19.4.09

From XP Developer to ScrumMaster

As luck(or misfortune) would have it, I have been tasked with ensuring that the team delivers the right software on time and to the product owners’ satisfaction. My previous forays in extreme programming(XP) mean that there is zero cost of adoption of this new way of working. It could be argued that scrum and XP are polymorphic. They both inherit from the same agile shrub.

It is tempting to approach the scrum master role from a developers’ perspective given that I am a developer to the core. But this misses the essence of being a scrum master. I need to balance the demands of the product owner with those of the development team whilst being aware of the latent political interests that subtly influence the project. Some of these interests have a less than positive impact on the project and are impediments that need to be reported if the project is not to grind to a halt.

Agile is new to the organisation and the idea of product owners, sprint velocity, burn-down, sprints, product backlogs, sprint backlogs is alien in certain quarters. It is not uncommon to be asked to provide an estimate on the spot without consulting the team. My advice is don’t do it and don’t over commit the team.

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