28
votes
Accepted
Should I ask my boss not to come to retrospectives?
It sounds like you have team members from high power distance cultures. People may not speak up when the boss is in the room because their values require them to listen and follow, not to advise or ...
- 396
24
votes
Accepted
How can I map stakeholders without offending anyone?
compare to other colleagues and feel insulted.
The other two answers are good - but this confuses me. When I've done stakeholder analysis, the process has been open and participatory. There shouldn'...
- 8,728
17
votes
Giving high level estimates to client without commiting to numbers
Slight frame challenge: consider providing your estimates as the wide-end of a cone of uncertainty rather than a discrete number.
"I need a [vague thing], how long would it take?"
"...
- 14.8k
16
votes
Should I ask my boss not to come to retrospectives?
Analysis
There is a chilling effect when he is here. Am I overreacting? Should I just try to build up the confidence of the team? or should I ban my boss from the retrospective?
In my experience, ...
- 49.8k
15
votes
How can I map stakeholders without offending anyone?
I personally don’t like tools you have to hide. This leads to mistrust and if it leaks (for whatever reason) you are in trouble.
So we started 20 years ago to use a technique which is called project ...
- 336
10
votes
Giving high level estimates to client without commiting to numbers
To add onto nvogel's correct answer.
Besides for providing itemized deliverables, you need to add in the standard functions that are forgotten, overlooked but necessary and very time + resource ...
- 4,562
9
votes
Giving high level estimates to client without commiting to numbers
Attach each estimate to an itemised deliverable rather than a named scope of work, that way there's less room for doubt about what was estimated. Use relative estimation (points) at the item level ...
- 6,216
8
votes
Team member frequently disregards "small" requests
TL;DR
You have one or more process problems involving communication and prioritization. You need additional information in order to inspect-and-adapt your team's process in a collaborative and ...
- 49.8k
7
votes
How should a non-technical person define tasks for technicians?
Stories should always be defined in business terms. Why does there need to be web integration? Who is it for? What exactly does it need to accomplish?
If it is not directly-related to a business ...
- 14.8k
7
votes
Method for managing Scrum ceremonies with an introverted team?
The most important part of this is: be yourself. Your team will work best when they are being themselves too. Having said that though, the dynamic of the team is changing (naturally) because a new ...
- 445
7
votes
Accepted
Earning Respect of Team Members When I Know Very Little About the Topic?
I'm a manager of a software development team who was a designer. I started with almost no prior knowledge of writing code, other than simple html and CSS.
My initial view was that they are the ...
- 248
7
votes
How should a Scrum Master deal with an angry stakeholder during a PO meeting?
I am drawing assumptions on your PO's agenda, based on my experience of other PO meetings, and discussing a stakeholder's objections on spend would not be consistent with that agenda. The PO, or you, ...
- 37.1k
7
votes
How should a Scrum Master deal with an angry stakeholder during a PO meeting?
TL;DR
I was thinking at the back of my mind to either:
defend the PO and budget
defend the team, since they were kept busy delivering items from the backlog
Bring focus to the meeting ...
- 49.8k
6
votes
Accepted
How should a non-technical person define tasks for technicians?
TL;DR
You should not be defining tasks for technical people. Instead, you should describe a value proposition and some testable acceptance criteria, and then turn your technical experts loose to find ...
- 49.8k
6
votes
Why can't QA's share expertise and suggest new ways of working
It might be how you're suggesting these changes.
It probably has nothing to do with your position (QA), per se, but more to do with the fact that some new guy is coming in, telling everyone that what ...
- 14.8k
6
votes
Accepted
How to deal with client's staff that says "this will be easy"
The first counter to 'this requirement will be easy to deliver' should always be ask politely to list down the risks involved. Such unfounded claims are done by people who want to boast or want to ...
- 234
6
votes
Is a mid sprint check-in/catch-up a good idea
What you're describing as your mid-sprint checkin is exactly what every daily scrum should be. So your idea is good, I would just do it every day instead of once per sprint. Now, you mention this may ...
- 16.9k
6
votes
Quicker Retrospectives? They are taking longer and are less effective now we are working from home because of COVID
The first item in the Agile Manifesto is:
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Your question lists a bunch of tools and asks about more tools, some that are more flexible to use ...
- 15k
6
votes
Responsibility of scrum master
There are actually two questions here:
What went wrong?
From the short description, it seems that there has been no training but the person was just given the job title (maybe with a copy of the ...
- 1,232
6
votes
Giving high level estimates to client without commiting to numbers
Your issue requires two things that are 100% owned by YOUR company, and only these two things: 1) You need to insert legalese-type language that accompanies your estimate that this is a high-level, ...
- 37.1k
5
votes
Method for managing Scrum ceremonies with an introverted team?
I think the place to start is with the actual scrum ceremonies: planning, standup and retro and see if you can gather the information you want instead of forcing it elsewhere.
For standup:
What you ...
- 383
5
votes
Accepted
Convincing my team that we need to split tasks by feature, not by work type
You're both right. (Or wrong, depending on perspective).
When possible/necessary, split Stories into smaller Stories.
One possible guideline for defining Stories is that they should be 'the smallest ...
- 14.8k
5
votes
Is a mid sprint check-in/catch-up a good idea
I wonder sometimes do they actually bring up impediments, concerns or issues.
This appears to be at the heart of your question.
Perhaps rather than organising another meeting it would be worth ...
- 19.4k
5
votes
Accepted
Safe spaces in scrum retrospectives
I would recommend having a discussion with the whole team, the development manager and the Scrum Master present.
The topic is: How much autonomy should the team have?
Scrum typically gives the team ...
- 19.4k
5
votes
Accepted
Quicker Retrospectives? They are taking longer and are less effective now we are working from home because of COVID
All the team members can agree on some set of guidelines to help.
We are following these fun guidelines that are working very well for us:
No person can talk for more than 1 minute at a time.
Every ...
- 242
5
votes
Quicker Retrospectives? They are taking longer and are less effective now we are working from home because of COVID
A few additional suggestions that we've tried with some success:
To specify seating order, you can do things like:
have everyone roll dice (slack has a D&D dice roller app, use /roll d100 to get ...
- 3,535
5
votes
Should I ask my boss not to come to retrospectives?
The answer to this question depends a lot on the people in the team and on the boss.
Normally, a Scrum team should not contain people with special roles, especially a boss. The balance of power gets ...
- 15k
5
votes
Giving high level estimates to client without commiting to numbers
Communication should be as clear as possible if you want to avoid misinterpretations, that's not impolite but simply professional. What about a prominent note
This is a rough estimate based on ...
- 1,232
5
votes
Accepted
What to do with a team that will never evolve into an agile one?
As a Scrum Master, you can do your best. But your best might not be enough. I have seen people that were so distrusting and obviously hurt by their former bosses and management strategies of ...
- 8,428
4
votes
Method for managing Scrum ceremonies with an introverted team?
My suggestions are:
Apart from having meetings, ask them for input individually; being a technically-minded, nerd introvert myself, group settings generally make for discomfort, which can be ...
- 246
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible