complexity Archives - Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast

BONUS: Learning what makes a great place to work with Woody Zuill and Yves Hanoulle

The idea for this episode started with a conversation with Yves and Woody when recording one chapter for the Tips from the Trenches Audiobook (check out the audiobook). In this episode, we talk about, and try to define what makes a great place to work, or as Woody calls them: wonderful places to work!

Woody starts by describing two different workplaces, one that was “wonderful”, and one that was not. We explore what the differences were between those two places, and what we can learn from those stories as Scrum Masters.

As Scrum Masters, our role is to help our teams, and our organizations move towards a better place to work, therefore these lessons are critical for us to act on.

In this segment, we refer to MobProgramming, an approach to teamwork that Woody has been talking and writing about for some years; and Cynefin, a model that tries to describe the differences between different levels of complexity, and defines certain strategies for managing different types of work.

“Turn up the good” a heuristic to build great places to work

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BONUS: Highlights of the Scrum Master Summit 2022 with the track hosts Kjell de Ruiter and Ari-Pekka Skarp

In this podcast we explore some of the main highlights from the Scrum Master Summit 2022 with track hosts Kjell de Ruiter and Ari-Pekka Skarp.

We also name the remaining track hosts and the other tracks that you can check out at https://scrummastersummit.org/. Those include:

Dana Pylayeva, will host the coaching track at the summit, where we explore some of the hard lessons we need to be aware of when adopting coaching in our practice
Ayodeji Ishola, hosts a track on the state of Agile in the African continent, and will be showcasing talks that address the cultural specific aspects of Agile in Africa
Mariana Trigo, will have 6 sessions on career advice for Scrum Masters and hiring advice for those hiring Scrum Masters. She’ll have a special focus on how you can get into the Scrum Master role even if you don’t have a tech background.
Yves Hanoulle, the co-author of the Tips from The trenches audiobook, hosts a track on Hybrid work, very topical now that we have our teams remote most of the time
Martin von Weissenberg, will share patterns of scaled agile. Not the frameworks we always hear about, but rather practical, down-to-earth advice for specific needs when we scale agile

Accepting and learning to deal with Social Complexity in Agile adoption

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BONUS: Social Complexity and the work of the Scrum Master with Jurgen Appelo and Ari-Pekka skarp

Social Complexity is a topic that does not get enough attention in the Agile community. Even if Social Complexity has been studied for a long time and has a significant influence on the study of groups, and society at large, we seem to have dropped it, or even missed it’s importance in the world of Agile.

Agile organizations, and agile teams are a prime subject for the use of tools and methods from Social Complexity research. So what do we need to learn from that field in our roles as Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches

What is Social Complexity? A primer for Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches

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Nilesh Makan: The future of Change Management in Agile organizations (warning: advanced topics!)

Often we refer to Change “management”, however, managing change in practice is very difficult. When we think of “change” as a normal path of evolution, however, things change. The metaphor helps us discover new approaches and possibilities. In this episode, we explore how thinking about change as an evolution changes the work we do as Scrum Masters and change agents.

In this segment we talk about the books Theory U by C. Otto Scharmer, Knowledge for Action by Argyris; and we refer to Systems Thinking and some of the thinkers that influenced the Agile movement: Ari-Pekka Skarp, Esko Kilpi, Ralph Stacey.

About Nilesh Makan

Nilesh is the founding Director at Padawan Consulting, where the vision is to build transformed businesses through transformed people. He works with companies in the arena of Digital Transformation, considering how to leverage people, process and technology to design and build innovative solutions.

You can link with Nilesh Makan on LinkedIn and connect with Nilesh Makan on Twitter.

SPECIAL XMAS BONUS: Human Business and Business Agility with Thomas Juli

Thomas’ perspective on business starts with the idea that businesses exist to generate value for people. The ones inside, as well as outside the business.

As he started the book, he realized that the digital age had transformed our ideas about what being human in that medium was all about. He set out to write about what it meant to be humn in the digital age. However, that was just the start of the book.

In that first part of the book, Thomas explores questions such as “am I a resource?”, a very common question we hear when we talk to teams.

This exploration leads to the realization that businesses have to generate value for customers, stakeholders, but also (and critically) for employees.

The needed transformation of business on the path to Business Agility

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