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I am in a big project which assembles 45 teams and all of them shall adopt Scrum (for various reasons). My observation is that all those teams which have a sust
by waschl 6y ago
I am in a big project which assembles 45 teams and all of them shall adopt Scrum (for various reasons). My observation is that all those teams which have a sustainable pace with regards to architecture, technology, quality, output, social behavior, etc have done so while adopting and embracing Scrum in a clean way since the beginning of their existence as a team. All teams severely struggling with their content of work, output and collaboration have also severe issues with regards to Scrum-adoption, and show anti-patterns similar to the Stackoverflow thread creator‘s. However I would say the root causes (which we discussed in maaaany meetings) are certainly neither caused by Scrum nor increased by it, but individual mindset, dysfunctional team dynamics, pressure, weird contracts, etc. and would be there under any other or no process framework.
I am no Scrum fanboy (I think), but this experience and also from former projects make me quite sure to not blame Scrum in the first place when I see struggling teams, but trying to understand the underlying problems and solve those.
- waschl 6y agoOne more thing: In answer to Scrum advocates claiming its about doing it right I would disagree and replace it with understanding what is really (really REALLY) the purpose and idea behind it. Don’t worship the cult and don’t fight it because it’s the perfect target of rants, but see the motivation behind it and acknowledge that there may be reasons why it makes sense how it is to some degree. This doesn’t only apply to Scrum but to any other interaction of humans.
- dboat 6y agoCould you explain what you mean by the real purpose and idea behind scrum?
- mongol 6y agoIn short I would say, applying ideas from the agile manifesto while providing cadence and some predictability. But that is a personal opinion.
- waschl 6y agoLet me try: I think it’s about reflection and continuous improvement and providing a framework to enforce those. Scrum-haters in our group are also notorious for an attitude of negativity and resignation in many matters, while Scrum-friends want to improve all the time and find ways to do so, beyond what is obvious.
- watwut 6y agoI think that Scrum leads to resignation for many people, because it takes away control out of individual and insists on everything being collective. So your personal options to improve or make decision becomes severely limited. Some people like it, because it allowed them to push themselves on the rest of the team. But people who dont thrive in such constant dominance conflict end up resentful and helpless.
- riffraff 6y agowhat control do you feel is taken away from individuals? I mean, you discuss tickets with the rest of your team, but that doesn't seem such a big loss of freedom.
- watwut 6y agoAll the control and all the autonomy I would say. There is nothing I would be responsible for where I can make own decision and have them right or wrong. In the teams where I liked to work, I felt control over order in which I do tasks and general shape of something I was responsible for. So I could make my own decisions, decisions that would be really mine. So when there was mess or something was late, it was my fault. I was not due to other people forcing me do things their way and I did not had to fight about every single detail, just because college happen to be anxious or control freak.
- mindcrime 6y agoSo what process are you advocating for over scrum, that would restore this control and autonomy to you?
- teddyh 6y agoRobert C. Martin – The Land that Scrum Forgot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG4LH6P8Syk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG4LH6P8Syk
- watwut 6y agoMy experience with scrum was that it makes issues around bad team dynamic, pressures and weird contracts worst. Basically, it makes it impossible for individual to react to them and defend against worst consequences. When it is good, scrum powerlesness does not matter, maybe. But when it goes bad, it does.
- waschl 6y agoI would agree that Scrum makes bad dynamics more transparent, yes. I would not agree that it generally makes bad dynamics significantly worse. This may happen and it’s certainly often claimed, but that is not what I can confirm from my experience.
- watwut 6y agoI did not said more transparent. I said harder to deal with and harder to solve. Those are fundamentally different things.