• Training
• Consulting Services

During this two-day hands-on class, you'll gain a comprehensive understanding of Scrum and how to function in the ScrumMaster role. You'll learn about the essentials of Agile and the Scrum framework through lectures and exercises that cover such things as implementation considerations, Agile estimating and planning, and a Scrum simulation.

This class is intended for anyone practicing or looking to practice the art of the ScrumMaster, but is also highly valuable for managers, team members, and product managers involved in Scrum.

After completing this class, you'll be registered with the Scrum Alliance as eligible to take the on-line Certified ScrumMaster self-assessment. Registration includes a two-year Scrum Alliance membership. PMPs can also claim 14 PDUs with the PMI.

Course Outline

Day 1

• Agile Thinking. To understand the benefits of Scrum and the nuances behind its framework, we begin with the history of Agile methods and how relatively new thoughts in software development have brought us to Scrum.
1. How manufacturing has influenced software development
2. The origins of Agile thinking
3. The Agile Manifesto
4. The complexity of projects
5. Theoretical vs. empirical processes overview
6. The "Iron Triangle" of project management

Exercise: The Art of the Possible. We'll explore how small changes in behavior can have a large impact on productivity. This exercise also turns your thinking toward new ideas and a willingness to change for the better.

• The Scrum Framework. During this time, we'll ensure everyone is working from the same foundational concepts that make up the Scrum framework.

1. The different Scrum roles
2. Chickens and pigs
3. Iterative development vs. waterfall
4. Self-management concepts
5. Full disclosure and visibility
6. Overview of the Scrum framework

• Implementation Considerations. Moving beyond Scrum's foundational concepts, we'll use this time to dig deeper into the basics of implementing Scrum. We'll also begin a discussion of integrity in the marketplace and how this relates to software quality.

1. Traditional vs. Agile methodologies
2. Scrum: The silver bullet?
3. The Agile skeleton
4. Scrum launch checklist

Exercise: The 59-minute Scrum Simulation. In this exercise, you'll work on a short project that lasts for just 59 minutes. Working in project teams, you will walk through the key steps of the Scrum framework as you work in project teams to deliver a new product.

• Scrum Roles. What are the different roles in Scrum? We'll review checklists of role expectations to learn more.

1. The Team Member
2. The Product Owner
3. The Scrum Master

Exercise: Understanding Customer Expectations. This exercise is the beginning of an extended exercise involving Agile estimating and planning. During this first portion of the exercise, you'll work with a fictional customer who has a demanding schedule to learn how your assessment of project work plays a significant role in customer satisfaction.

Day 2

• The Scrum Team Explored. Because the ScrumMaster’s goal is to protect the productivity of the team, we will examine the differences in behavior among various types of teams.
1. The Agile Heart
2. Bruce Tuckman's team life cycle
3. Patrick Lencioni's Five Dysfunctions of a Team
4. Team ground rules
5. Involving human resources
6. The impact of project switching
7. The MetaScrum
8. The Scrum of Scrums
9. The importance of knowing when software is "done"
1. "Done" for multiple team integrations divided by function
2. "Done" for multiple team integrations divided by skill
3. "Done" for unsynchronized technologies
10. Internal outsourcing
• Exercise: Agile Estimating and Planning. We'll break into project teams that will work through decomposition and estimation of project work, and then plan out the project through delivery.

1. Product backlog features
2. Relative weighted prioritization
3. Prioritizing your time
4. User stories
5. Relative effort
6. Velocity
7. Planning Poker and story points
8. Ideal team days
9. Team capacity
10. Projecting a schedule
11. Why plan in an Agile environment?

• The Product Owner:  Extracting Value. The driving force behind implementing Scrum is to obtain results, usually measured in terms of return on investment or value. How can you ensure that your project work provides the best value for your customers and your organization? We'll take a look at different factors that impact the ability to maximize returns.
1. The priority guide
2. Product backlog refactoring
3. Productivity drag factors
4. Fixed price/date contracts
5. Release management
6. Earned value management

• The ScrumMaster Explored. It's easy to read about the role of the ScrumMaster and gain a basic understanding of the responsibilities. The difficulty comes in the actual implementation. Being a ScrumMaster is a hard job, and we'll talk about the characteristics of a good ScrumMaster.

1. The ScrumMaster aura
2. ScrumMaster characteristics
3. The difficulties of being a ScrumMaster
4. A day in the life of a ScrumMaster
5. The importance of listening
6. Using common sense

• Meetings and Artifacts Reference Material. While most of this material was discussed in previous portions of class, more detailed documentation is included here for future reference.

1. Chart of Scrum meetings
2. The product backlog
3. Sprint planning
4. The sprint backlog
5. The sprint
6. The daily Scrum
7. The sprint demo/review
8. Why plan?
9. The ideal team day
10. Scrum tools

• Advanced Considerations. This section is reserved for reference material. If a topic in this section is of particular interest to the class, we may discuss it during class time.

1. Conflict management
2. Different types of sprints
3. The ScrumMaster of the Scrum of Scrums
4. Metrics
5. Dispersed teams
6. Scaling Scrum
7. Developing architecture
8. Stage-gate/Milestone-driven development
9. Inter- and intra-project dependencies
10. Task Boards and Project Boards
11. Scrum and CMM, Traditional XP

• Closing Topics. We'll wrap up with direction on where to go next with your Scrum experience, recommended reading and Scrum reference sites, and a graduation ceremony.