Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile storytelling from the trenches

How Performance Reviews Killed a Great Agile Team | Joel Bancroft-Connors

Jun 3, 2025

Joel Bancroft-Connors, known as The Gorilla Coach, dives into the pitfalls of performance reviews in Agile teams. He shares a cautionary tale of a thriving team that was derailed by individual metrics and misaligned goals during a large-scale transformation. Joel emphasizes the importance of balancing performance evaluations between team and individual contributions. He also highlights the transformative power of understanding the 'why' behind Scrum, inspired by Simon Sinek’s insights, to foster collaboration and elevate team success.

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INSIGHT

Start With Why Changed Scrum Teaching

Joel Bancroft-Connors realized he was teaching Scrum incorrectly by focusing on mechanics rather than purpose.
Teaching why Scrum matters inspires people to use it, more than teaching how to do it.

ANECDOTE

Agile Transformation Fail Story

Joel worked with an agile team in a large insurance company caught in a poorly supported scaled agile transformation.
The CTO promoted agile then disengaged, leaving teams measured by output not outcomes, causing flow interruptions and frustration.

INSIGHT

Measurement and Reviews Harm Teams

Focusing on metrics like teams trained ignores the real goal of how teams work and feel.
Individual-focused performance reviews led team members to compete and undermine collaboration.

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Joel Bancroft-Connors: How Performance Reviews Killed a Great Agile Team

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Agile and Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes.

Joel tells the story of a team caught in the crossfire of a poorly executed large-scale agile transformation. While the CTO championed going agile, they quickly checked out, leaving the organization without clear direction or understanding of why they were adopting agile practices. The company measured success through output metrics like "number of teams trained" rather than meaningful outcomes. Joel worked with an exceptional team that had built their own collaborative workspace and was performing well, but external forces kept pulling them out of flow. Performance reviews created internal conflict, leading team members to focus on individual success rather than collective achievement. The team ultimately fell into their own traps, with everyone "focusing on themselves and throwing others under the bus." Joel recommends balancing performance evaluations with 50% team-based and 50% individual metrics to prevent this destructive pattern.

Self-reflection Question: Does your team truly understand why they are using Scrum, or are they just going through the motions of the framework?

Featured Book of the Week: Start with Why by Simon Sinek

Joel credits Simon Sinek's "Start with Why" as a transformational influence on his coaching approach. The book's central principle that "people don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it" fundamentally changed how Joel teaches Scrum. He realized he had been teaching Scrum incorrectly by focusing on the mechanics rather than the purpose. Now Joel listens to this book annually and has shifted his focus to helping teams and organizations understand why Scrum matters and why it's important. This shift from teaching the "what" to emphasizing the "why" has made his coaching significantly more effective and meaningful.

Joel also mentions the book Coaching Agile Teams by Lyssa Adkins.

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About Joel Bancroft-Connors

Joel Bancroft-Connors is The Gorilla Coach — a Certified Scrum Trainer and Agile disruptor focused on sustainable value and effectiveness. With a background in product, project, and coaching, Joel blends sharp insights with practical tools to help teams thrive. He is a Miro power user and rocks curated classroom playlists.

You can link with Joel Bancroft-Connors on LinkedIn.