The document discusses the perspectives of different stakeholders involved in an agile software development project. It includes the views of a sponsor who was initially skeptical of agile but became a believer after seeing results. Developers are portrayed as enjoying aspects of agile like retrospectives and tools, but the business stakeholder expresses frustration with a perceived lack of urgency and focus on revenues. There is a need to better communicate how agile practices help deliver business value and manage risks.
2. Scrum
Sponsor
Rela0vely
successful
at
Scrum
and
Agile
-‐ Visa
are
excited
about
agile
-‐ Responsible
for
a
product
that
Visa
acquired
-‐ Built
it
by
being
painfully
rigorous
about
scrum
–
playing
by
the
rules
Defender
of
the
Realm
-‐
Hired
a
CST
in
training
Agile
adventurer
-‐ Never
done
it
-‐ Never
proved
it
-‐ Didn’t
believe
in
it
-‐ But
now
my
dad’s
even
a
believer
J
And
yes
oHen
to
my
team
–
I
am
“The
Business”
and
I
am
conflicted
-‐ I
am
a
senior
exec
at
Fundamo
(strategic
role
player)
-‐ I
ac0vely
par0cipated
in
the
bid
and
acquisi0on
by
Visa
-‐ I
ac0vely
sell
our
product
-‐ I
work
with
partners
(in
the
channel
and
technology)
-‐ I
chair
product
investment
commiQee
(yes
–
the
one
the
product
managers
come
2
3. Product
SteerCo
Clue
#1Go
tell
those
people
to
stop
playing
games
Every
0me
I
come
to
a
demo
you
show
me
new
tooling,
new
infrastructure
Don’t
those
people
know
we
have
a
business
to
run
–
some0mes
I
think
they
just
come
to
work
to
play
games
3
4. Embraced
agile
Allowed
me
the
space
to
introduce
scrum
Watched
us
develop
a
commercial
product
in
less
than
a
year
Allowed
me
to
defend
the
team
But
–
he’s
driving
revenues,
and
he
is
the
consummate
entrepreneur
–
innova0on
above
process
And…he
has
a
business
to
run
4
5. • What’s
this
about
gatherings?
[conference
or
a
mee0ng]
• Lightning
spot
• Stand
up
• Open
space?
[
• Retrospec0ves
[
• Value
the
items
on
the
right
vs
the
leH
• What
mind
altering
trip
are
these
people
on?
• Calm
steadiness
to
our
teams
• NO
sense
of
urgency??
I
am
encouraging
us
all
to
think
like
business
leaders
–
like
managers
5
6. -‐ S0cky
notes
(of
different
colours)
-‐ FedEx
day
-‐ (all
these
I
sponsor)
-‐ Poker
cards
-‐ Chickens,
Pigs
-‐ New
tooling
-‐ New
frameworks
-‐ This
trust
thing
–
hey
man,
we
trust
the
team
-‐ How
can
you
trust
these
people?
6
7. To
all
you
scrumdamentalists
out
there
(with
your
games,
your
gatherings,
your
retrospec0ves,
your
s0cky
notes
and
your
fancy
marker
pens
We
are
in
the
business
of
soHware
because
we
are
capitalists
–
not
because
we
want
you
to
feel
comfortable
at
your
R20,000
chair,
your
chill
room,
the
blackjack
table
in
the
corner
of
the
dev
room,
your
two
21”
screens,
sifng
on
your
beanbag,
scribbling
on
a
random
post
it
note!
Do
you
understand
we
need
to
sell
this
stuff
to
people
who
want
to
use
it,
like
to
use
it
and
want
to
buy
more
of
it?
You
know
what
–
I
think
the
teams
do
–
most
developers
know
why.
And
the
business
grudgingly
accepts
we
know
how
to
develop
soHware.
This
is
a
tough
one:
-‐ They
want
scope,
features
-‐ Commit
to
less
work
that
expected
Now
of
course
these
are
all
valid
reasons
why
we
adopted
agile
and
scrum
(BUT
SOMETIMES
WE
SUCK
AT
COMMUNICATING
THAT)
-‐ We
know
that
there
are
many
unknowns
-‐ We
know
that
if
we
priori0se
we
will
do
the
most
valuable
stuff
first
-‐ We
know
that
the
team
will
work
as
hard
as
they
can
7
8. See
we
come
to
our
gatherings
We
priori0se
our
workload
We
con0nually
improve
We
need
to
remember
why
we
do
this
–
the
challenge
is
to
remind
the
business
(ME)
We
are
changing
the
world
–
from
Africa
–
for
real
people
The
why
we
do
things
–
is
known
to
us
in
the
detail
of
the
business
And
you
know
what
bugs
me
-‐ We
always
have
an
answer
-‐ The
team
will
know
-‐ We’ll
drop
some
scope
-‐ The
Product
Owner
understands
-‐ We’ll
just
ask
the
Steering
CommiQee
for
more
0me
-‐ We
do
a
spike
(spike
–
what’s
that?
–
oh
yes
–
we’ll
experiment,
play
games)
8
9. Is
this
a
lifestyle
thing
rather
than
a
business
thing?
How
can
I
respond?
Is
our
business
more
profitable
because
of
scrum?
What
do
those
games
mean
Is
this
some
way
we
aQract
the
underworld
(hidden
community
of
geeks)
Are
they
games?
Business
value?
Scrum
rituals
Gatherings
Retrospec0ves
Ceremonies
(what
happened
to
mee0ngs)
A
fantasy
world
for
geeks?
Are
the
metrics
right?
How
do
I
jus0fy
using
scrum?
Did
I
really
have
to
say
that?
9
10. -‐ Do
we
have?
-‐ Unhappy
clients,
bugs,
more
demand
than
supply
–
normal
business
pressure
-‐ Also
a
company
divided
in
some
senses
–
and
I
think
you
will
find
this
common
-‐ A
voracious
appe0te
for
more
features
(hey
–
that’s
why
we
do
this
Scrum
thing,
right?)
We
also
have
-‐ Teams
organised
-‐ Scrum
masters,
PO
per
team
-‐ Regular
cadence
-‐ Some-‐what
groomed
backlog
-‐ Regular
releases
-‐ Happy
clients
So
YES
10
11. License
sales
growing
Content
of
product
–
is
relevant
Ongoing
support
is
gefng
beQer
For
all
of
you
the
same
is
probably
true
11
12. -‐ TDD
-‐ Design
experience
-‐ Extreme
Automa0on
-‐ Story
grooming
-‐ Granularity
of
stories
-‐ Assign
a
PO
to
each
team
-‐ Kanban
for
support
12
13. Like
hippies
–
pursuing
love
–
not
meaning
for
the
customer
We
can
become
too
inwardly
focussed
–
on
the
good
things
-‐ Improving
our
quality
-‐ Predictability
-‐ Stories
-‐ Epics
-‐ Features
-‐ And
for
Fundamo
Visa
teams
–
we
are
far
from
the
end
user:
-‐ Dev
-‐>
BD
-‐>
SI
-‐>
Customer
-‐>
Consumer
-‐ That’s
tough
to
be
sure
we
are
doing
the
right
things
13
14. I
cannot
emphasise
the
importance
of
on-‐going
communica0on
–talking
the
language
of
the
business
When
I
am
most
successful
I
reflect
the
business
picture
of
our
roadmap
(not
a
burndown
–
a
roadmap)
Yes
–
it’s
up
there
in
the
agile
manifesto
We
favour
conversa0on
over
documenta0on
But
–
there
are
many
stakeholders
out
there
-‐
be
sure
your
PO
or
PM
is
having
those
conversa0ons
-‐
be
sure
the
conversa0ons
are
consistent
-‐
be
sure
the
context
is
always
there
-‐
return
to
the
beginning,
refine
the
picture,
show
how
it
changed
-‐
in
the
heat
of
the
sprint
or
release,
we
some
0mes
forgot
how
we
re-‐priori0sed
-‐
If
we
did
our
stakeholders
certainly
did
(moving
priori0es
of
stories)
14
16. The
prac0ces
of
scrum
help
us
-‐ that’s
where
the
games
come
in
-‐ That’s
where
the
discipline
comes
-‐ It’s
management
Don’t
think
it
will
solve
your
basic
stakeholder
management
issues
–
it
will
only
expose
them
-‐ Status
repor0ng
-‐ Change
management
-‐ Infrastructure
management
-‐ Some0mes
documenta0on
is
necessary
-‐ We
neglected
our
roadmap
–what
stuck
was
the
12
month
old
roadmap
(what
about
x
y
z)
16
17. Projects
became
the
enemy
They
needed
project
managers,
and
they
do
waterfall
They
needed
scope,
and
signing
in
blood
And
so
we
have
this
backlog
thing
-‐ A
hiding
place
for
many
evils
(a
joke)
I
suggest
the
structure
of
a
project
is
not
evil
-‐ It
gives
execu0ves
big
chunks
to
decide
on
-‐ A
simple
project
charter
confirms
value
and
cost
-‐ It
defines
priori0es
-‐ It
defines
scope
boundaries
-‐ It
defines
terminology
-‐ It
reduces
complexity
-‐ It
integrates
with
the
rest
of
the
business
(charge
codes,
status
reports,
investment
themes,
stakeholders)
-‐ It
is
not
waterfall
Instead
of
a
great
big
backlog
–
an
ordered
grouping
of
projects
17
19. It’s
so
temp0ng
We
have
two
areas
of
the
business
-‐
1
scrum,
one
not
-‐
very
different
pressures
I
honestly
observe
-‐
the
team
could
work
harder
-‐
the
team
does
work
hard
-‐
we
do
not
burn
people
out
(this
is
the
development
mindset
I
started
in)
Yes
the
team
can
work
beQer
–
that’s
why
we
adopt
agile
-‐
when
they
have,
the
bugs
go
up
and
I
measure
that
in
ZAR
Make
sure
you
have
a
response
–
mine
is
NO
–
they
are
working
harder.
Judge
that
on:
-‐ Commitment
-‐ Quality
-‐ Stability
(aQri0on)
19
20. Responsible
–
actually
doing
the
work
Accountable
–
approve
or
disapprove
it
–
this
is
not
the
team
-‐
and
some0mes
it
is
not
the
PO,
who
is
already
under
a
ton
of
pressure
-‐
be
sure
you
define
in
your
business
who
is
accountable
(a
single
wringable
neck
–
the
manager)
-‐
for
my
business
that
is
the
product
manager
-‐
make
sure
the
V-‐Model
is
defined
for
your
organisa0on
(we
lost
our
way
a
liQle)
Let
the
team
take
resonsibility
–
trust
them,
remind
them
[I
trust
you
to
commit,
improve,
add
value
è
you
trust
me
to
protect
you
and
give
you
a
great
place
to
work]
20
21. Agile
coach
Scrum
coach
As
a
business
leader
–
reality
check
-‐
why
are
you
saying
that
Double
check
-‐
are
we
too
theore0cal
-‐
can
I
inspect
and
adapt
I
have
had
a
couple
-‐
some
on
the
team
-‐
some
external
-‐
keep
checking
yourself
as
an
execu0ve
21
23. Think
about
growing
in
teams
(one
team
at
a
0me)
Grow
the
whole
team
(PO
-‐>
Dev
-‐>
Tester)
Think
abut
the
overheads
-‐ Architecture
-‐ Code
complexity
Don’t
think
it
will
solve
your
basic
stakeholder
management
issues
–
it
will
only
expose
them
-‐ Tes0ng
-‐ Code
quality
-‐ Secure
coding
prac0ce
-‐ Status
repor0ng
-‐ Engineering
prac0ce
(XP)
-‐ Infrastructure
management
23
24. Yes
–
because
we
have
order
-‐
higher
engagement
-‐
flexibility
(my
boss
even
thinks
so)
-‐
reality
(we
build
what
we
can)
-‐
predictability
-‐
honesty
-‐
reliability
–
release
plan
PLAYING
GAMES?
NO!
24
25. We
have
to
be
clear
abut
common
measures
with
the
business
This
needs
a
lot
of
work
That
the
business
understands
-‐ Not
just
our
internal
scrum
measures
(RTF)
Measure
the
roadmap
-‐
how
did
you
s0ck
to
it
(so
I
suggest
using
RTF,
but
call
it
roadmap
execu0on)
Measure
how
well
the
priori0sa0on
works
-‐
a
simple
c-‐sat
with
your
customers
(Sales,
Execu0on)
-‐
How
oHen
did
you
get
what
you
needed
just
in
0me
Quality
-‐
use
bug
trends
Cost
-‐
show
the
cost
of
support
-‐
show
the
cost
of
a
team
Revenue
-‐
the
toughest
of
all
-‐
I
use
this
for
the
team
25
26. A
toothless
wimp?
I
think
he
needs
to
give
more
direc0on
We
need
to
balance
this
servant
leader
with
real
deliverables
If
your
scrum
master
does
not
have
clear
responsibili0es
-‐ Give
them
deliverables
(metrics,
improvement,
goals)
The
SM
role
is
not
a
hiding
place
The
SM
needs
to
in0mately
know
what
the
team
is
doing,
understand
it,
test
it
26
27. -‐ talking,
gathering,
s0cky
notes,
marker
pens
-‐ All
is
good.
We
do
play
games…
-‐ Some0mes
I
think
the
success
of
scrum
is
gefng
started
and
then
doing
–
report
on
success,
keep
shou0ng
out,
keep
communica0ng
-‐ So
use
your
gatherings,
your
retrospec0ves
-‐ Remember
to
get
real
–
talk
to
business
people
like
business
people
-‐ All
important
stuff
we
do
-‐ But
we
need
to
ground
ourselves
in
the
reality
of
running
a
business
-‐ Revenue
-‐ Quality
-‐ Communic0on
27