#158. It's 2025, and I still meet Power Platform and Dynamics 365 professionals that don't know what Scrum is or have an incomplete understanding of what Scrum is. Especially in job interviews!

In this short episode, you'll learn:

• What Scrum really is
• Why it's a framework and not a methodology
• A simple hack for remembering the 18 components of Scrum

🚀 Agile Foundations for Microsoft Business Apps: Learn the basics and benefits about adopting agile approach to building business applications. https://customery.com/foundations

Mentioned in this episode:

My 50th Birthday Special Offer

Scrum turns 30 in 2025, but more importantly, I turn 50 this January! To celebrate, I'm offering my Scrum for Microsoft Business Apps course for just $50 for the Learning Plan (usually $399) and $250 for the Certification Plan (usually $499). All you have to do is be on my mailing list when the promotion launches later this month. Visit https://customery.com/neils-50th-birthday-party and I'll let you know as soon as the promotion goes live.

#157. Rethink the role of the scrum master. Two recent events—a thought-provoking article by agile coach Maarten Dalmijn and a leave of absence by Matthew, a beloved scrum master in my team—prompted me to question if scrum masters might be overrated.

Comparing scrum teams to sports teams like Ultimate Frisbee, where players self-regulate without referees. Imagine a world where your scrum team operates the same way, holding each other accountable and mastering the game without a dedicated scrum master.

You'll learn about Maarten's controversial stance: in startups and scale-ups with fewer organizational impediments, having a scrum master might be unnecessary overhead. Instead, Martin suggests that with a deep understanding of scrum, your team could self-manage effectively.

I share my own team's bold experiment—replacing a traditional scrum master with a hybrid scrum master-developer. Spearheaded by Sapan, who has extensive experience in both development and scrum, this experiment offers surprising results.

It's not a one-size-fits-all solution for all Power Platform teams. But it does highlight the importance of being open to new practices and continuous experimentation in agile development.

Keep experimenting 🧪

-Neil

RESOURCES

• Maarten Dalmijn on LinkedIn
• Maarten Dalmijn, 'Are Scrum Masters Too Much Overhead?'

#156. Drawing on the book "Mastering Professional Scrum" by Stephanie Ockerman and Simon Reindl, I outline critical areas for team success, such as creating valuable products and understanding organizational influences. I emphasize five core capabilities needed for continuous improvement: teaching, facilitation, coaching, technical excellence, and servant leadership.

I discuss the continuous improvement process recommended by Ockerman and Reindl, which includes self-assessment questionnaires and root cause analysis to address team issues. I highlight the importance of the Scrum pillars—transparency, inspection, and adaptation—and shows how sprint events like planning and review foster a culture of empiricism, allowing teams to run experiments and refine their practices based on real-world outcomes.

Celebrating the traits of high-performing scrum teams, I underscore the significance of being cross-functional, self-managing, and collaborative. I touch upon practices that bolster collaboration within these teams, such as backlog refinement and pair programming, while also stressing the freedom scrum teams have to define their workflows within Scrum guidelines.

You'll also learn about common challenges, such as the absence of key roles during refinement sessions, and recommends using the Five Whys technique to tackle root causes. I provide practical tips like conducting multiple short refinement sessions to prevent release delays.

RESOURCES

• Simon Reindl on LinkedIn
• Stephanie Ockerman on LinkedIn
• Mastering Professional Scrum from Amazon (affiliate)
• Mastering Professional Scrum audiobook on Audible (affiliate)
• Stephanie Ockerman's site, Agile Socks
• Mastering Professional Scrum on InformIT