Agile For Value - Effective Agile and Scrum Training

Don’t call the business “Business”!

Tue, 01 Sep 2020 01:52:37 -0700

Summary

I see this a lot: Anyone outside IT is referred to by IT people as “the Business”, and Agile Transformation efforts focus at establishing “IT & Business collaboration”. I particularly dislike using the catch-all term “Business” and advise against using it. There is not a single type of “Business”, there is no single “IT”, and there definitely is not only one type of “Collaboration”. Each business unit, customer segment or product has its own needs in terms of IT enablement and collaboration. It has been a long time since Agility was a thing coming out of IT, spreading to “the Business”. In fact, we see more and more organizations nowadays targeting Business Agility (as opposed to simple delivery agility) and start their agile transformations from the non-IT parts of the organization.

There is not single “Business”. There is not single “IT”.

What has been achieved by the Agile movement in the recent years in various organizations is really significant.

Cross functional teams are slowly but steadily tearing down organizational silos and the flows of product development are becoming continuous, fast, and predictable.

Many times, though, during my agile coaching involvements I hear discussions about the benefits of “IT & Business Collaboration” or “Putting the Business in the Driver Seat”, usually from the IT part of the organization.

The thing is, there is no such thing as “the Business”. Calling everyone “Business” prevents the IT addressing their individual and specific needs. Let me explain.

Not two “Businesses” are the same. B2C business is not the same as B2B business. E-channel business is not the same as physical-channel business. Efficiency-focused business is not the same as...Read More

Agile: The end of innocence

Tue, 16 Jan 2018 04:33:52 -0800

6point6's study published on April 2017, based on a survey on 300 CIOs (average company size: 1,300 people) shows that the perception of Agile is changing. CIOs are often disillusioned, finding (usually the hard way) that many(12%-21%) agile projects fail completely, that Agile is not easy to scale, and that distributed agile teams are often underperforming.

This is good news. Agile never was, and never will be a silver bullet. Struggles with Agile adoption and a decent share of failures, show us that Agile will work only when carefully customized for the specific organization, by the specific organization. This should shift our focus from advocating Agile to making it work – without expecting/demanding that the organization changes its culture overnight to become ‘Agile’. Established Agile scaling frameworks such as SAFe can help with that.

The report

For the massive effect it has had on the software industry, there are surprisingly few industry reports analyzing the extend of Agile adoption*, compared to Waterfall, the older standard. Moreover, we have little data on the perceived success of the adoption efforts. Is Agile considered successful by the companies adopting it, after all?

Most reference reports (such as the ‘State of Agile’ or the ‘State of Scrum’) base their data on surveys conducted on people already interested in or practicing Agile, a fact which obviously limits the sample and creates a strong positive bias towards Agile.

This report published recently by 6point6 (a UK consultancy),...Read More

Start your first Scrum project in 12+1 Steps

Mon, 16 Oct 2017 05:32:41 -0700

Step 0: Organize a Scrum Training session

If you are serious about using Scrum, do not skip this. Bring an expert in to educate both teams and stakeholders, so you can start with the right foot. Experimenting with Scrum requires a mental shift, which cannot be triggered without an external facilitator.

Step 1: Find a Product Owner

The first step is to get your (internal or external) customer on board. If you have already discussed with them and they have understood how Scrum works they should be able to pick a Product Owner. Picking a suitable Product Owner is critical for the success of your project. This person has to be able to work on both strategy and details level, on both business and technical levels, on both senior management and junior employee level.

Step 2: Create an initial Product Backlog

The next step is to have an initial description of the product or service you are about to start creating. High (epic) level, 10-20 user stories is fine at this point. This is normally something that the PO (Product Owner) is expected to do, usually with the help of major stakeholders (stakeholder = anyone who has an influence, or is influenced by the product or service that you’re developing) and the team.

Step 3: Form team – Developers and Scrum MasterAdd a heading here.

Find the rest of the team. Picking up developers, keep in mind that you need to cover all skills required to turn user stories into releasable functionality. If your organization has a specialized QA (testing) department, make sure to get a person from there as well.

Picking up a Scrum Master might be trickier. Usually, during the Scrum training session you can usually spot 1-2 persons that seem to be more interested in the Agile way of working, or are excited about the potential that the team will uncover using Scrum. These will probably be the first Scrum Masters of your organization.

Step 4: Create a...Read More

AGRS2017 - And the winner is...

Sun, 24 Sep 2017 12:51:35 -0700

That was a great conference!

...650+ participants

...more than 15 sponsors

...10 exciting talks

... and Uncle Bob

There is a 450€ gift for you!

105 of you took part in the lottery to win a free seat at our upcoming Scrum for Value seminar of Oct 20-21.

Before we announce the winner, let us tell you that by participating in our survey you are entitled to our exclusive AGRS offer

Just use the coupon found on the survey.

If you already have the coupon, register for the course here.

...and the winner is...

Mr. Triantafyllos Gavrilas

If you are Mr. Gavrilas, congrats!

You will be contacted by our team very, very soon

Agile for Value proudly supports the Agile Greece Summit 2017

Thu, 07 Sep 2017 07:12:52 -0700

Taking place on Friday Sep 22nd 2017 in Athens, the Agile Greece Summit 2017 will host an impressive speaker line-up, presenting their journeys and experiences. More than 550 participants will enjoy the inspiring talks, the fantastic atmosphere and community feeling of the event.

Agile Greece Summit is organized by the Greek Agile Community.

Agile For Value is sponsoring the event for the 2nd year in a row.

See you on the 22n of September at the Agile Greece Summit 2017 - don't forget to visit our stand in the lobby.

AGRS2016 Lottery. Who won?

Sun, 18 Sep 2016 13:28:56 -0700

During the Agile Greece Summit we promised to draw a free seat for one of the next AgileForValue Agile training courses. Lottery was based on the contact data of the attendees. Who won?

The drawing

The drawing was made on Sunday morning. Theresa ensured the fairness and transparency of the procedure, following strict rules and guidelines :)

And the winner is... YOU!

Bring a friend or colleague, and spread the agile way of working.

Start using Scrum to reduce your time-to-market and increase the quality of your product and the happiness of your development team, or
Become a Scrum Master and get ready for certification by Scrum.org

Note: Kanban courses are excluded from the offer -sorry guys, the instructors are flown in from London for the course.

But wait!... There is also a lottery winner for a completely free course, no strings attached.

And the lottery winner is...

Thomas Arvanitis, whose business card Theresa drew from the box, is the lucky winner.

We'll contact Thomas and make sure he enjoys his course with AgileForValue.com.

New! Kanban Courses from Agile For Value

Sun, 04 Sep 2016 13:19:02 -0700

Agile for Value proudly announces two new Kanban courses

KMP Foundation I
KMP Foundation II

The courses will be taught by leading experts Nader Talai and Lokesh Kataria.

The first KMP Foundation I class will take place on 10-11th November. You can find out more and register here.

Το Nexus Guide στα Ελληνικά

Wed, 31 Aug 2016 03:28:35 -0700

Το Nexus Guide στα Ελληνικά

Το Nexus είναι ένα μεθοδολογικό πλαίσιο για την ανάπτυξη και τη συντήρηση προϊόντων και λογισμικού σε μεγάλη κλίμακα.

Aποτελείται από τους ρόλους, τις δραστηριότητες, τα αντικείμενα και τις τεχνικές που συνδυάζουν τη δουλειά περίπου τριών έως εννέα Ομάδων Scrum που εργάζονται πάνω σε ένα κοινό Product Backlog.

Βασίζεται στο Scrum και αναπτύχθηκε από τον Ken Schwaber και το scrum.org.

Μάθετε περισσότερα για το Nexus Guide εδώ, και κατεβάστε το, στα Αγγλικά ή Ελληνικά, εδώ.

Δείτε και το workshop “Scaling Scrum with the Nexus Framework” που διοργανώνεται στα πλαίσια του Agile Greece Summit 2016.

The Nexus Guide has been translated to Greek

Nexus is a framework for developing and sustaining scaled product and software development initiatives.

It is a framework consisting of roles, events, artifacts, and techniques that bind and weave together the work of approximately three to nine Scrum Teams working on a single Product Backlog to build an Integrated Increment that meets a goal.

It uses Scrum as its building block, and has been developed by Ken Schwaber and scrum.org.

Find out more about the Nexus Guide here, and Read More

Agile for Value proudly supports the Agile Greece Summit 2016

Tue, 23 Aug 2016 15:34:58 -0700

Agile for Value is a Silver sponsor of the Agile Greece Summit 2016.
Taking place on Friday Sep-16th 2016 in Athens, the Agile Greece Summit 2016 will host an impressive speaker line-up, presenting their journeys and experiences. More than 250 participants will enjoy the inspiring talks, the fantastic atmosphere and community feeling of the event.
Agile Greece Summit is organized by the Greek Agile Community.
See you on the 16th of September at the Agile Greece Summit 2016 - don't forget to visit our stand in the lobby.
Read More

The Scrum Guide has a new version

Thu, 07 Jul 2016 02:45:46 -0700

A few days ago, the new (3rd) version of the Scrum Guide was released by Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber, the inventors of Scrum.
The only modification is the addition of a paragraph concerning the Scrum Values.
You can find a great article by Gunther Verheyen explaining the additions here.
It's also great fun to watch Ken and Jeff explain the additions.
You can download the latest version at scrumguides.org.
Read More