Sjoerdly Talks: Recent Episodes
Sjoerd Kranendonk
AI assisted facilitation, coaching and Scrum Mastering is not about welcoming our new overlords. What it is about, I learned during yesterdays' @scrumfacilitators Meetup with Chris Stone aka the Virtual Agile Coach. Using ChatGPT to easily generate facilitation ideas, ways to help teams improve Sprint Goals and other ideas. I wonder if you have used it and have anything to add to this episode? Or maybe questions or ideas to experiment with for the podcast? Let me know!
Video of a similar previous session by Chris Stone: https://youtu.be/AWQZbrUluTs
Next Meetup: A Cheeky Cocktail for Leading Yourselves: Four C's! with Lorraine Ho and Anne Wever from Mobilee.
Music Tip #16:Guts - Hip Hop After All / @guts_puravida
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one May 22, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
A personal reflection on the work I'm doing at the police and how focus and impact are a balance to keep an eye out for...
Music Tip #15:D/Troit - Heavy (Orange vinyl LP) / @dtroit.dk
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
One of the teams I'm working with, wants to change their sprint length from three to four weeks. I discuss what factors I would consider when deciding on a Sprint length, and how I approached the idea from this team. We work in a multi-team environment, and we want to stay in the same rhythm for easier Sprint Review and joint Sprint Planning. So how did we start the conversation with the other teams and Scrum Masters? And how did I facilitate this idea? Listen and find out.
Let me know anything I should additionally consider, discuss or explore with the teams to make the best decision, or find a better solution.
Also please ask me any Scrum, Agile or Product management related question. I'm happy to explore your suggestions!
Music Tip #14;Stro Elliot - Black & Loud: James Brown Reimagined (Vinyl LP)
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Why do we even need facilitation? We're professionals right? Not kindergarten children that need to be told how to have a proper conversation... Well, in this episode I discuss why using a 'natural flow' (no facilitation or process) can lead to suboptimal results and inequality (in this example between genders). I also add some additional tips to start creating a safe space, by inviting to contribute while having the right to pass, instead of pressuring people to participate.
Backdrop to the video: Music Tip #13 - Sam Redmore - Universal Vibrations (LP)
Links & Sources:
- https://www.sociocracyforall.org/myth-natural-flow/
- https://www.scrum.org/professional-scrum-competencies/facilitation
- https://www.scrumfacilitators.com/course/Professional_Scrum_Facilitation_Skills
- https://www.liberatingstructures.com / https://www.liberatingstructures.com/17-conversation-cafe/
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
We explore the duality of being a facilitator and a team member at the same time. As a Scrum Master, we are part of the team, while also being accountable for effective ways of working, including facilitation. I share insights based on a discussion we had in the Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills course. But first we start with the definition of facilitation, where the cambridge dictionary 'business english' version provides a clear definition. I hope this podcast episode is helpful to improve your facilitation insights for Scrum Team sessions you might want to participate in as well. And to better decide when to bring in some help so you can fully participate in the discussion as a team member, and when this is not needed.
I hope you like this episode, and find it useful. As always ideas and feedback are welcome!
Backdrop to the video: Music Tip #12 - Carrtoons - Homegrown (pink translucent LP)
Links & Sources:
- https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/facilitate
- https://www.scrum.org/professional-scrum-competencies/facilitation
- https://www.scrumfacilitators.com/course/Professional_Scrum_Facilitation_Skills
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Today I attended the Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills (PSFS) course. It was very well facilitated by fellow Scrum Facilitator Ziryan, together with Xebia's Evelien Roos. What I really like about the course is that it gives an overview of facilitation (in the context of Scrum) and offers practical tips and insights that are simple to understand. Ziryan and Evelien tweaked the standard exercises of the course to be even more interactive and apply training from the back of the room concepts, as well as Liberating Structures to enhance and maximize learning. Great discussions, nice additions to the toolkit and a solid set of principles to guide facilitation design and practice. I will discuss the facilitation principles since this was a really new concept to me. I will also share my struggle with the way the principles are set up, because 'process' is not of the same kind as the other ones.
Backdrop to the video: Music Tip #11 - Hiatus Kaiyote - Mood Valiant (red in black inkspot LP)
Links & Sources:
- https://www.scrum.org/professional-scrum-competencies/facilitation
- Based on, and adapted from The principles of meeting excellence - Promeet
- https://www.scrumfacilitators.com/course/Professional_Scrum_Facilitation_Skills
- https://www.bowperson.com - Training from the Back of the Room
- https://www.liberatingstructures.com
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
I've been thinking a lot lately about the Fundamental Attribution Error (HBR Article). This is where you attribute someone else's behaviour to personality (often a bad one) and your own behavioural mistakes and errors to circumstance. This is explained easily because for our own mental world we have the complete picture of our needs, circumstances and emotional state. For other people, especially people we don't know (well) enough yet, we lack this insight. The way to mitigate this error is by increasing our empathy. In the podcast I discuss three facilitation techniques to help on this front; 1. Check-Ins, 2. Heard, Seen, Respected Liberating Structure, 3. Conversation Cafe Liberating Structure.
Which ways would you suggest to mitigate this error? Or do you have a nice example of it happening to you yourself? Let me know!
Backdrop to the video: Music Tip #10 - Top albums of 2022: Ezra Collective - Where I'm Meant to Be (orange marbled vinyl 2LP)
EU/UK Touring Schedule on Instagram (many UK shows already sold out) & Follow @ezracollective on Insta.
Links:
- https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/the-fundamental-attribution-error
- https://www.liberatingstructures.com
- https://www.liberatingstructures.com/19-heard-seen-respected-hsr/
- https://www.liberatingstructures.com/17-conversation-cafe/
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
When I started this podcast last week for the Open Up with Alice Podcast Challenge, Alice asked me this question. In this episode I attempt to answer it, discussing the core elements of Scrum and coming to the conclusion that the human side of Scrum is what fascinates me most. Another think I like is that there are so many topics related to Scrum that could be helpful (or essential) to support Teams and Organisations trying to leverage it, that there is always more to learn!
Which Scrum challenge, question or related topic would you like to hear next? Please share!
Music Tip - Top albums of 2022: Butcher Brown presents Triple Trey featuring Tennishu and R4nd4zzo Bigb4nd (blue vinyl LP + 7")
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Why I am excited to book a trip to Paris in may. And what it has to do with Scrum. About learning, collaborating and imporving together. Also about reconnecting with friends and seeing people in real life who you've only met through chat online. Takeaway: do stuff even if you don't know exactly what it'll be like. Get out of your comfort zone!
What are you excited for?
Please share!
Music Tip - Top albums of 2022: Danger Mouse & Black Thought - Cheat Codes (red vinyl LP)
Image: 'Paris by Nighttime' by Mikhail Nilov
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Today the Scrum Teams had our three-week Sprint Review and Planning sessions, with a twist. An all hands, in person day covering Scrum Events, as well as a look back and look ahead with regard to the New Year. And bonding, socialising as a group. Some people had not seen each other in person for years!
In this podcast I talk about the program, what I would do different next time and a really simple approach to facilitate a lego session.
Have you experimented with brick based facilitation? What are your tips and insights? Have you tried other interesting Year review and look ahead approaches? Please share!
Music Tip - Top albums of 2022: Bruut! - Zest (pink vinyl LP)
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Today we organised the first Meetup of 2023 and it was a succes (to me). People showed up, and we had Derk-Jan de Grood share his experience with evolving the role of the agile coach during a transformation. This talk was suggested by the XP2023 conference organizers (Agile Alliance) to advertise the call for experience reports which is open until february 12. After the talk, Derk-Jan also facilitated a discussion using his own developed cue cards to help participants find experiences they could potentially submit for the conference. Most of Derk-Jan's talk and more background and examples can also be found in his book 'Surfing the waves of Agile'. In this podcast I discuss his three waves approach, the table of problems to classify, fix and focus as a team of coaches. And how I hope to use these ideas to raise transparency and alignment in the Police IT Scrum Master Community.
Check out the book: https://www.bol.com/nl/nl/f/the-waves-of-agile/9300000042258258/
And the original experience report paper: https://www.agilealliance.org/resources/experience-reports/the-changing-role-of-the-agile-coach/
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one February 13, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Time to reflect on the past week and the challenge. I did not make it easy on myself, moving towards video, not choosing between music and work related topics, but doing both (10 podcasts instead of 5!) and getting to know all these new tools and processes, while trying to also improve the content and delivery. Many thanks for those who engaged (mainly through linkedin), asking questions and giving feedback! Keep it up and look forward to getting into a cadence of 4 + 4 episodes per week (first aim) letting a bit of that pressure off.
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Sjoerdly Talks - A daily dose of experience with Scrum, plus a music tip!
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, on Instagram @SjoerdlyTalks, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups (next one January 16th, then once every month after that)
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
The Definition of Done in Scrum is quite important, but why? Bart Versteegen asked me for my view on this question and I am happy to discuss it, tying it to the purpose of Scrum, the importance of goals and outcomes we want to achieve and the coloring page printing as a product example.
Please let me know if my explanation makes sense or if you think I'm wrong, could explain it better etc. Also please contact me to ask me new questions, share ideas and tips or whatever you feel like. Also feedback on the podcast style and if I should keep doing video is deeply appreciated.
This is day 4 of the Challenge with Alice of Podcast in je Pyjama and Open up with Alice.
Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups next one is monday 16 January, followed by monthly editions
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
In this episode, I answer Anita Kalmane's question of how to become a Scrum Master if you have no Scrum experience. With some help from my Linkedin friends I discuss training, gaining experience as. part of a Scrum Team and looking at skills and experiences from other positions that may overlap with the accountabilities of the Scrum Master. -edit: On linkedin Anita shared this blog post with additional tips and insights from her and her colleagues' experiences.
This is day 3 of the Challenge with Alice of Podcast in je Pyjama and Open up with Alice.
Referring back to yesterday's episode: another way to better describe and measure value is Tom Gilb's Planguage, suggested by Niels Maloteaux. Find a recent video by Tom, an article by Niels and this introduction by Ryan Shriver: Measurable Value with Agile at www.malotaux.eu/?id=downloads (under "Articles by others").
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Free tools, games and facilitation support at https://scrumfacilitators.com
Follow me on Twitter @sjoerdly, connect with me on LinkeIn (please write a message when connecting) or send me questions and suggestions at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com
Other ways to collaborate and learn together:
- The Scrum Facilitators Community Podcast where we host you, the Scrum Facilitator Community to share your experiences and ideas.
- Scrum Facilitators Meetups
- Scrum Facilitators Youtube channel with webinars and videos
Day 2 of the Podcast challenge by Open up with Alice, and this time I answer one of the questions I got on linkedin when I published yesterday's podcast.
Ynse Segaar asked: "I am curious to your views on this topic: What is Value and how can we measure it based on outcome instead of output".
Listen to the podcast to hear an example using coloring pages as a simplified Product, what I think is value in this case and how the logic model can help differentiate different 'levels' we can measure and a tip to define value through outcomes, in a way that makes it easy to measure.
And of course let's not forget to validate the value once we have a product release so we can learn whether our product actually increased its value or if it diminished!
Links:
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Logic Model: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic_model
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Open up with Alice Podcast: https://openupwithalice.nl
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Linkedin Post with the original question: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sjoerdkranendonk_sjoerdly-talks-activity-7018468619030298624-fY5C
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More info on Evidence Based Management (Goal setting and Value measurement Framework): https://scrum.org/EBM
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Free card sets and other Products (outputs) by me and other Scrum Facilitators: https://scrumfacilitators.com
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Free Meetups to discuss similar topics and share experiences, insights and food: https://www.meetup.com/scrum-facilitators/
Note: I've decided to record the music tips separately, because including the song would mean no distribution on other platforms. Should probably be its own show later...
Introducing the Leadership Circumplex and relating it to leadership as a Product Owner in Scrum.
The Leadership Circumplex is extensively documented in the book ‘Around Leadership’ by Patrick Vermeeren (‘Rond Leiderschap’ in Dutch). You can also find the version I describe in this article: https://sitarnewsletter.weebly.com/expanding-the-circle---vermeren-redeker-de-vries.html
Podcast challenge experiment to record one episode per day for five days, starting January 9. Challenge by Alice van der Zalm of Open up with Alice podcast and Podcast in je pyjama. More info: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2Rf93TW8doG9jDdegc1sUl
Any and all questions about this content are welcome, as well as questions and ideas for future episodes on Scrum, musicand anything else you might want to suggest or ask. Find me at sjoerd@scrumfacilitators.com , look me up on linkedin or connect on twitter @sjoerdly. Cheers!