The Blame Game Retrospective — Making Your Scrum Work #6

TL; DR: The Blame Game Retrospective

There are plenty of failure possibilities with Scrum. Given that Scrum is a framework with a reasonable yet short “manual,” this effect should not surprise anyone. Turning the Sprint Retrospective into a Blame Game Retrospective demonstrates a Scrum team’s lack of skills and professionalism.

Join me and explore the reasons and the consequences of this Sprint Retrospective anti-pattern in 83 seconds.

The Blame Game Retrospective — Making Your Scrum Work #6 – Age-of-Product.com
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Three Wide-Spread Product Owner Failures in 6:09 Minutes—Making Your Scrum Work #5

TL; DR: Three Wide-Spread Product Owner Failures

There are plenty of Product Owner failures. Given that Scrum is a framework with a precise and concise yet short “manual,” this effect should not surprise anyone.

Explore with me three widespread examples of how Product Owners fail their team in three short video clips, totaling 6 minutes and 9 seconds.

Three Wide-Spread Product Owner Failures in 6:09 Minutes—Making Your Scrum Work #5 — Age-of-Product.com
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Sprint Acceptance Gate? — Making Your Scrum Work #4

TL; DR: The Sprint Acceptance Gate

There are plenty of failure possibilities with Scrum. Given that Scrum is a framework with a reasonable yet short “manual,” this effect should not surprise anyone. Turning the Sprint Review into a Sprint acceptance gate where stakeholders sign off features is unfortunately prominent and defies the idea of self-management.

Join me and explore the reasons and the consequences of this Sprint Review anti-pattern in 80 seconds.

Sprint Acceptance Gate — Making Your Scrum Work #4 — Age-of-Product.com
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Data-Informed Retrospectives

TL; DR: Data-Informed Retrospectives

In their book Agile Retrospectives, Esther Derby and Diana Larsen popularized the idea that a Sprint Retrospect comprises five stages. The second stage refers to gathering data so that the Scrum Team can have data-informed Retrospectives.

As I have observed in practice, many Scrum Teams either limit the data gathering part of the Retrospective, thus lacking vital information. Or they invest too much time doing so, leaving little capacity to analyze the data and come to conclusions on how to best improve as a team.

Read on and learn how you can avoid falling victim to both scenarios by gathering data continuously and asynchronously.

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A Sprint Review without Stakeholders — Making Your Scrum Work #3

TL; DR: A Sprint Review without Stakeholders

There are plenty of failure possibilities with Scrum. Given that Scrum is a framework with a reasonable yet short “manual,” this effect should not surprise anyone. A Sprint Review without stakeholders may create an unhealthy bubble for the Scrum Team due to the disconnect, thus resulting in lower effectiveness.

Join me and explore the reasons and the consequences of stakeholders avoiding participating in the Sprint Review in less than 150 seconds.

A Sprint Review without Stakeholder — Making Your Scrum Work #3 — Age-of-Product.com
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Product Owner Interview Questions — The Product Backlog and Refinement

TL; DR: Product Owner Interview Questions — The Product Backlog and Refinement

If you are looking to fill a position for a Product Owner in your organization, you may find the following 71 interview questions useful to identify the right candidate. They are derived from my fourteen years of practical experience with XP and Scrum, serving both as Product Owner and Scrum Master and interviewing dozens of Product Owner candidates on behalf of my clients.

So far, this Product Owner interview guide has been downloaded more than 8,000 times.

Product Owner Interview Questions — The Product Backlog and Refinement — Age-of-Product.com
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