Food for Agile Thought #389: Scrum’s Failure, Staying Scrappy for Innovation, Forecasting 2.0, ProductOps Handbook
Also: Give More Feedback, Jira Anti-Patterns, North Star Metrics Template, Fluid Scrum Teams

Food for Agile Thought #389: Scrum’s Failure, Staying Scrappy for Innovation, Forecasting 2.0, ProductOps Handbook

TL; DR: Scrum’s Failure — Food for Agile Thought?#389

Welcome to the 389th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 46,163 peers. This week, we delve into Scrum’s failure: Jason Godesky reminds us that few have ever worked in a true Scrum team, but many have in a Scrum cargo cult environment. Moreover, we delve into “bias and noise” and how they influence forecasting, and we learn how you can use Fluid Scrum Teams to manage multiple data products over various Sprints. Also, in shameless self-promotion, I want to point to the No Nonsense Agile Podcast that Murray Robinson, Shane Gibson, and I recorded recently. (Speaking of anti-patterns: There is also a new article on Jira and its perils if misused.)

Then, we analyze the fundamental misalignment between the ‘business’ — focusing on one customer at a time — and ‘product/engineering,’ focusing on the overall impact for the installed base. Additionally, we point to the importance of embracing a learning mindset as the driver of innovation while process, vetos, institutional memory, and the vilification of failure work against it, and we share a practical and actionable list of recommendations to create a ProductOps handbook.

Finally, we suggest five experiments to help foster a safe working environment, from equal speaking time during meetings to celebrating failure, plus a new tool to ease the often challenging task of communicating project issues: the Definition of Broken. More tools are from John Cutler, who points to the free template library of the complete North Star metrics framework. Lastly, Nicole Abi-Esber and Juliana Schroeder claim that people underestimate how much others want to receive feedback.

Did you miss the previous?Food for Agile Thought’s issue 388 ?

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Join your peers on May 4, 2023:?HoA EXTRA: How Elon Musk Would Run YOUR Business with Joe Justice .


?? The Tip of the Week: Scrum Anti-Patterns


?? Shane Gibson and Stefan Wolpers: Scrum Anti?Patterns

In shameless self-promotion, I want to point to the No Nonsense Agile Podcast that Murray Robinson, Shane Gibson, and I recorded recently.

Source:??? Scrum Anti Patterns

Authors:?Shane Gibson ?and?Stefan Wolpers


?? The Lemon of the?Week

No lemon this week.


? Agile &?Scrum


Jason Godesky (via Medium): Why Scrum?Fails

Jason Godesky reminds us that few have ever worked in a true Scrum team, but many have in a Scrum cargo cult environment.

Source:?Medium: Why Scrum Fails

Author:?Jason Godesky


Philip Rogers (via Medium): A Fresh Perspective on Forecasting in Software Development

Philip Rogers delves into bias and noise, and how they influence forecasts.

Source:?Medium: A Fresh Perspective on Forecasting in Software Development

Author:?Philip Rogers


Tobias Maasland and Anna Wei?haar (via inovex GmbH): Using Fluid Scrum Teams in Data Products Development

Tobias Maasland and Anna Wei?haar share how they use Fluid Scrum Teams to manage multiple data products over various Sprints.

Source:?inovex GmbH: Using Fluid Scrum Teams in Data Products Development

Authors:?Tobias Maasland ?and?Anna Wei?haar


?? ?? ?? ???? Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills Class — May 16,?2023

The Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills (PSFS) training by Berlin Product People is a guaranteedone-day?official Scrum.org class for advanced Scrum practitioners and agile coaches , including the industry-acknowledged PSFS certification. This PSFS training class is in English.

Enjoy the benefits of an live-virtual immersive class with like-minded agile peers from 09:00–17:30 o’clock CET.

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Learn more: ?? ?? ?????Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills Class — May 16, 2023 .

???From time to time, we can offer last-minute seats for training classes at cost to individuals who do not have access to a corporate training budget. If you like to be notified about these opportunities,?please register here .


?? Product


Rich Mironov: The Chocolate Cake?Problem

Rich Mironov analyzes the fundamental misalignment between the ‘business’ — focusing on one customer at a time — and ‘product/engineering,’ focusing on the overall impact for the installed base.

Source:?The Chocolate Cake Problem

Author:?Rich Mironov


Deb Liu: Staying?Scrappy

Deb Liu points to the importance of embracing a learning mindset as the driver of innovation, while process, vetos, institutional memory, and the vilification of failure work against it.

Source:?Staying Scrappy

Author:?Deb Liu


Antonia Landi and Lara Orrico: D.I.Y. Product Ops?Handbook

Antonia Landi and Lara Orrico share a practical and actionable list of recommendations.

Source:?D.I.Y. Product Ops Handbook

Authors:?Antonia Landi ?and?Lara Orrico


?? Jira Anti-Patterns

If you ask people to come up with popular attributes for “Agile” or “agility,” Scrum and Jira will likely be among the top ten featured. Moreover, in any discussion about the topic, someone will mention that using Scrum running on top of Jira does not make an organization agile. However, more importantly, this notion is often only a tiny step from identifying Jira as a potential impediment to outright vilifying it. So in March 2023, I embarked on a non-representative research exercise to learn how organizations misuse Jira from a team perspective as I wanted to understand Jira anti-patterns.

Read on and learn more about how a project management tool that is reasonably usable when you use it out of the box without any modifications turns into a bureaucratic nightmare, what the reasons for this might be, and what we can do about it.

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???Learn more:?Jira Anti-Patterns .


?? Concepts, Tools & Measuring


Joost Minnaar (via Corporate Rebels): Here are 5 Proven Practices to Boost Psychological Safety

Joost Minnaar suggests five experiments to help foster a safe working environment, from equal speaking time during meetings to celebrating failure.

Source:?Corporate Rebels: Here are 5 Proven Practices to Boost Psychological Safety

Author:?Joost Minnaar


Mike Griffiths: Definition of Broken (DoB): A Tool for Improving Communications and?Outcomes

Mike Griffiths suggests a tool to ease the often challenging task of communicating project issues.

Source:?Definition of Broken (DoB): A Tool for Improving Communications and Outcomes

Author:?Mike Griffiths


John Cutler: Amplitude North Star Template?Library

John Cutler points to the free template library of the complete North Star metrics framework.

Source:?Amplitude North Star Template Library

Author:?John Cutler


?? Encore


(via Behavioral Scientist): Give More Feedback — Others Want It More Than You?Think

Nicole Abi-Esber and Juliana Schroeder claim that people underestimate how much others want to receive their feedback.

Source:?Behavioral Scientist: Give More Feedback — Others Want It More Than You Think


Simone Cicero (via Boundaryless): The Trilemma of Organizational Unbundling

Simone Cicero and Emanuele Quintarelli explain what organizational unbundling is and why it is critical for the future of organizations.

Source:?Boundaryless: The Trilemma of Organizational Unbundling

Author:?Simone Cicero


?? Training Classes, Meetups & Events?2023

Upcoming classes and events:

???See all upcoming classes here

??? Last Week’s Food for Agile Thought?Edition

Read more:?Food for Agile Thought 388: Perils of Deterministic Thinking, ChatGPT for Product Work, Interruption & Context Switching, Pre-Mortems .

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Food for Agile Thought 389: Scrum’s Failure, Staying Scrappy for Innovation, Forecasting 2.0, ProductOps Handbook was first published on Age-of-Product.com.

???? Chris Stone ????

"The Continuous Improvement Coach" | Keynote Speaker | I help people deliver more value through Training, Coaching & Community. | 56k people learn with me daily. Book a 1:1 to make Continuous Improvement easy.

1 年

Have I ever been featured in an episode Stefan Wolpers? If not, I need to up my game.. Or drop it to feature as ?? of the week

Antonia Landi

Product Operations Coach & Consultant | Keynote Speaker | Community Builder

1 年

Thank you so much for the mention! ?? Super happy you enjoyed the Product Zine ??

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