Originally posted on: http://geekswithblogs.net/gevjen/archive/2016/07/20/186294.aspx
Book Notes from 'Scrum: Doing Twice the work in Half the Time' By Jeff Sutherland
Pop the Happy Bubble
One thing that happiness is
not - is complacency.
Christa Foley - at Zappos :
I love coming to work, rather than encouraging you to become complacent,
our positive and uplifting culture makes you work harder.
They want people who use joy
as a driver.
That the only route to
employee happiness is a sense of fulfillment resulting from an important
job done well.
Helping them achieve great
things.
What can companies do to
create an atmosphere in which people thrive?
Managers can encourage
autonomy by letting people make their own decisions about their job.
Managers should have zero
tolerance for incivility and never allow an employee to poison corporate
culture through abuse or disrespect.
They don’t realize that
continuous improvement means just that, it never ever stops.
Team might be doing all the
things Scrum teaches - prioritization, single-tasking,
cross-functionality, review rituals - but they have stopped improving.
So how do you pop the bubble
before your players embarrass themselves on live tv.
The first step is to be
aware of the problem.
Which is why we measure
velocity every sprint.
The Wise Fool
Is the person who asks
uncomfortable questions or raises uncomfortable truths.
There are other ways of
popping the happy bubble
Bring in new blood and
management intervention.
With Scrum everything is
transparent - how much the team is producing, the quality of their work,
how happy the customer is.
Happy Today - Happy Tomorrow
Harvard professor - asks
people what they're doing today makes them happy and whether it will make them happy
tomorrow.
Four types of people
Hedonist : is someone who is
doing what makes them happy right now - tomorrow? Let tomorrow worry
about tomorrow - I'll just enjoy today.
Nihilists : it sucks today
and they think it will suck forever.
Rat-race addicts : guys who
were brought in to run the place.
The person who is working at
stuff that is fun today but has an eye toward a better future and who is
convinced it will be more fun forever.
Happiness Metric is his
company - it helps the team help its members become better people.
The fundamental Attribution
Error - when your surrounded by assholes, don’t look for bad people, look
for bad systems.
Top of the pyramid - 'Achieve
Ones full potential'
Scrum focuses on this -
helping people achieve personal growth and fulfillment.
It is not just enough to be
happy - harnessed to produce results.
All the elements of scrum
come together to help a person do just that.
The Takaway
Its the journey not the
destination : True happiness is found in the process not the result.
Happy is the new black
Quantify Happiness
Get Better Every day - and
measure it : at the end of each sprint, the team should pick one small
improvement that will make them happier.
Secrecy is poison : everyone
should know everything
Make Work Visible : have a
board that shows all the work that needs to be done.
Happiness is Autonomy,
Mastery, Purpose : everyone wants to control their own destiny, get better
at what they do, and serve a purpose.
Pop the Happy Bubble :
Complacency is the enemy of success.
Priorities
Scott Maxwell - founder of
OpenView Venture Partners.
Scrum isnt just about teams
going faster - its about boosting impact
Pets.com / Zappos
Both had vision - what
pets.com didn’t have was a sense of priorities.
How to make faster/better
work for you - how to achieve greatness.
Scott Maxwell - true power in
scrum lies in its ready, prioritized, and sized backlog of what to do.
The Backlog: What to Do When
First thing you do when
starting scrum - start a backlog
You need a clear idea of what
you want at the end of work.
Once you have a vision - you
need to consider what it will take to make that happen
Backlog should have
everything you could possibly include in the product
What are the items that have
the biggest business impact. What is most important to the customer.
Make the most money and the
easiest to do.
You want to get to the things
that deliver the most value with the lowest risk.
80% of the value is in 20% of
the features.
Customers really only want
20% of them.
The trick to scrum is
figuring out how to build the 20% first.
The difficult part isnt
figuring out what you want to accomplish - its figuring out what you can
accomplish.
Figure out where the most
value can be delivered for the least effort. - do that first.
Need someone who can figure
out both what the vision is and where the value lies. (Product Owner)
The Product Owner
Only three roles in scrum
You're doing the work
You're a scrum master
You're the product owner.
Decides what should be
worked on
Owns the backlog and more
importantly - what order is should be in
Leadership has nothing to do
with authority
It has to do with knowledge
and being a servant leader.
Scrum Master is the how
Product Owner is the what
PO - needs to be able to
deliver feedback to the team.
Half their time with the
customers
Half the time creating the
backlog
The customer is anyone who
will get value from what you're doing.
The scrum master and the team
are responsible for how fast they're going and how much faster they can
get
Essential Characteristics of
a Product Owner
Needs to be knowledgeable
about the domain
Know the market well enough
to know what will make a difference
Empowered to make decisions
Given leeway to make
decisions about what the product vision will be.
Be available to the team
Accountable for value.
In business context - what
matters is revenue.
I measure a product owner by
how much revenue they deliver per point of effort.