There are few people in the agile world that have had a bigger impact on our work than Lyssa. In this episode, we’ll talk about her upcoming session at the Agile Virtual Summit entitled Running Around Like Crazy? Use Agile on Yourself! (it’s harder than it seems but really worth it). She’ll even share some brand new news about her book Coaching Agile Teams, which is approaching its 10 year anniversary. Mentioned in this episode:  Get your Agile Virtual Summit tickets for FREE at https://AgileVirtualSummit.com Find out more about Lyssa Adkins …and of course Lyssa’s book: Coachin ..read more

Every once in a while I stumble upon a facilitation tool that works so well I’m a little shocked. Recently I was helping several teams work together to create a backlog for their large project and I had a sneaking suspicion that the teams they had formed were not truly cross-functional. The trouble was, as an agile coach who had just parachuted in to do some training and coaching around their complex project, I didn’t absolutely *know* that they didn’t have cross-functional teams. Thankfully there were some stickers in the room, and my Red Dots of DEATH activity was born. The activit ..read more

Whether you build video games for a living, or just like playing them for fun today’s episode will help you improve your Scrum implementation. I’m always looking for practical tips on how teams can improve their work together and my friend Clinton Keith (who wrote Agile Game Development with Scrum) just came out with a new book called Gear Up! Advanced Game Development Practices.  This book is a treasure trove of 88 bite sized tips, tools, and tricks your team can use TODAY. While the thrust of the book is video game development, an Agilist working in any space will find useful ..read more

Ed works for a government integrator and is finding it very difficult to deliver thin vertical slices of functionality every sprint. The difficulty is that, by law, his company cannot have access to the full system they’re working on. I’ve enlisted the help of my friend Patrick McConnell, who’s an Agilist with tons of government experience to help me tackle this thorny issue. While this question mainly applies to government integrators, the discussion will likely spur some ideas on how you can help remove silos in your organization and improve your definition of done. A non-scru ..read more

In my courses and coaching, I’m often asked how a Scrum team should be formed. Since the Scrum Guide gives no guidance on this, organizations usually decide to have managers form these new teams. Sadly, this approach doesn’t work well in the long run for a myriad of reasons. Thankfully, there’s a better way. On today’s show, I’ll have a conversation with Adam Hsu, Gabe Abella, Jason Newberg, and Natalie Veilleux of JP Morgan Chase, whom I met while giving an opening keynote at their internal developer’s conference last year.  These four fantastic agile c ..read more

The podcast is BACK! Today’s question comes from Stig, who is wondering how to help his team give honest and constructive feedback to their Scrum Master during retrospectives. We’ll talk about an approach you can use to help your team to break through the power imbalance that might be keeping them from sharing useful information with your Scrum Master. Mentioned in this episode:  Join my free 5-day Daily Scrum Challenge on June 12th. Start by checking out how awesome your current Daily Scrum is at http://DailyScrumQuiz.com Like the podcast? I’d love it if you’d take ..read more

I’ve gotten the same question from several different people over the last several weeks”What happened to the podcast?” and “Is it ever coming back?”. << Spoiler Alert >> Yes it’s coming back. Soon Listen to this quick update to find out what the heck happened to it. Like the podcast? I’d love it if you’d take 60 seconds to rate it in iTunes. Do you have a question for the show? Submit it at http://GetAgileAnswers.com ..read more

Today’s question come from an anonymous source. “Stifled Scrummer” says that their boss is on their team, which makes self-organization difficult. Stifled is wondering what tips I have for helping them deal with this organizational impediment. Mentioned in this episode:  Free chapter of Agile Antipatterns  Like the podcast? I’d love it if you’d take 60 seconds to rate it in iTunes. Do you have a question for the show ..read more

We’ll take a look at why teams often use user stories to capture agile requirements and how the format often gets misused. If a user story isn’t a detailed requirement, then what is it? Like the podcast? I’d love it if you’d take 60 seconds to rate it in iTunes. Do you have a question for the show?  Submit it at http://GetAgileAnswers.com ..read more

We’ll take a look at why teams often use user stories to capture agile requirements and how the format often gets misused. If a user story isn’t a detailed requirement, then what is it? Mentioned in this episode:  User Story Mapping by Jeff Patton Like the podcast? I’d love it if you’d take 60 seconds to rate it in iTunes. Do you have a question for the show? Submit it at http://GetAgileAnswers.com ..read more