J. Carlos Velasquez

Join any of my upcoming #Scrum or #Kanban courses to learn Agile practices and techniques that help cross-functional teams evolve toward iterative & incremental delivery. Register here: https://lnkd.in/guePVSqg

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“According to the study, putting a specification in place before development begins can result in a 50 percent increase in success, and making sure the requirements are accurate to the real-world problem can lead to a 57 percent increase.” My take: I’m a believer in planning and then using agile to deliver and iterate with short feedback loops. We use a hybrid with up front planning that moves into two week sprints for delivery. Take what works from PMO and from Agile. Focus on principles and setup enterprise planning and solution delivery to fit the maturity of the company, in a continuous improvement practice. #pmo # agile

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Best not-so-hidden secret tool in the Agile Coach toolbox - Dysfunction Mapping! Thanks Michael Lloyd and Jamie Kriegel for this actionable training.

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Lean Thinking is foundational to Agile. In this series, I share how Agile thinking and practices can be to nearly every industry. https://ed.gr/eedaz #Agile #businessagility #leanthinking

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Kanban! What is it? What can it do for my company? Do you have any questions about kanban? Here is a pod cast that may answer many of your questions: https://lnkd.in/ewSbTzv5 I join Andy Olrich and Shayne Daughenbaugh for an in depth discussion. Even with all of that, there is still a lot more to Kanban! Sit back and enjoy!

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When was the last time you asked what your client really needs? 🎯 Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches, it's easy to get caught up in our methodologies and sprint cycles, but are we aligning closely with our clients' current needs, or are we just assuming? Regularly asking "What do you need today?" can transform the way we deliver value. 🔄 Let’s shift our focus from assumption-based planning to client-centered actions. This not only enhances our agility but also strengthens client relationships. 🤝 Agile leaders, how often are we checking in with our clients to ensure we are truly meeting their needs? #AgileCoaching #ClientFocus #ScrumMasters

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I will be teaching how to Scale Scrum teams using Nexus Even after achieving success with Scrum, teams are still limited by the amount of work they can do and the value they can create. They need to expand, or scale, to a group of Scrum Teams working together on the same product. When doing so, they often encounter common challenges with cross-team dependencies, self-management, transparency and accountability. When introducing heavy-weight scaling methodologies, teams often find that the added overhead slows down the teams and distracts from the essence and benefits of Scrum. Instead, Scrum.org created the Nexus FrameworkTM by minimally extending the Scrum Framework to include ways that help solve the dependency and collaboration challenges of cross-team work. Since Nexus enhances the foundational elements of Scrum, it reinforces the benefits of Scrum while also being familiar to those that have used Scrum. The Scaled Professional Scrum™ (SPS) with Nexus course, builds on the Nexus framework by introducing complementary practices and techniques proven to help teams scale. The course also includes a free attempt at the globally recognized Scaled Professional Scrum (SPS) certification exam Eric Naiburg Lindsay Velecina Arunvignesh Ramakrishnan #scaling #nexus

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Hey LinkedIn community, Id really like your input. As Agile practitioners, we know that not all Scrum teams (well teams in general really) function smoothly all the time. In fact, many of us have faced the challenge of turning a dysfunctional or brand new team into a cohesive, high-performing unit. I follow & talk to many of you sharing battle scars, techniques & strategies. Today, I want to hear from how you do it in 2024. How do you bring a dysfunctional or brand new but inexperienced Scrum team together? Whether it’s clashing personalities, unclear roles, no clear vision on the project goals or a lack of trust, there are numerous factors that can derail a Scrum team. But the real test is in how we, as delivery leaders, address these issues and guide our teams back to collaboration and success. Here are a few strategies that I’ve found effective: Facilitate Open Communication: Create a safe space for team members to voice their concerns and ideas without fear of judgment. Transparency is key. Hard to do though right? Revisit the Basics: Sometimes, it helps to go back to the fundamentals of Scrum. Clarify roles, responsibilities, and the importance of the Scrum ceremonies. I've done this pretty successfully, tbh. Build Trust: Trust is the bedrock of any successful team. Encourage team-building activities and foster a culture of mutual respect. Eat your own dogfood. Address Conflict Head-On: Don’t shy away from conflict. Address it directly but constructively, helping team members find common ground. Continuous Improvement: Encourage a mindset of continuous improvement. Regular retrospectives can help identify issues early and keep the team on track. I struggle with this. I’m eager to hear your experiences and strategies. What has worked for you in uniting a dysfunctional Scrum team? Share your thoughts and stories in the comments below! 👇 #Agile #Scrum #TeamDynamics #Leadership #ProjectManagement #ContinuousImprovement #DeliveryManagerDaily Looking forward to your insights!

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We still have quite a few seats open for our Dysfunction Mapping course on June 3-4. If you are seeking ways to make yourself more effective as a Scrum Master, Agile Coach, Team Leader (of any team), this class is for YOU! https://lnkd.in/gGFZFPGJ If you are looking for helpful classes that deliver SEU's and PDU's, this gives 8 of both! #Agile #Scrum #Dysfunction #DysfunctionMapping #Leadership #Training

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https://lnkd.in/ge_5cyPK The beta class is going live! Explore the 1-day workshop!

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The Scrum Sessions Podcast's latest episode is out. Gereon Hermkes and I conclude our Agile Pet Peeves Series with the Scrum Master's pet peeves. https://lnkd.in/g-_8ifEJ Please subscribe, like us, and give us feedback! The Scrum Sessions are still on hiatus. I plan to bring them back int he second half of the year. #scrumsessions #scrumsessionspodcast #agile #scrum #transformation #scrumatscale #raskere #teamflow #scalingdoneright #businessagility #agileleadership #scrummasters #safe #less #leadershipdevelopment #productowners #productmanagement #leadership #lean #agilecoaching #leanagile #agiletransformations #agilelearning #leanstartups #podcast #productmanagers Bob Schatz, DMgt. Claus Reestrup Joanne Tierney Agile Education by Scrum Inc.™

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Kanban: More Than a Solution I've often heard, "We want to change to Kanban because it's the solution we need." The reality? Kanban itself does nothing. It highlights what’s happening and what we’re capable of. Once we have that clarity, we can take meaningful action. Kanban isn't the end goal; it's the lens through which we see and improve our processes. How are you using Kanban to understand and enhance your workflows? #Kanban #AgileConsulting #ContinuousImprovement

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Agile Blooming 🌷 Take your #Scrum team to the next level with #AgileClassrooms. We offer premier Certified Scrum Master and Product Owner courses as well as custom coaching. Let us be your guide this season. Crush impediments. Cultivate value. https://lnkd.in/eMPFNd-4

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We have 3 spots left in our Certified Scrum Product Owner® Workshop tomorrow (Jun 19-20) 8:30-15:30 CT. We would love to see you! Product owner roles are becoming increasingly important. In 2020, LinkedIn named it the #15 emerging job with a 24% annual growth. The World Economic Forum went even further, calling it the #1 job needed for the emerging global workforce. Skills in the New World of Work report shows that 55% of companies are ready to pay higher salaries to those with agile certifications. Other summer dates available as well: https://lnkd.in/eajaKWX #Scrum #agile #productmanagement

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Scrum is not inherently difficult. I've gotten teams up on it in an hour. This is an overview of a section on my Amplio System Visual "Using Amplio to Improve Scrum." See https://bit.ly/3z5EMuY for a running entry of additions and take the top entry and click on the box labeled "Using Amplio to Improve Scrum" for more.   Scrum is easy to adopt when used in the context for which it was designed. It is only difficult to master when this is not the case or when the physics of flow is not understood. Scrum was inspired by “The New New Product Development Game." While Scrum can be for more than creating new products, it is immutable in its core practices. These include: * Teams are cross-functional * They are able to plan ahead 1-4 weeks. * A product owner is available on a regular basis   Another qualification is that teams should either know how to build the product or be able to learn it quickly. Scrum is more than this, of course, but the only constraints the additional practices provide are when they happen. This immutability makes Scrum not be fit for purpose for many teams. The following Scrum mantras hold teams back by both slowing down learning and requiring reinvention of known ideas. 1. “Scrum is based on empiricism.” Adding validated theory, sometimes called “the physics of flow,” enables people to relate their experiences to desirable Agile team practices. This improves understanding, quickens learning, and creates confidence. Without this, improvement will be slowed, if not stagnated. 2. “Follow until you understand.” Integrating validated theory with empiricism enables a small set of practices to be provided with understanding. Simple starts are possible with empiricism and validated theory. 3. “Purposefully incomplete.” This requires people to reinvent the wheel. The motivation for a simple start is good. Providing the information needed after the start, when it is needed, avoids a lot of rework. 4. “Cross-functional teams.” Having all the capabilities needed be on the team is good. But they are often not possible or even desirable. The combination of requiring them without allowing for alternative, better methods in certain contexts, creates waste. 5. “Sprints and planning ahead.” Many situations do not lend themselves to this. Interruptions may be the nature of the game. Planning ahead just wastes time in these situations. One-day timeboxing or a flow model is often better. I believe it's better to get a little understanding up front and then use that to learn instead of trying to follow a guide. You don’t need much to start if you can get the information you need later when you need it. Doing team-based Agile is very easy when you have the skills you need, an understanding of why small increments are good, and a cross-functional team. When you don't, you need more than empiricism and following someone else's ideas that supposedly work to solve urgent, complex problems that haven't been solved before. 

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One of the priveliges of what I do is the ability to support my fellow employees of Lean Tree in their learning and growth. We recently started our third annual, internal Scrum Study Group, which I facilitate for Lean Tree employees who want to deepen their mastery of Professional Scrum. The key to initiatives like this is to make them achievable for people, including myself, who are on challenging, full-time client assignments. We opt for the high-frequency, small-chunk model. In other words, our investment is just one half-hour tutorial per week at the end of a mid-week professional day, like a brief after school club, with one easy-ish, strictly time-boxed, humble-goal assignment. A means to make one modest but valuable gain every single week. Small improvements achieved frequently add up very quickly and it elegantly defeats the zero progress we often (don't) make when we intimidatingly set our goals up in such big chunks that it's forever not the right time to start. I design the assignments to cause people to go back to the Scrum Guide, join dots, and think more deeply about what it says. Here's to good #Agile and #Scrum, and to us supporting each other in our continued growth, including mine as a trainer, coach, and facilitator.

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