I do not like to listen to the same song over and over again, especially not when I know there is a whole album, a variety of tunes I could be listening to. Recent developments in the agile community suggest that people realise more so than ever that is it time of us to start listening to those other ‘tunes’.
I am tired of Scrum in a software development context. I am sick of listening to the same arguments over and over again, when history has clearly shown that Scrum is very well suited to deliver projects on time with an increased return on investment in the software area.
The Agile Manifesto clearly focuses on the issues surrounding software development, its principles clearly stating that. As a governing body over the principles and ideas expressed in the Agile Manifesto the Agile Alliance has started to take those principles a step further as many of the article submissions on their web-site clearly reflect.
It is imperative for us as an agile community, for us as a company which tries to be as agile as possible to advance Scrum past its perception of being only well suited for software development. This has happened in the most wonderful ways, some member of the scrumdevelopment group actually reporting that he had managed his wedding preparations by using Scrum.
The theories behind agile principles and Scrum in particular are very strong, the evidence that Scrum could work in any context which is not directly connected to software development is starting to become more publically available. There is no reason for to use to be overly circumspect.
While Ken Schwaber’s first two books focused on single team application of Scrum the next book will focus on the challenges involved with scaling Scrum, looking at it from an Enterprise point of view, probably for that very reason so aptly titled “Enterprise Scrum”. Scrum evolves and with every Scrum gathering or interesting discussion we are taking the next steps towards a more versatile, building block based approach in the application and adoption of Scrum on many different levels.
Scrum will evolve and hopefully such efforts as the APLN and their Learning and Recognition committee, which is working hard towards creating a common grounds for certification around agile leadership and principles can help provide the people necessary to understand Scrum and its aspirations. Recently I have been nominated for the Level 2 sub-committee of the L&R APLN effort and I am very much looking forward to the poll. Regardless whether I am elected as chair of the committee I will still participate and I urge you to do the same. Community participation is imperative to the continued success of Scrum, whether that is with the entities listed above or your own interest group.
I hope that innovative work done by thinkers in the community, innovative work done by companies such as Conchango when running projects will help to add new facets to how Scrum is being perceived not only by individuals but also the business community. We might have to adjust our expectations in terms of what a functional delivery actually is, how Product Ownership is realised and what Return on Investment constitutes in their respective context, but we will know for sure that we have a solid set of principles to build on.
When the term Web 2.0 was coined, some say by Tim O’Reilly, the geeks and experts moaned and somewhat belittled it as yet another new word for something already well known to them. But business recognised the dawn of a new age and investments in web based companies were invigorated.
I feel that it is time for Scrum EX (as in Extended) or Scrum NG (next generation), whatever you might call it, we seem to be at the very edge of that step into a new dawn of Agility and Scrum seems to be at the forefront. I know I am going, I would hope you all tag along.