When reading the Scrum Guide and discussing the Definition of “Done” the conversation always includes something about the Increment. After all, the Definition of “Done” facilitates transparency of the Increment. However, one thing that is often breezed over or not mentioned at all is how the accountability of roles comes into play when discussing the Definition of “Done” for a Scrum Team. This post is one in a multi-part series on the Definition of “Done”.
GE has been making managerial news lately as they begin their shift away from annual raises much like they shifted away from annual performance reviews. It got me thinking about my compensation preferences, and the many discussions I’ve had with coworkers over the years about the same. In every company I’ve worked for I’ve had a conversation with my employer about trading pay for extra time off. This rarely jibed with the vacation policy of my employer and required comprehensive questioning.
Having a retrospective is an important part of the inspect/adapt loop for any team. No matter the batch size of your work, from one item at a time to a month’s worth of work, it can be helpful for people to periodically and regularly look at how they’re operating and ask what they could change in their personal or work process to make things a bit better. That self introspection can be daunting for many, even with a team of people who work closely with and trust each other.
A coworker recently pointed me to an image from a SolutionsIQ blog post The Third Wave of Agile which I’ve included below. The article calls out three areas in Agile thinking - Agile Teams, Agile at Scale, and Business Agility - with key events that either fostered the growth of opinions or reeled them in towards consensus. It’s a good read, one to add to your list after this post. <wink wink>
The year is 1984. You move to a new city and now some kids are beating you up because you’re getting friendly with the ex-girlfriend of one of them. You need to learn how to defend yourself. Okay, so you’re probably not The Karate Kid. Much has changed in 30 years. Your competition is gaining market share, and you’re struggling to keep up. You need to take action in the new year and adopting Agile techniques seems like a way to compete.
It’s always a joy to see individuals whose work involves lots of regulation come through Scrum training with questions around process, timing, documentation and so on. These questions highlight very well that Scrum is not the waterfall process they’re accustomed to. It makes perfect sense; the language for regulation was written when waterfall was the dominant process. The great thing is, Scrum and compliance already work together better than you may think.