Radar (retrospectives, distributed Scrum)
Scrum = random?
A real life example, during a work interview:
“Me: So, Scrum is an empirical method of managing projects.
xpto: So, it’s something random, right?”
Way wrong. There is a huge difference between: random and empirical.
Let’s start with the first one: the empirical method which is in the base of Scrum is not random - far from it. If you prefer, substitute the term “empirical” by “adaptative” - because that’s what’s done in continuous feedback cycles in Scrum: Inspect, Adapt, Do, Repeat, etc.
In Scrum, you have 3 cycles of feedback:
- every 24 hours, at the Scrum Daily Meeting
- every Sprint (2 to 4 weeks, in average), at the Sprint Review
- every Release (several Sprints)
So, it’s far from random. In fact, is much more reliable than the Waterfall methodology. Waterfall is a predicitive model - i.e., you pretend you have a magic crystal ball, in which you predict everything which is going to happen during the project(!). That sounds a lot more like random wishful thinking, IMHO.
To sum it up, in Scrum, you have an empirical/adaptive methodology instead of a predicitive one.
Q&A - Which books I need to read in order to know how Scrum works?
I’ve got another interesting question from Artur Martins:
“Which books I need to read in order to know how Scrum works?”
Nowadays, there are tons of books regarding Scrum. When I started to get some information regarding Scrum, I did a very common mistake: try to get my hands in all books I could manage to. Is that useful? Not really.
IMHO, the best thing to do is read the book that started it all: “Agile Software Development with SCRUM”, by Ken Schwaber and Mike Beedle. Some approaches stated in the book are a little dated nowadays, but it’s still the best place to start.
Then, if possible, get a CSM (Certified Scrum Master) course: I can recommend you the services of Boris Gloger - not cheap, mind you, but for sure he delivers!
Next step? Three next steps, in fact: Practice, Practice, Practice.
Only after that you’ll reap benefits from reading other books about Scrum, which deal with specific parts of applying Scrum.
“Scrum 101″ - Retrospective :)
So, how went the workshop at Barcamp Portugal ‘08? Great, thanks to a fantastic audience, which hanged tough for almost 4 hours(!) - it seems that my inital estimate was really way off :).
My big Thanks! to all the participants - it was a pleasure to be with you! Now I just have to recover my voice. 
Please feel free to download the slides from the workshop here: scrum101
Talk “Scrum 101″ @ Barcamp Coimbra 2008
Next step after Hamburg? Well, really close to home - I’ll be giving a talk/presentation in Coimbra, Portugal, on the 3rd Edition of Barcamp. Curious about what is a Barcamp? Take a look here. The event is organized by those tireless guys at WeBreakStuff, whose work and “can-do” attitude I admire.
About the talk: it’s an overview of Scrum (what else?), with an estimated duration of one hour and a half - and it’s prepared for a maximum of 40 participants. And, of course, it’s free, as everything in Barcamps is.
Interested? Drop me a line, if that’s the case.
About the Hamburg Projecktmanagement Forum meeting
Hello again!
The PM Hamburg meeting was a success: the location (Café del Sol, Hamburg) was great - roomy, which adapted very well to our crowd of enthusiastic Project Managers.
My sincere “Thank You” to Bernd Oestereich, Christian Weiss and Stephan Koß - for organizing such a great event. I’ll do my best to be on the next edition, in Vienna!
Offline meeting of Project Management forum from Xing
I’ll be present on the offline meeting of PM forum from Xing.
Where: Hamburg, Germany - Café del Sol, Jenfelder Allee 80 a, 22045 Hamburg (link)
When: 15 Aug 2008, 07:00 pm — 11:45 pm (Berlin Time)
Q&A - One team for several projects? What to do?
I’ve got a good question from Cairo Noleto, regarding Scrum, which I’ll answer here:
“In Scrum, a Team is always mapped in only one project. Is it possible to manage several projects with a single Team? That’s something that happens quite a lot in the real world, specially in small organizations. How does Scrum deals with it?” - Cairo Noleto, Add4 Comunicação, Brazil
One thing which is crucial in a correct Scrum adoption is to avoid (and that’s a part of the Scrum Master job) that the team is interrupted during the duration of a Sprint. If the Team members have their effort splitted over several projects, then their concentration will be interrupted and cut off several times per day!
For a Scrum approach, the right thing to do is change from a team such as:
Team A: 8 members, working in projects P1, P2 and P3
…to, for instance….
Team A: 3 members, working in project P1
Team B: 3 members, working in project P2
Team C: 3 members, working in project P3
More questions? Feel free to ask, to ricardomestre at fastmail dot fm.
