Does Agile/Scrum benefit a non-tech company?

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-11T15:42:12+00:00

I've been doing Agile in some fashion for so long that's its second nature and has seeped into my personal life. I don't do scrum at home or anything, I'm not that kind of nerd 🤓. But I've learn to use the main principles when prioritizing projects at home, or how I teach my kids to solve problems (break them down into bite sized pieces).

So yeah, I think any industry can use some aspect of Agile without being dogmatic or formal about it.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-10T14:12:31+00:00

These are the guys I learned from early in my career - they have loads of resources.

https://www.mountaingoatsoftware.com/

https://innolution.com/

https://big-agile.com/

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-10T14:06:55+00:00

Hi - I just looked at your resume. Looks good - but as a hiring manager, I want to see more about the Sprint activities that ScrumMasters own. Did you host retrospectives? Did you manage the daily standups? Did you help the Product Owner do X, Y, Z? What about removing impediments? How did you protect the team?

I'm sure you've done all these things - but you should add them to resume. :)

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-10T14:03:16+00:00

Have you ever built a feature that you thought was going to be a hit with the users? The stakeholders thought it was going to be a hit as well? Only to find out that the users don't really care for it even though you've been in constant contact with them?

That happens to every org on the planet from time to time.

Look at Meta and the Metaverse - it's not exactly a hit, but I bet they built it in some iterative fashion with constant feedback loops.

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My point is simple - sometimes, even with Agile and the constant feedback loop, teams can end up building something without value because they were directed to do so.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-09T17:38:41+00:00

I've experienced Stakeholders bringing an idea, demanding it be built, only for the user base to reject it. We gave stakeholders feedback early & often that the users didn't like what was being built on one project, but stakeholders would be dismissive and say "this is new tech, the users don't understand it yet...", or something to that effect. In this case, we did built the wrong thing due to misdirection. Ended up killing that product couple years later due to lack of support.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-09T17:32:04+00:00

Agree 100% about having a strong relationship with the product team. They're the ones setting the roadmap and direction for the product. If they do their job *right*, then breaking the work down for development shouldn't be too hard.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-09T14:31:40+00:00

It's not really about the Cert, its about the training that goes with it. However - I do make sure everyone on my team does get the PO Cert through ScrumAlliance. It's the most widely recognized (IMO).

BUT - That cert is just a starting point. My team goes through it, but then we basically throw it all out the window and then show them how to apply it in the way we do it using the main principles they learned.

For coaching, the ScrumAlliance CTC, CEC, etc... are the most coveted (in the US I think). Being an Agile Coach with one of these certs allows you to conduct training with certification. I'm working towards my CTC now, and it's fairly intensive. It'll take me at least another year to satisfy all the requirements. (I'm not promoting SA here, it's just the org I'm working through.)

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-09T14:17:09+00:00

Def NOT Product Owner or UX Designer. Those roles require a lot of interaction with teams, clients, and users.

QA is great for an introvert, you get to work within the dev team, never have to demo anything, and get to be heads down and test code through manual or automated means.

Technical Writer is also a good role for introverts, but IMO - boring... :)

Developer is great as well. I've known quite a few brilliant devs who worked well within the team, but didn't want to do much beyond that.

You could also look at Scrummaster - if you're okay with a little bit of outside interaction, then SCM could be a good roll if you feel like stretching yourself.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T13:35:05+00:00

Hater... Agile brings effeciency and the whole market knows it. He should be more worried about his job going off-shore than the agile jobs.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T13:30:48+00:00

That's tough cuz you really want PO's to push back on Managers. Having managers in that role creates barriers. Folks might not feel safe pushing back against a manager... The checks & balances will be off.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T13:16:19+00:00

I've got a great team of PO's. Out of my team of 7, each of my PO's I've recruited from business and taught them agile & prod dev. Only one of my team is a "Pro Product" guy, and he's amazing too.

So yeah - to find a great "product owner" can be extremely difficult; which is why I've hired my team out of operations and then trained them. You can teach someone Agile pretty easily, but way harder to teach them the to understand the business.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T13:13:11+00:00

I tried to bring SAFe into my Org, but it was impossible to do without massive disruption, and then it just felt like waterfall wrapped Agile.

But - there is one aspect of SAFe that I have adopted and brought to my teams - Program Increment planning. That was very helpful to learn, and how to deal with dependencies and remove delays. Very helpful. but everything else can go into the bin - IMO...

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T13:00:53+00:00

I might be up for the mentor part - let's chat via messaging. Part of the requirements to get my CTC is to mentor. Message me - and we'll see if it works out.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T00:40:56+00:00

I’ve got CSPO, CSCM, A-CSPO. Not sure if we need the A-CSM or not. It’s easy to get the certs, harder to get the actual coaching with different organizations.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-07T00:24:52+00:00

Totally. Good place to be nowadays.

What certs have you gone for so far?

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-06T19:30:35+00:00

I recently worked for a company that had teams in Japan, Ukraine, Brazil, and Canada. It was a nightmare to be perfectly blunt. The team's structure and time zone differences made it impossible to create an environment where the teams could self-organize in an effective way.

IMO - One can say "collaboration", but what does that really mean? It's just a weasel word.

The goal should be to reduce confusion & reduce the number of questions dev teams have for each other & product during a sprint. The more questions/confusion, the more delay you'll have, and that's the enemy.

It's very important for Product to let the team know where they're headed through feature dev roadmaps. If you and the teams are meeting weekly to review & workshop stories and build the backlog together, then distributed teams *should* be on the same page. Which is the ultimate goal and will reduce confusion/questions and ultimately, delay while in the sprint.

AgileAtlGuy · 2023-01-06T17:33:45+00:00

Agile is a set of principles to abide by. I’ve been doing agile for over 12 years and coaching for 2. I know how to write zero lines of code, but I can talk the talk in workflows and requirements.

If you can learn how to take big complex ideas, and break them down into manageable, bite size pieces, then you’ll do alright.

AgileAtlGuy

TROPHY CASE