We are scrum masters. We are botanists.

Botany = the scientific study of plants.

I have a bush in my garden that I planted over 3 years ago. I bought it because I’ve seen them in other people’s gardens in glorious full bloom and they have strikingly beautiful flowers (which also happen to be my favourite colour). 

However, whilst it remained alive, it stayed exactly as planted, stuck in a time warp. It didn’t grow. It certainly never flowered. 

So this year I decided to pay it some attention, give it some TLC and after only a couple of months this happened…

So, last week on one of those hot, dry July afternoons, as I stood over the flowering bush with pride, hose pipe in hand and it desperately soaking up the cold water beneath me – this metaphor stuck me – as a scrum master helping individuals, teams and organisations on their journey …

• We look for fertile soil, because we’ve learnt that hard, resistant ground will be difficult to penetrate without significant effort. Our preference is to seek out malleable earth for a quicker impact. If we can’t find it, we work to create it by starting to gently dig and turn the stubborn soil
• We create spaces to drop seeds or plant a small sapling
• We provide regular refreshment and sometimes food
• We remove broken twigs and dead heads in order to stimulate new growth
• Sometimes we relocate plants to a more suitable environment where they can thrive, after all some take delight being in shade, others in the full sun. 
• We derive great pleasure from watching buds start to appear as we know this is a sign of the flowers to come
• We pay attention to other gardens for ideas and inspiration of what might be beneficial to our plants, or compliment what we’ve got in place
• We read books and articles to deepen our knowledge. Maybe even join a forum or group of like minded individuals to share ideas and talk about our problems
• We sometimes use light weight frames to encourage growth in a certain direction
• We spend time tending and cultivating the soil to keep it fertile and soft
• We watch out for bugs that might damage or infect our plants, we might even put up a net or a protective layer to shield the plant from potentially damaging external factors
• We are grateful for any outside help from Mother Nature, but appreciate we need to put in the work too
• We know that some plants will grow quicker than expected, others more gradually and some might not take at all
• We are patient
• We take a scientific, empirical approach to our ongoing study of agility
• We are botanists
• We are scrum masters

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I've often played with different metaphors for agility but never found one that works for me, until now. What metaphors do you use?

This post originally appeared on my blog dysfunctionalrequirements.com aimed at helping you survive and succeed in todays corporate jungle. Take a peek!