Journey is more beautiful than destination. So is Agile Adoption Journey!

“…Congratulations! Management is ready to adopt Agile. Soon, we shall be an Agile Team. We'll adopt Agile way of work, stop traditional practices & become a high performing team …”

These talks from a team is quite exciting as they are about to start Agile Adoption Journey. But, is it really that simple as it sounds? Is this change quite linear? Is there any challenge to achieve this change?

I believe, CHANGE always comes from CHALLENGE; Only need is to attack the core of CHALLENGE i.e. LLE. The same is true with Agile Journey also.

I, as a SM, helped my team in their Agile journey in these 3 steps below:
L – Losing
L – Love
E – Educate

Step -1: Let Team realize what they are ‘Losing’ now

Until team understands what they are losing now & why Agile needed, the adoption will not be taken seriously and the efforts may not come from bottom of the heart. So firstly i'll discuss the current problems & possible reason of it. In past, I did this by having sessions. Mostly teams had problems like:

1. Missing continuous & timely deliveries – mainly due to either under-estimating the work or scope change during the development.
2. Pressure to make changes in the product – Stakeholder wants the changes in the product at the later stage of development which is difficult.
3. Unresolved dependencies & no coordination with stakeholders – The questions raised to stakeholders, remain unanswered for long time & team is not able to work which results in delay.
4. Fear in releasing the product – Product will work or not in customer’s environment? Release is done at very later stage.
5. Stakeholders never satisfied – Interesting point. They said it does not matter how big efforts we make, we get criticism & dissatisfaction only.
6. No time to learn new technologies – Deadline are so narrow that they never get time to explore new technologies & way of doing things.
7. Lack of Transparency – From top to bottom, everyone had this feeling with each other. No one knows how anyone else is adding value to the product.
8. Being treated like Machines & Psychological unsafe environment – We don’t have “our” time. Questioning on why this much time is required to do particular task. No leave can be availed due to deadlines. Due to unnecessary questioning & conflict, people stopped even putting their points. They just follow commands.

By discussing these problems, I earned a personal touch from team like there is someone who understand their issues. Also gave them a ray of hope that these issues can be solved. The objective of first step was to win the trust of team that someone is there to protect them which I did.
Here we should also understand that SM is an enabler. It is the team who will make efforts to bring the change & it can be done only when team has reason, hope & willingness to do so.
  

Step -2: Make people ‘Love’ Agile

The second step is to let Team know how Agile can solve these problems. But if we just reiterate  Manifesto & Principles, people might lose interest & find it bookish. We need to present agile in a way that they may correlate it with their problems. Personally, I wanted them to Love Agile & so I took below initiatives:

A) Use Interesting Examples:

• Bollywood - Took example how bollywood embraced change & showed what is happening in society & what society wants:
• 1910s – first movie “Raja Harishchandra”
• 1950-60s – Landlord related movies - MotherIndia, Do Ankhe Barah Hath
• 1960-80s – Unemployment, Poverty - Angry Young Man movies
• 1990-2000 – LPG -We started thinking liberally & experienced generation gap (love stories & parent objections kind of movies).
• 2000s - Corporate culture, dis-satisfaction in the society -  Page-3, Life in a Metro
• 2010s - WebSeries with much bolder content because it is the need of time. 

• Demonetisation – One night, Demonetisation (Nov’16) was announced. Country saw currency issues for few months. If I was developing my ecommerce website with Indian culture of cash-on-delivery option, I might not be able to have business at that time. In Agile, I can add other payment options in my website whenever I want. Showed how Paytm blossom during this time.

• http://www.scrumyourwedding.com/ – wedding-planners using scrum.

• Mythology – Took Incarnations example. How the complexity in world increase and incarnations become more & more superior to tackle the situation.

• Comparisons – Orkut vs FB, BB vs Samsung, Kodak vs Nikon – Why One see growth & other      closed?  

B) Concept clarity by Games & Story Telling:

• Flip Coin Game – light weight game to demonstrate iterative delivery concept.

• Calligraphy Game – game to focus on completing the things.

• Ham-n-eggs - Story to showcase difference between involvement & commitment and relation to Agile Teams

• Water Journey from Underground to Glass (Different Analogies)
• Groundwater = Product Backlog,
• Tank on roof = Sprint Scope
• Filtered Water in RO = Increment
• If we take water in glass = Deployed to customer.
• I highlighted, if ground water is not available, we might not have drinking water. Same way, if product backlog is not maintained, it will directly impact the delivery.        

• ​​​​​​​And many more...

C) Touching the Nerves:

Above #A & #B helped team to understand soul of Agile & by now they started talking Agile. Now, it was the time to showcase how Agile can solve their problems which we discussed in “Losing” section. We had many QnA sessions on how Agile Way can help us, like:

• Maintain Transparency by Having a Kanban board and see the journey of product 
• Release Schedule practice will help in Continuous & timely deliveries. Eventually, we achieved this.
• Highlight how can we facilitate changes in the product. Showcase the importance of scrum events (Planning & Review), refinement meetings.
• How Agile Practices focus on Coordination & collaboration with stakeholder. It is easier to resolve the dependencies.
• Explained that Stakeholders are not satisfied because they don’t get what they need even if the product follows the signed contract. The reason is, expectations change with the time and so we need changes in our product.
• I personally felt that, Most of the members complaint regarding estimates. They do not get required time to do their task or they are asked to cut-down the estimates. I made them understand Estimates, Velocity, story point in a very interesting story-telling way.
• Finally, when we discussed Scrum Values, it was like last nail in coffin. It motivated team towards Agile & Team looked confident, hopeful and dedicated to Agile after these discussion.

Step -3: ‘Educate’ people to Execute

Now, last step is educating & helping team to implement practices. It is Bi-Dimensional approach which focuses on – Doing Agile (adopt practices) & Being Agile (change mindset by cultivating values & principles).
I believe we can’t avoid any of it. ‘Doing’ is important to maintain the Deliveries & RoI and ‘Being’ is important to transform the culture & mindset of team. Our Agile Adoption efforts included both. I trained, coach & teach my teams on these by organizing dedicated interactive sessions.

• Doing Agile Workshops - Explain Framework, Events, Role & Responsibilities, best practices in detail.  
• Being Agile Workshops - Explain Scrum Values, Principles, Empiricism, Transparency, Psychological Safety, Transforming the culture and Earning Trust.
  
• Setup Agile CoE & CoP - Setup dedicated environment & spaces where people can Talk Agile, Practice Agile, Discuss their problems and Learn.    
• Agile Maturity Assessment -  Prepare Agile Maturity Assessment which can be taken on regular basis & highlight the improvement areas in the team. 

  
Below are few of my Articles which focus on certain Agile Practices. I explained the core of these to Team in workshops:  

·       TUFE is not TOUGH to understand

·       Krishna: The Ultimate ScrumMaster chosen by Pandavas

·       Estimations​​​​​​​

The idea is to make Team able to understand & execute practices and at the same time develop psychologies & values in their mind.

 

Conclusion

In last 5 years, I worked with many teams & I realized these 3 steps are the core to help any team in its agile journey. It is not the journey from Traditional to Agile, rather it is the journey of Earning Trust & Cultivating Team Spirit which can be achieved by practising Values, understanding Principles & executing Best Practices. Once Netflix CEO said -

"Do not tolerate brilliant jerk. The cost of teamwork is too high." Believe me, I found it so helpful in building an Agile Team.

As SM I helped many teams in their Agile journey but I believe:

“A SM is successful only when her/his team is in condition when SM is not required.”

And so my journey (to attack LLE in CHALLENGE = CHANGE) goes on ...

Krishna: The Ultimate ScrumMaster chosen by Pandavas (The Team)

Krishna: The Ultimate ScrumMaster chosen by Pandavas (The Team)

As per Vedas, somewhere around 5000 years back, Mahabharat (Kurukshetra war) battle had been fought. There were so many sequential events which led to the circumstances where battle became inevitable. There were 2 sides Kauravas & Pandavas. Both the armies (teams) participated in the event. We all know this.

Have you ever analysed the role of “Krishna” in that battle (event)? What he did? What he thought and to what was he accountable? Let’s see!

1-      Krishna did not fight the battle himself.

2-      He aligned Pandavas to the goal (which is actually not winning the battle rather re-installing the ‘Dharma’ on the Earth).

3-      He facilitated all the discussion among Pandavas to find the solution of problem. He took Pandavas on the same page and let them take the collective decision what to do next.

4-      Only when Pandavas were not able to take any decision, he ‘suggested’ the action-items.

5-      When Arjuna put down his weapons, he asked Arjuna to fight not-to-win but for the goal which “re-installation of Dharma”. He re-installed the Commitment, Courage & Focus among the Pandavas (the team).

Krishna was accountable only for “re-installing the Dharma” and keeping team motivated towards this goal for which he made Pandavas:-

a)       Committed towards the goal

b)      Focused towards the goal

c)       Courageous enough to proceed towards the goal (Here, pandavas were courageous enough to fight but when Arjuna saw relatives other end, Krishna made him & other courageous enough to take step which are required to achieve goal which is re-installing Dharma.)  

d)      Open enough so that they can say/suggest what they think

e)      Respecting each other’s quality among them. (E.g. – Yudhishthir every time spoke truth which created tough situations to handle. But other Pandavas supported their eldest brother.)

This battle had been fought for 18 days and after each day’s fight, Krishna facilitated discussion for Pandavas to inspect the incident and adapt & prepare for next day. He instilled the quality of ‘Empiricism’ (learn from today’s experience and plan for tomorrow accordingly) among the members.

I could see this as the qualities of ScrumMaster. The 2 things:-

1-      Reveal - not resolve, and

2-      Actively doing nothing

are something on which facilitation is based. Krishna was truly a facilitator for Pandavas during the complete event by: -

-          keeping them focused towards the goal (again, not winning but to re-install the Dharma)

-          keeping away from external distraction

-          helping them to identify the blockers (like Bhishma, Karna) towards goal and removing them

Along with this, He made team (Pandavas) able to earn trust on each other. Everyone trusted each other. This was one of the main ingredient of their success.

If not completely, isn’t it mostly in line of ScrumMaster’s responsibility?

Krishna correctly proclaimed:

“It is not my duty to do your work (fighting the battle). I’ll show the correct path to you and set the environment in which you can fulfil your duty.”

Most importantly, he left Hastinapur when the re-installation of Dharma was achieved (the goal).

“And ScrumMaster is succeed only when team is in condition when ScrumMaster is not required.”

Learn From Google Map to Grow as SCRUM Team!

Learn From Google Map to Grow as SCRUM Team

Today, it is very common & easy to use google map navigation when you are going somewhere. Just enter your source & destination and start navigation. Right after this moment, google map will do below activities for you: -

1. Calculate Estimated Time of Arrival as per current traffic scenario;
2. Highlights the best possible path to reach destination;
3. It also mentions the other available paths in grey colour;
4. During the journey, if traffic scenarios changes on the way, google map will highlight the other best alternate route;
5. If you change the destination in middle of journey, it accepts the change and highlights the best possible route to reach changed destination;
6. Once you reach destination, it notifies the same to you;

Along with these standard steps, google-map also does: -

a)       Learn about newly created route on the way. (Eg. – On your way, one new underpass or alternative route was constructed by Govt. When you & other travellers follow that route, google-map learns that there is another route here and after significant learning, it will start suggesting this route in navigation);

b)      It keeps check on time-taken during the journey. If time-taken is more or lesser than the predicted one, it learns whether this route has some issue (like some construction is going on) or the route has been improved. Based on this learning, it adapts the new changes and provide predictions accordingly;

c)       It learns whether a path contains toll booth. Accordingly, it highlights the same thing so that you might know about other extra expenses before journey;

Apart from these, it also does number of things. However, let’s consider only these activities performed by google map.

Let’s give a thought on this, doesn’t it look like standard activities of a project (or journey of a product). During the product development, we do: -

1. Set the product vision (the destination)
2. Create plan as per available resources (people, tools, budget etc)
3. Based on the information in #1 & #2, define the roadmap and estimated time of delivery
4. Since, during the development nothing (vision, people, tools etc) will be fixed or prone to change, the teams need to adapt these changes and come out with the best possible plan in the scenario
5. Once product has significant features, it will be released to customers
6. According to the further requirements, the future development will go on
7. During the development, team learns & enhance skills which results into better & faster product delivery
8. Team can foresee the other challenges, roadblocks, extra-cost during the product development and notifies this to business.

What we have seen, is the quality of Scrum: -

Inspection, Adaption and Transparency!

Google map is the prefect example which Inspect or Retrospect the surroundings and improve its knowledge and learns from the experience (Empiricism). It Adapt the changes coming in the surroundings whether new construction, any roadblock or extra-cost requirement or the destination itself has been changed from the original destination. Having the quality of Inspection & Adaption, it truly satisfies the need of being Transparent. It is transparent to user and providing the most correct information. These are the exact virtues of Scrum Teams who learns from experience, retrospect themselves & adapt the changes, embraces the change requests coming during the product development and ensure transparency among themselves & to organization.  

Scrum Teams, if you want to learn, grow & develop as an Agile/Scrum team, analyse the activities of google map doing for you & learn from it