’t allowed to solve the customers’ problems? In Sweden, the major telecom operators are notorious in this regard, in my personal experience.

What is it like in your company? Is everyone allowed to and capable of really helping your customers?

“In addition to encouraging creativity, bossless environments also increase efficiency, according to Stephen Courtright, a management professor at Texas A&M’s Mays Business School. He cites the example of Southwest Airlines, which allows baggage clerks the freedom to decide how to solve a customer’s complaint on the spot, without having to say, “‘Wait while I consult my boss.’”

Going Boss-free: Utopia or ‘Lord of the Flies’? – Knowledge@Wharton.

Posted in Leadership, Quality | Leave a comment

There’s Always One [Drop|Comment|Question] Left

Posted on June 1, 2012 by Tobias Fors

My childhood friend’s mother was a “dagmamma”, literally, a “daytime mother”. In other words, she took care of a bunch of other people’s kids in her own home.

She was a very kind and intelligent person. One of the things she said has stuck with me to this very day.

“There’s always one drop left.”

She would say this when we had had finished our “fika” (for kids in Sweden, this would be strawberry juice and cinnamon buns) and we would start playing with our empty glasses. Or rather: we thought the glasses were empty, but she knew better. That’s why she reminded us.

I think of this every now and then when facilitating a meeting or a workshop. Whenever you ask for comments and questions, there comes a point where the contributions start to taper off. Silence commences. This is where you as the facilitator or convenener should stay quiet, too. Because, to paraphrase the wise dagmamma:

“There’s always one comment left”

Keep quiet. Count to twenty in German *) to focus your attention on something other than the heavy silence, and lo and behold. One more reflection always pours out.

 

*) Silently, that is. If you experiment with counting loudly in this situation, let me know what happens. I haven’t tried it yet.

Posted in English, Leadership, Retrospectives | Leave a comment

Fast Company on Why We Fail to Innovate

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Tobias Fors

FastCompany puts the finger on an important reason why many companies have a hard time coming up with more innovative behaviors:

“here’s the truth: most companies can’t innovate because everyone is paid to maintain the status quo. This is the single biggest reason companies fail to do anything new or exciting”

via Stop Blabbing About Innovation And Start Actually Doing It | Fast Company.

Posted in Systems Thinking | Leave a comment

Interview with Ricardo Semler

Posted on April 20, 2012 by Tobias Fors

Here’s an inspiring video interview with Ricardo Semler from Semco, about creating a democratic corporation.

And a lecture with Semler:

Also, a conversation between Henry Mintzberg and Semler:

Posted in Systems Thinking | Leave a comment

Late Again, Thinking About the Cost of Delays

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Tobias Fors

It’s Wednesday morning, and I’m on the train heading to Stockholm. The train is late, and it’s not the first time.

One reason delays annoy me so much is that they break my expectations. I’ve made my plans to fit with the train company’s timetable, and now they are not upholding their part of the commitment.

Then again, when it comes to riding the train from my hometown Uppsala to Sweden’s capital – Stockholm – delays are such an integral part of the experience that I’m no longer surprised when they happen. Curiously, they still annoy me. Maybe it’s because the company running the trains couldn’t seem to care less about the problems the delays are causing me. Somehow, they still manage to act like every single delay is a big surprise to them. I take comfort in the fact that I get some extra time to read and write, as long as I’ve found a place to sit on the train – but that’s another story.

Anyway, while a train delay may not seem a huge thing to fret about, consider its less obvious effects. When I don’t make it on time to my networking meeting, I miss out on information and networking that would be valuable to me.

Intuitively, we know that being late costs us, but we easily focus on only one narrow part of that cost: the increased cost of working on something for a longer time. We forget that we also push the rewards into the future, and that might be costing us even more.

In general, I find that a concrete cost today is easier to grasp than a probable loss in the future. Maybe it’s because we find it hard to think about loosing something we never really had in the first place. I guess this is one of the reasons we make short-sighted decisions.

If you want to learn more about understanding your cost of delay, Donald Reinertsen’s books are a good investment: Developing Products in Half the Time, Managing the Design Factory and The Principles of Product Development Flow.

Posted in Agile, English, Lean, Systems Thinking | Leave a comment

Johanna Rothman to Stockholm, May 30, 2012

Posted on March 23, 2012 by Tobias Fors

Author, consultant and teacher Johanna Rothman is coming to Stockholm on May 30, this year. She will be leading a one-day workshop about the agile project portfolio. The course will be in English, and I highly recommend you check it out if you need some inspiration on how to manage in a situation where you have multiple projects going on.

Here is the course page (in Swedish, but remember, the course itself is in English): http://www.citerus.se/curriculum/724094-agile-project-portfolio-management

If you haven’t heard Johanna talk before, there’s an interview with her on InfoQ. Watching it is time well spent.

Posted in Agile, English, Events, Video | Leave a comment

Vision and Execution: Apple’s Plan to Kill The Mouse

Posted on March 1, 2012 by Tobias Fors

I’ll admit it, I’m a bit of a fanboy. Maybe not so much an Apple fanboy as a software fanboy. My fascination with software goes back to the very first time I had a computer demonstrated to me as a kid, and today, Apple is probably the only company whose products give me that feeling of joy. It’s also an interesting company to follow if you’re interested in product development in general. So let’s have some fun and speculate a little bit about what might be waiting around the next corner.

A few years ago, Apple acquired a company called FingerWorks for its user interface technology. I thought the Fingerworks stuff looked really cool, and I’ve wondered why Apple hasn’t been moving forward more agressively with the acquired solutions. Now, I’m not an industry analyst, but that doesn’t mean I can still have a little theory about the approach Apple is using to introduce into the mainstream a new way of interacting with desktop computers.

Apple has an uncanny ability to both dream big and execute. I think Steve Jobs saw the potential of the Fingerworks approach immediately. I think Apple has been methodically at work moving towards what we will soon see, at least since 2005.

Right now, Apple is gradually introducing some needed changes in their operating system. They are preparing their software platform for the introduction of new hardware that lets us interact as directly with desktops and laptops as we now do with their tablets.

At the core of the changes to the user interaction in OS X is the building up of a language of multi-touch gestures. This and a slew of other changes seem to herald the coming of  mouse-less interaction: scroll bars are disappearing and the scrolling direction has been reversed (we now scroll by “pushing on the content”), full screen apps can be flicked between with your fingers, and so on.

By letting us practice with the new features for quite some time, Apple is making sure we’ll be ready to use the new hardware once it hits the stores. By then, we’ve also helped Apple debug the software.

I think the current “magic trackpad” is a simple device compared to what’s waiting around the corner. The mouse is old, and Apple is working to get rid of it once and for all. We’ve seen the revolution in interaction design that’s come about because of tablets and their support for gestures. Of course Apple wants us to be able to use what we’ve learned to do on the iPad on the laptop and desktop as well. After all, Apple’s success is based not just on building cool products, but on creating and evolving an entire system of products, channels and behaviors.

There’s been some speculation about touch screen iMacs. I don’t think that’s where Apple is going next. Touch screen desktops and laptops remain a bad idea for ergonomical reasons, unless a way can be found to work around those problems. A new kind of input device that rests on the desk and is big enough to fit two hands seems like a more healthy alternative. Of course, I wouldn’t cry if it turned out that Apple was developing a huge multi-touch screen like Jeff Han’s. I just think it’s less likely as a next step.

But what about typing? If we have both our hands on a big trackpad, where would we put the keyboard? Integrated into the trackpad would be really cool, if we could still get keys that depress enough to get a good writing experience. Writing on just a piece of glass is quite awful compared to a real keyboard. A likely first steps on laptops, though, might be a more advanced touchpad placed below the keyboard. Or, Apple might turn things around, and move forward with plans to build a keyboard with multitouch support. In fact, it turns out a combined keyboard and touchpad was one of the products that Fingerworks used to make, even if they lacked the design prowess of Apple. I’m guessing the visionaries from Fingerworks, John Elias and Wayne Westerman, are hard at work as we speak, overseeing the final steps of the resurrection of their concepts from almost a decade ago.

Well, enough speculation. Now we’ll just have to wait and see. Maybe I’d better run out and buy a spare mouse or two, while they’re still available.

Speaking of vision and execution:

  • Is there a unifying vision at play in your company?
  • If there is a vision, how is your current project taking you towards it?
  • What’s in it for you?
Posted in English, Product Development | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments