21-12-2024 Hey Reader, "The are too many meetings is Scrum". Or so many people say. But in reality, whether you use Scrum or not, you probably have too many meetings. There are a few things that you can implement to immediately free up your calendar and focus on what's really important. To help you with that, I wrote up a blog post. In summary, I bring you 5 rules to follow to avoid useless meetings: A meeting can only happen if it has a clear purpose. No preparation means no meeting. The...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
21-12-2024 Hey Reader, Today I wanted to talk to you about a topic that has been on my radar for the last several months. And the more I look into it, the more I want to discuss it. Luckily, I got a chance to deep-dive into this topic with Mark Metze during the recording of a podcast episode for Agile Within. The topic is "how much technical knowledge do you need to be a successful Scrum Master (or Agile Leader in general)". I'm sharing a part of that podcast with my answers to Mark's...
8 months ago • 4 min read
21-12-2024 Hey Reader, I sat down with Ryan from Australia for an episode of the Agile Audit podcast last year. Yes, this is how long it takes me to get a video out these days... Anyway, we had an awesome discussion, and as I was rewatching it to get the episode ready, I got some new insights and inspirations. One of the topics we delved into was the role of a Scrum Master as a connector or a glue of sorts. Since our jobs bring results that can only really be seen long-term and are difficult...
9 months ago • 2 min read
21-12-2024 Hey Reader, This is a special message for all of my Spanish-speaking subscribers! Estamos muy emocionados de anunciarles que nuestro Scrum Master Daily Planner está disponible en ESPAÑOL! 🎉 En el encontrarás espacio para planificar y realizar un seguimiento de tu trabajo, orientación sobre qué hacer cuando trabajes con un equipo Scrum, y algunas listas de verificación que puedes seguir. Es la herramienta perfecta que contiene todo lo que necesitas para tener éxito como Scrum...
9 months ago • 1 min read
21-12-2024 Hey Reader, I've been working with a new team this year. It's always exciting to meet new people, figure out how they work, and understand their product offerings. It's also rewarding to see small changes implemented that bring more value to everyone involved. And really, this is what it is all about for me in the end. This time one important thing we did was to improve the Sprint Reviews and I wanted to talk about that. Reason number one: it's a common challenge for many teams....
10 months ago • 4 min read
October 2023 What's new? Hey Reader, I'm not always talking about what's been going on in my blog or my YouTube channel, so I thought I'd start sending you recaps of the posts and discussions from the past month. We're a bit late with the month of September since it's our first issue. But here you go... Just a FYI - you can update your preferences to receive only the emails you'd like. This one you're reading right now is part of the monthly updates featuring new posts and videos. New...
about 1 year ago • 4 min read
Hey Reader, The other week I was talking with a new Product Owner on the team. Well, not necessarly new, since it's been a while she joined the team. But we discussed her experience onboarding to the team. And as often happens, it was a difficult journey. I remember joining many new companies and teams, and I would usually have to figure everything out on my own. Somehow, the onboarding process was not very well defined anywhere I've been. When you get started everything is new, and it would...
about 1 year ago • 4 min read
Hey Reader, So I've been working on some new materials. Just a few pages explaining Scrum in easy terms. The idea behind it was to create a wiki that teams can use for onboarding and just as a quick overview of Scrum. Not everyone may be able to attend a class, but at least they have the most important information about how the teams work in the organization. (these materials probably will make their way to existing products like the Intro to Scrum and the SM Startup Guide) Obviously, I...
about 1 year ago • 6 min read
Hey Reader, One of the topics that I wanted to make a video about is "Can I apply Agile to anything I do?". And I've been thinking about what approach to take with this video. I don't promise I'll actually make it, but I wanted to share some thoughts I had about how Agile can be applied to anything. The main question we have here - is it applicable in any situation ever? When I talk to my students, I usually say that Agile is not a universal solution. It has been created with complex work in...
over 1 year ago • 4 min read