My Certification experience of Agile SCRUM – Certified SCRUM Master (CSM)

I went through the CSM training arranged by my company – Euromonitor on Jan 15th 2013 as it was a mandatory requirement (from my employer) for my role & responsibility. It was conducted by Peeter Deemer from “SCRUM Alliance” in Bangalore. It was really very helpful and eye opener session for me on the SCRUM. Also, I appeared for the online exam and got the certification. My membership on the “Scrum Alliance” DB can be
accessed as: http://scrumalliance.org/profiles/233484-ashok-kumar-sahu

As it was a first exposure session, few/many things I understood might be not correct but thought of putting / sharing them down now and in future also so that I can keep an watch on my understanding or maturity level improvement. Before to this, I had done some good amount of online reading on this to get an idea and also had worked for a long time with a fantastic & great team (Compose product team from Thomson Reuters) where got exposure to partial SCRUM and Ad-Hoc execution both (Will write my long experience with this team sometime later). I’ll be doing the same as and when I’ll be improving more on this Agile – SCRUM. 🙂

My understanding on the first day of SCRUM training:

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–          Agile process (Scrum practice) does not say ‘No documentation’. In fact it encourages for more documentation but it should be right amount of documentation which is really needed and can be used by team or useful for the product.

–          Scrum team (especially development) is not responsible for finalizing the product release or release date but the Product Owner is.

–          ScrumMaster(SM) role is to be or act as:

• Process Owner (Monitors and improves the process as it suits to the company, team and product)
• Protector (Keeps the team away from the external factors so that the team can concentrate on their day-to-day work)
• Problem Solver (To improve productivity, SM should help in removing any blockades/problems/impediments faced by the team)

–          Testing can’t be left to the end of sprint(s) as it increases risk factor. In fact, it should start as soon as the team is done with the PBI development work.

–          ScrumMaster should help the team in figuring out the details of task team wants to do. S/He should encourage the team on how to figure out and when.

–          In the Sprint Retrospective, every team member needs to come out with at least one +ve and one –ve points on the respective sprint.

–          In the Sprint Retrospective, we need to discuss on ‘Why velocity is not increasing?’ if there are no blockades/problems/impediments. That would remind the team to put in their team work and the ethics.

–          If there is any dependency on a different product/team, then all (SM, PO, Team) needs to be present in the sprint grooming and planning calls and they need to commit to clear the dependency by providing required help or input. If the earlier happens, then it makes more sense to include the dependency/related PBIs in a sprint.

–          Scrum does not help/solve/prevent issues but helps in cropping up the problems or make them visible to all so that it can be addressed and things can be improved.

–          SM is the one who should say NO to Not Required/Limit/Capability like things as he is the protector for team.

–          Different Sprint Types are as: 1) Velocity based and 2) Capacity based

–          In a sprint end/closure, if a PBI is incomplete or needs rework or needs improvement/change then that PBI should be pushed/moved to Product Backlog and then re-estimate again for the pending work and include in upcoming sprint.

–          Burndown chart should not be seen by the management or anybody else apart from the real team. The management only should see this if the team is not doing well and some problem is going on.

–          Product Owner (PO) should report/update to management only on the “Release Backlog” (and the related PBIs/Stories targeted for) and the “Release burn down chart” and nothing else on the Scrum front.

–          SM should be courageous, diplomatic and should know how to escalate and protect the team.

–          An Overcommitted team only has two options: 1) Cut Quality 2) Work at an unsustainable pace. Both quickly ruin the team’s productivity.

–          Definition of Done is: Coded, Tested and No defects.

–          No meeting should be headed/driven by anybody in particular but if SM facilitates all the meetings it’s well and good. As he gets time to train the team, mentor/groom them in the learning scrum & implement it in a better/matured way.

–          Test automation also should get introduced along with Unit Test and Test Driven Development (TDD).

–          If the question arises taking a break in between the sprints then you are overcommitted so don’t do this – it’s the real problem.

–          Why we measure the PBIs in points?: Humans are good at estimating small things like your/opponent/my boss’s weight but if somebody asks your building’s weight or what’s all the buildings in your street weigh then your mind just goes blank. The answer could come up like not sure but might be above 1000 tons which shows how difficult/complex it is. That’s why we need to go for another kind of measure like points to get an idea of roughly. So here all street building(s) is the project/PBI and the tasks under is as individual’s weight.

–          While working with Cross-Functional teams, Effort Points of two different teams can’t be compared even for a single company or a single product/project. As they are two different person’s from different sources as like you can’t compare resources from two different Zones/places like UK and India.

–          While estimating the Product Backlog Items (PBIs) in the SCRUM Planning meeting, When different team member’s effort point votings are high and low and the same voting remains in similar situation after 3^rd try then go for a card in between low and high , or go for a majority or ask if the story is big (if so then breakdown it further).

–          Poker card effort estimation should be done by all DBA, Tester/QA, Developer, PO….etc. because over a period of time everybody needs to understand who has got how much work involved. This will get better after sometime. We need to start practicing this as we need to start somewhere.

That’s for now………..:)

 

Impressing Others

Is it a biological or psycho behavior of human being? How much of it is required in our life? Does it have any moral value? How much of importance this carries in one’s life? Especially, do I need to convince a foreigner who might be related officially or personally or as a senior or that said in any other way? Many queries like this disturb me sometime. This I have felt after coming across few good people like this since past and no doubt in the recent past. Hence, thought of dropping two lines of my conflict thought about it.

 

I have seen few persons trying their level best to impress somebody (again it could be a senior or friend or a girl friend or a foreigner or somebody like this…). I just do not understand why it is required to impress somebody and how much of it is required and up to what extent we need to go ahead just to get some benefits like some appreciation / compliments / promotion or some best recognition. If there is something which need to be noticed by somebody (whom we think to impress) then it needs to have that much of value and importance by itself. So that the opponents can recognize it and give you what you want. We need not to impress somebody intentionally. Intentionally impressing somebody sounds like asking/expecting your own respect from others forcefully. This is not the way to get a good return for some well doings. If we have really done something great or good then it needs to be recognized by others in its own course of time span. May be you could demand the return for your own good doing (which again is only good as per yourself) forcefully but it really does not have that much of importance or great feeling for yourself. Getting your own choice delicious food without asking has a different taste then getting it prepared by yourself or asking for it. So the moral of the story is I’ve seen few people showing off what they have done irrespective of anybody asking for it. They just want to show it intentionally and expect an appreciation for it which really does not make them happy in life. Always their hunger increases for the real appreciation which they do not allow to come to them. It’s like we teaching or ordering our younger to respect us.

 

There is another incident in our life. When a discussion happens or something is expected by our own family members from us, and assume we are against of it or may not like then the approach we do with our family members. In many of the cases we just either sought or show anger to the beloved one in some the other way that is we tell them that we are against for it in anger mood. But if we see it in places like our office colleagues or friend circle or this could be with our girl friend then we approach it in different way. Either politely or a friendlier way or in a sweeter way. But we do not do the same thing with our regular family members or who are always there for our life. So is this not a show off? Is this not like impressing somebody artificially? If yes, then why do we do this? Is this a psycho behavior of human being or the selfish nature which is blossoming? Or could we consider this to be a biological behavior of human being?

 

If there is something good we are doing than it need to be and will be recognized by some people if not by all people and again in a time of span. If this is not getting recognized then somewhere, something could be wrong. We might need to be patient for this to happen and do some course correction. Always and everywhere selling ourselves may not be the right approach. Doing a good job itself should be enough to satisfy own, it could be then in any way like my profession job or some social work or some stuff. This by itself is good moral and a good job which gives more satisfaction then getting from anybody else. But expecting always a better return for something good endeavour is not the good way of doing. Again expecting a good return for our investment may not be a bad thing. I do not understand how to judge on this. So both has got own pros and cons. If this is to be a psycho behavior than we might need to change it or if it’s a biological behavior then god knows what to do with it?

 

At the end but not the last, I’m sure different people will have different thoughts about it. This is just to put my thoughts in terms of some words so that I can understand myself better.