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Agile Scrum and the New Way of Work in 2023

The Origin of Agile

Twenty years ago, 17 people from around the world gathered at a ski resort in Utah and created what we know today as Agile Software Development Manifesto. The core value of this new alternative to the traditional project management process was to place people and values at the core and work together to achieve results. The Agile approach to software development focuses on completing the project with iterations and constantly focuses on improvement and collaboration. The founding group that called themselves the Agile Alliance went on to create four central values of the Agile Software Development Manifesto:

Agile development manifesto created by agile alliance.

Unlike the waterfall approach, Agile methodology divides work into actionable items, called sprints, enlist feedback and reprioritize work as per business needs and market changes.

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Agile – What’s a Manager to Do?

Agile - What’s a Manager to Do?

As a manager, when I first started learning about Agile development, I was confused by the fuzzy way that Agile teams and projects are managed (or manage themselves), and frustrated and disappointed by the negative attitude towards managers and management in general.

Attempts to reconcile project management and Agile haven't answered these concerns. The PMI-ACP does a good job of making sure that you understand Agile principles and methods (mostly Scrum and XP with some Kanban and Lean), but is surprisingly vague about what an Agile project manager is or does. Even a book like the Software Project Manager’s Bridge to Agility, intended to help bridge PMI's project management practices and Agile, fails to come up with a meaningful job for managers or project managers in an Agile world.

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Relevance of Project Management Skills in an Agile World

As organizations are moving toward Agile transformation, there is a revamp of several roles involved in software delivery. One role that is gaining popularity is that of a Product Owner. On the other hand, a traditional role that is losing its significance in this context is that of a Project Manager: a role that is not a part of the Scrum Team. While both Project Manager and Product Owner roles are accountable for the successful delivery of a product, there are differences between the roles and responsibilities of each. This article examines the project management skills that are essential for the success of Product Owners in a Scrum Team.

Scrum Team and Roles

The Scrum Guide describes the Scrum Team as a small team of people consisting of one Scrum Master, one Product Owner, and Developers. 

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Definition of Done Canvas

UPDATED 11/2020:

This article and the DoD Canvas have been updated to reflect the Scrum Guide 2020. In the DoD Canvas, this includes removing the speech marks from the word Done and enriching some of the wording in the Benchmark section.

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Kanban vs Scrum — Here’s What Your Team Needs To Know [2020]

man wearing a jetpack
Scrum is the most popular Agile framework today ( 56% of all Agile teams use Scrum ).  But is it the most effective one, particularly for your team?  Or is Kanban,  one of the trending agile frameworks today , a better fit for your team?


This “Kanban versus Scrum” article will tell you whether you should go with Kanban or Scrum.
But first….

What Is Scrum?

The Scrum Agile terminology and definition was first introduced by Ken Schwaber and  Jeff Sutherland in 1993 . Jeff referenced a  1986 Harvard business study  to come up with the idea.  Scrum stands for delivering high-quality software in a minimum amount of time. 


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What Are the Responsibilities of a SAFe Agilist?

Becoming a SAFe Agilist Practitioner and bringing the Agility to the organization, is not new for today as with the implementation of Agile Methodology, comes the fact that it has provided huge contributive significance in the Software & IT industry for growth, improved results and development.

As the SAFe Agilist plays a vital role in getting significant improvement throughout the Agile Journey, the way of management and implementation of the responsibility acts as a backbone for getting improved results.

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Test-Case Reviews in Scrum-Teams

Introduction

Software reviews are advantageous when the bias of the developer is challenged constructively. A software engineer developing anything from an architectural diagram, a unit of code, or a test-case, is biased. An effective review of any software artifact is usually performed by a person different from the person that developed the artifact. Since test-cases are designed to exercise the code, the code reviewer is a good candidate for a test-case reviewer too. After reviewing the code, she/he has an insight into the code which makes her/him an appropriate white-box tester.

In this article, I will share a recent experience where a newly formed Scrum team has evolved and learned through its successes and mistakes. The role of test-case reviews has been twofold. First, they brought technical expertise to the developers (gained insight on how to test) and the testers (learned programming skills). Second and most important, test-case reviews acted as a laboratory for strengthening the bonds between the team members. The scrum team transformed into a cohesive team of members that shared and cared. All of them have gone well beyond their comfort zone for the benefit of the team.

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Scrum Masters: Be Impediment-Removing Ninjas

The first thing that comes to my mind when I think about a ninja is the movie “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” – the 1990 version, not the 2014 reboot. Modern culture views a ninja as a sort of superhero. According to Wikipedia, a ninja (or shinobi) was a covert agent or mercenary in feudal Japan. Folklore depicts the ninja as having legendary and often supernatural abilities. Sound like any Scrum Master you know?

You may also like: What Makes a Scrum Master Successful? Insights From 30 of the Best

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Why Agile Fails: The PA-SA-WAKA-DA Theory

It is funny to notice that, more often than not, we only hear the good stories in each segment of our lives. That applies equally to Hollywood, where we only get to see the shining stars, but ignore the struggle that goes behind it, or any successful Agile project, where we see and relish the success, forgetting the relentless effort by a dedicated team. Does success cover the entire story? Of course not! There is a very dark side as well — which is often not too exciting to hear or encouraging to know — but very insightful if you wish to learn what not to do to avoid failure.

It is repeatedly presented that only 42% of Agile projects succeed in truly being Agile. The other 58% struggle (50%) or fail (8%)! So, what are they doing differently that keeps them from success with Agile? This is interesting to know — as doing or being Agile, may sound different, but in reality, they are very closely-related, only differed by the span of its usage.

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Five Reasons Why Scrum Fails in Software Development

Generally, the majority of Scrum software development projects are completed successfully. However, there are situations where Scrum does not deliver the expected results. This article discusses why Scrum fails in software development and the possible reasons for it. This article is targeted toward those who have a good understanding and some experience on the Scrum framework.

1. Lack of Understanding of The Scrum Framework Among Team Members

It is very important to have a good understanding of the Agile Scrum principles, strategies, and approaches. It is equally important that all team members have a common understanding of the Scrum framework, as well as the Scrum roles in the team. The team should know the distinct roles and responsibilities that the Product Owner, Scrum Master, and developers should play.