Christian Hofstetter: The Product Owner that was too busy to help the Scrum team

From the common and frequent “too busy to help” anti-pattern to the PO that was ready to handle the natural and predictable unpredictability of business. Two contrasting patterns that can make or break the success of the team and the product. 

The Great Product Owner: A PO who is ready for uncertainty

Good Product Owners have a clear Vision and know how to communicate it to the team and stakeholders. However, great Product Owners also are able to understand how to adapt that Vision and evolve it continuously in uncertain market and business conditions.

In this segment, we refer to the concept of VUCA: Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguity.

The Bad Product Owner: Too busy to help the team

One pattern that emerges over and over again is that of the PO who is too busy to help the team succeed. In this episode, Christian shares his own story as a Product Owner, and what he learned about how to step out of the “too busy to help” anti-pattern.

 

Are you having trouble helping the team working well with their Product Owner? We’ve put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at: bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO’s collaborate.

 

About Christian Hofstetter

Christian is an enthusiastic Release Train Engineer, Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, and Facilitator who started his agile journey as a Product Owner. Later he turned his back on technology and focused on people and relationships. He is passionate about creating space for people and teams to be the best they can be.

You can link with Christian Hofstetter on LinkedIn.

Christian Hofstetter: The Flow Retrospective, helping Scrum teams make better decisions

Christian has been thinking hard about the question of what success means for Scrum Masters. He describes how the role of the Scrum Master must have a “risk” perspective, and be about minimizing risk. In this episode, we discuss what that may mean for Scrum Masters and what practices help with that goal.

Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: The Flow Retrospective

Christian shares his idea on “The Flow Retrospective”, which describes and illustrates how Agile software development can help teams reach much higher productivity and predictability. In this retrospective, Christian helps the team analyze and understand flow metrics to help them make better decisions. 

In this segment, we refer to Actionable agile metrics from Dan Vacanti and The #NoEstimates book by Vasco Duarte.

About Christian Hofstetter

Christian is an enthusiastic Release Train Engineer, Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, and Facilitator who started his agile journey as a Product Owner. Later he turned his back on technology and focused on people and relationships. He is passionate about creating space for people and teams to be the best they can be.

You can link with Christian Hofstetter on LinkedIn.

Christian Hofstetter: My journey as a Scrum Master, how to promote the role in your organization

In some organizations, the question that emerges over and over again is: “what’s the value a Scrum Master brings?”

As Scrum Masters, we must be ready to answer this question. Christian found inspiration in the work by Barry Overeem, Chris Verwijs (both previous guests on the podcast), and started to work with his colleagues in defining what an impactful and inspiring Scrum Master role would be at his company. Barry Overeem also published his own journey as a Scrum Master for us to read, and learn from.

About Christian Hofstetter

Christian is an enthusiastic Release Train Engineer, Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, and Facilitator who started his agile journey as a Product Owner. Later he turned his back on technology and focused on people and relationships. He is passionate about creating space for people and teams to be the best they can be.

You can link with Christian Hofstetter on LinkedIn.

Christian Hofstetter: Discovering what drives a blame culture in a Scrum team

Christian was asked to step in and give his insights on how one team was performing. When he joined a Sprint Planning he saw “finger-pointing” and a culture of blame. When he looked deeper he found some of the patterns that were fostering that culture. 

In this episode, we discuss some of the patterns that drive a blame culture. 

Featured Book of the Week: Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux

In Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux, Christian found an explanation that helped him understand how organizations change (and don’t), and what are the cultural models that influence organizations’ evolution. He also understood what “value systems” may help or hinder the change we hope to promote when working as Scrum Masters.

In this segment, we refer to the idea and model of Spiral Dynamics.

About Christian Hofstetter

Christian is an enthusiastic Release Train Engineer, Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, and Facilitator who started his agile journey as a Product Owner. Later he turned his back on technology and focused on people and relationships. He is passionate about creating space for people and teams to be the best they can be.

You can link with Christian Hofstetter on LinkedIn.

Christian Hofstetter: Learning to confront micro-managing managers to help the Scrum team

Christian was working on an Agile transition, helping teams move from traditional project management to Scrum. As it usually happens, someone was trying to micro-manage and control the development team, after all, that’s the default situation in a project management culture. The team tried to push back, but that didn’t work. Christian took it up with the manager himself, confronting him with what was going on. At that time, Christian learned an important lesson: we have to stand for what we think is right. 

In this episode, we talk about the book: Radical Candor by Kim Scott

About Christian Hofstetter

Christian is an enthusiastic Release Train Engineer, Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, and Facilitator who started his agile journey as a Product Owner. Later he turned his back on technology and focused on people and relationships. He is passionate about creating space for people and teams to be the best they can be.

You can link with Christian Hofstetter on LinkedIn.

Get The Booklet!
How to deliver on time and eliminate scope creep By scoping projects around outcomes and impacts, not requirements!
Get the Product Owner Booklet!
Avoid scope creep! And learn to scope projects around impacts and outcomes, not requirements!
Get These Valuable Lessons Today!
Down-to-earth, hard-earned Scrum Masters lessons and the Tips from the Trenches e-book table of contents, delivered by email
Enter e-mail to download a clickable PO Cheat Sheet
This handy Coach Your PO cheat-sheet includes questions to help you define the problem, and links to handy, easy techniques to help you coach your Product Owner
Enter e-mail to download a clickable PO Cheat Sheet
This handy Coach Your PO cheat-sheet includes questions to help you define the problem, and links to handy, easy techniques to help you coach your Product Owner
Enter e-mail to download a checklist to help your PO manage their time
This simple checklist and calendar handout, with a coaching article will help you define the minimum enagement your PO must have with the team
Enter e-mail to download a checklist to help your PO manage their time
This simple checklist and calendar handout, with a coaching article will help you define the minimum enagement your PO must have with the team
Internal Conference
Checklist
Internal Conference
Checklist
Download a detailed How-To to help measure success for your team
Motivate your team with the right metrics, and the right way to visualize and track them. Marcus presents a detailed How-To document based on his experience at The Bungsu Hospital
Download a detailed How-To to help measure success for your team
Read about Visualization and TRANSFORM The way your team works
A moving story of how work at the Bungsu Hospital was transformed by a simple tool that you can use to help your team.
Read about Visualization and TRANSFORM The way your team works
A Quick & Practical Guide to Agile Projects for BI
No Spam. Only your book. And you can unsubscribe any time.
Start Reading Now