Gaming Velocity

TL; DR: Gaming Velocity

Imagine your team’s line manager insists that a successful team improves velocity regularly. How could you, as a team, satisfy this strange, unsuitable demand without working more? How can you make gaming velocity a reality?

I run this exercise with my students of entry-level Scrum Master and Product Owner classes to help them reflect on the tricky nature of measuring success, metrics, and, of course, Goodhart’s Law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”

For the following article, I aggregated suggestions from more than 50 classes on how to “best” game velocity.

Gaming Velocity – Age-of-Product.com
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The Expensive Folly of the Oversized Product Backlog

TL; DR: The Costs of an Oversized Product Backlog

Some Product Owners believe that a comprehensive Product Backlog is the best way to accomplish the Product Goal and be fully transparent simultaneously—never let a possibly valuable idea slip away. However, a comprehensive backlog may quickly become an oversized Product Backlog with unintended side effects.

Learn more about an oversized Product Backlog’s negative impact on innovation, your Scrum team’s ability to create value, and your relationship with stakeholders.

The Oversized Product Backlog Problem — Making Your Scrum Work #11 — Age-of-Product.com
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The Dogmatic Scrum Master Anti-Pattern — Making Your Scrum Work #20

TL; DR: The Dogmatic Scrum Master Anti-Pattern

There are plenty of failure possibilities with Scrum. Since Scrum is an intentionally incomplete framework with a reasonable yet short “manual,” this effect should not surprise anyone. For example, how do we communicate with members of the Scrum team that take the Scrum Guide literally? What about a dogmatic Scrum Master?

Join me and delve into the effects of Scrum dogmatism in less than 120 seconds.

The Dogmatic Scrum Master? — Making Your Scrum Work #20 — Age-of-Product.com
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The Oversized Product Backlog Will Cost You Dearly — Making Your Scrum Work #11

TL; DR: The Oversized Product Backlog Problem — When Noise Interferes with Signal

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. Neglecting the critical Scrum artifact for continuous value creation is one of the common Scrum anti-patterns. If your Scrum Team strives to make your customers’ lives easier Sprint after Sprint, beware of the oversized Product Backlog.

📺 Join me and explore the consequences of inadequate Product Backlog management in less than three minutes.

The Oversized Product Backlog Problem — Making Your Scrum Work #11 — Age-of-Product.com

Update: I am running a poll on LinkedIn—join the voting: “What reasons have you observed why Scrum Teams stuff their Product Backlogs — a very costly pattern that diminishes ROI and value creation?”

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