Team Disagree? Try a Lunch and Learn - Mike Cohn

If you’re like many of the Scrum teams I work with, your team members might have learned about Scrum in very different ways and at very different times. Some people might be self taught, others might have taken a CSM course 15 years ago, still others might have taken their first Scrum class last week.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Diversity of thought is an excellent quality for teams to have.
But it can become problematic when everyone believes their approach to some agile principle or Scrum practice is the “one true way”. Meanwhile agile leaders, HR, and others outside the team are still trying to figure out what Scrum even is.
Sound familiar? I’m betting it does.
Here’s something you can do right away to help. Host a lunch and learn on whatever topic has your team at odds.
 

• Maybe it’s “What are story points?”
• Maybe it’s “How many items do we bring into a sprint?”
• Maybe it’s “Do we have to have a sprint goal?”

Need to add a little authority to your discussion? Share the linked videos above as part of the lunch and learn. I regularly cover those topics (and more) out on my YouTube channel in short videos (typically 3-8 minutes).
My next few email tips are going to cover a few of the common ways teams get twisted when they can’t agree on what “being agile” or “doing scrum” means. If you’ve got a specific issue, reply to this email and let me know. I’ll do my best to cover it. Getting your teams on the same page is a fundamental way to succeed with agile.

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