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Agile Coach / Scrum Master chiming in - I switched from an engineering position to this more people-centric role, and completely agree with you. What I find fa
by MrGilbert 1y ago
Agile Coach / Scrum Master chiming in - I switched from an engineering position to this more people-centric role, and completely agree with you.
What I find fascinating about this is how predictable people become once you know the different personalities and their nuances. It helps tremendously to also be interested in getting to know people. And yes, you will encounter people that are disruptive. Usually, and I can only speak for my environment, the team itself is quite good at handling that. I just need to give them room and provide a setting where they can talk about the issues at hand on a constructive base.
That's why I love my job, and it may sound weird - but I'm the guy who can ask all the obvious questions that come to mind and others don't dare to ask. I love that I can build myself a toolbox to use in different (and difficult) situations. And I love to see my team succeed on the one hand, and learn from failure on the other.
- MrGilbert 1y agoCurious to know why my comment received a downvote / downvotes.
- kortilla 1y agoBeing an agile coach isn’t management
- whstl 1y agoOff topic, but: It's interesting how everyone thinks they're "managers" in "agile" teams. Scrum Masters, Product Owners. I've even had Designers and QAs trying to make decisions on behalf of the team.
- MrGilbert 1y agoThat sounds like a dysfunctional team to me, to be honest.
- whstl 1y agoIt is indeed.
- azangru 1y ago> It's interesting how everyone thinks they're "managers" in "agile" teams. In scrum in particular, teams are supposed to be "self-organizing and self-managing". Perhaps that's why :-)
- whstl 1y agoWell, yes, but "self-managing team" implies the team manages itself, not that one person picks up the slack. As the sibling poster said, this is a sign of a dysfunctional team.
- jamesfinlayson 1y ago> QAs trying to make decisions on behalf of the team Oof, hits close. Suggestion from a QA to implement some feature that is hugely difficult to implement? Business agrees so developers now need to make it happen.
- whstl 1y agoYep. The crazy one for me was QA not going through business and just marking new feature ideas as "bugs", and then informing business that "there are still lots of bugs to be fixed". Cross-functional teams can be very toxic when there is no decision maker, and someone suddenly decides they don't want to really collaborate.
- MrGilbert 1y agoLeadership and Management are two pair of shoes, I get that.
- azangru 1y agoThe author of the article writes: > You’re not the player, you’re the coach. Sometimes that means strategy and big-picture thinking. Sometimes it means shielding your team from dumb shit. Sometimes it means buying someone coffee and saying, “You’re not crazy. This is hard.” Guess what good agile coaches or scrum masters are expected to do :-)
- kortilla 1y agoVery little of that. Agile coaches don’t deal with under performers, promo packets, retention issues, etc. Agile coaches are also not able to shield the team from dumb shit. They don’t have the power to make priority calls on what the team is doing.
- MrGilbert 1y agoI'd argue it's not my job to "shield the team". It's my job to enable the team to question "dumb shit" and put them in a position where they can discuss these matters constructively with management (or whomever). Also - I "deal" with underperformers because my team needs to deal with them. It all comes back to "what benefits the team". I see that there are a lot of different varieties of agile coaches out there.
- poisonborz 1y agoI didn't, but guess: a lot of happy-babbly words without much substance or stark opinion. What's the summary? "I love this job, there are challenges, but I can master it well". Well..ok, thanks?
- dogleash 1y agoI didn't downvote, but you started out sharing credentials that aren't management and then recounted standard platitudes about collaboration and some personal experience with zero transferable utility. And you posted that in response to a comment saying how difficult topics necessary to succeeding as a manager don't happen often on the internet. I understand why people would evaluate your contribution as detracting from the conversation at hand and downvote.
- MrGilbert 1y agoUnderstandable. Thanks for pointing it out!
- jamesfinlayson 1y ago> how predictable people become once you know the different personalities and their nuances I will never cease to be amazed at managers who don't do this. I've seen enough managers who pick fights with the wrong subordinates then have to scramble to replace key staff when they leave.
- wavesbelow 1y ago> What I find fascinating about this is how predictable people become once you know the different personalities and their nuances. curious - is there a way to learn this other than from experience?
- MrGilbert 1y agoI haven't discovered it yet. Of course, there are certain studies and models like 16 personalities, DISC, etc. But you cannot pinpoint people to these categories easily. It's a spectrum, I guess.