Archive for category scrum

Sizing Up the Enterprise

As teams begin to estimate User Stories, they may explore different approaches such as T-Shirt sizes and Fibonacci sequences that stop at 8 or go much higher.

This freedom to choose a relative sizing style allows a team to adopt what fits well within their work environment.

While this flexible approach is quite useful at the grass roots team level, it does pose an interesting challenge in the Enterprise setting where Agile teams roll up into an Agile PMO.

How do those in charge of the overall strategic planning, make informed cross team decisions with Product Backlogs of such varying size criteria? How can they identify the features that involve the least complexity, effort and doubt coupled with a high return on investment?

scrumology.net agile pmo sizing

Before we go into my suggestions on how to address this, let’s explore a common fallacy that is being evangelized in the Enterprise today.

Mandating Story Points to Ideal Days Solves Cross Team Sizing Inconsistencies

“1 Story Point = 1 Ideal Day (6 hour work day)

Seems quick and easy doesn’t it? Mandate that all of your Agile teams conform to this and your problem is solved!

By doing this, however, you’ve inadvertently stripped the Story Point of its original intent while roadblocking your team from personalizing (and humanizing) the process. You risk dismissing the conversations about complexity, effort and doubt while focusing on the mythical 6hr work day.

Another unintended side effect of tying Story Points to actual hours is that it isn’t long before people make the dangerous link between Story Points and Budget.

So what is the silver bullet to this issue? As is the case with all things Agile, there is no silver bullet! Solving this issue depends on the nature of the Agile teams and their relation to the business within the Enterprise.

Are these teams separate business units within the organization, or do they all contribute to the same product?

If the teams each have their own role within the organization and are only loosely tied to the same business goals, my suggestion is to let them be for the most part. Sizing, and especially Velocity, does not translate well across teams or up the organization. It will be an apples to oranges comparison, and you should keep your eye on delivering business value. As long as your teams are collaborating by sharing their Release Plans, does it really matter if they use a T-Shirt size or a Fibonacci scale as a means to an end?

If the teams do happen to roll up into an overall product, then I suggest that sizing occur from a single Product Backlog before decomposing them into each Team Backlog. With this approach, you can have the overall strategic conversations early. I would much rather have representatives from each team weigh in on a single Product Backlog, than try to make sense of it from the bottom up. This also brings a consistency to the sizing while allowing each team to have flexibility at the Sprint Planning level.

To summarize, tread carefully when trying to apply consistency across Agile teams within the Enterprise. It may not make sense to mandate sizing techniques, especially if it causes more harm than good.

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Distributed Video Standup

Distributed Video StandupDistributed Teams need high bandwidth bidirectional communication to succeed, and the organization should provide these tools for collaboration. Luckily for us, Video Chat and Broadband are becoming more and more affordable so this is no longer an unrealistic goal.

With a decent Video Chat setup you can teleconference with teams around the world and pick up on body language that you’d otherwise miss using only the phone or chat.

So why is it that some Distributed Teams sit around a conference table while on Video Chat?

In short, they shouldn’t.

The Scrum Master needs to do everything in his power to ensure that the teams have an area to stand up for their Daily Scrum on Video Chat. Just because you are thousands of miles away, it does not mean that you can be lazy. If you lead your Daily Scrum sitting behind a desk using Video, it’ll be harder to keep team members from pontification. It’ll also become much more difficult to change the team’s behavior later on down the line.

So fellow Distributed Scrum Masters, please stand up when facilitating the Daily Scrum over Video. Encourage others to stand up if they are reluctant, and try your best to make those visual connections early. It’ll keep the team focused and you won’t start your day by dismissing one of the key aspects of your Scrum!

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What will you do tomorrow?

Distributed TeamsDistributed Scrum Teams can be a challenge on many different levels. In the past, I’ve attempted to explain this by deep diving into all of their idiosyncrasies while citing Jeff Sutherland’s excellent White Paper on the issue. I’d then draw communication diagrams and illustrate how bi-directional, high bandwidth communication is important instead of using uni-directional, low bandwidth channels. Next I would stress how discipline and not protocol is the key to success. (and so on…)

Today, many of the distributed scrum scenarios include U.S & Indian team members. I’ve decided to take a step back and explain this adventure in very simple terms that any Scrum Master can easily relate.

A typical, Collocated Scrum Team begins their Daily Stand Up with the following:

What did you do yesterday?
What will you do today?
What is blocking progress?

Simple enough right? You are all face to face, and within 15 minutes should be wrapped up and back to work. The Scrum Master may follow it up with a Daily Sit Down to learn more about the impediments, but all-in-all it should be collaborative and efficient.

In contrast, a Distributed Scrum Team that includes U.S & Indian team members is now at least 9 1/2 hours apart. Your early morning Stand Up will instead begin with the following questions:

What did you do today?
What will you do tomorrow?
What is blocking progress?

Can you feel the efficiency and collaboration begin seep out of the process with that subtle shift from today to tomorrow?

Forget the high tech video conferencing and online agile software for a moment, and try to wrap your head around the impacts of your Daily Stand Up agenda.

Do you mind keeping your team members from their families as you sit down and try to better understand the impediments?

Are you able to remove those impediments while half of your team is asleep?

I’d suggest that all aspiring Distributed Scrum Masters understand those questions before deep diving into white papers or focusing on the tools and technology.

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