Your Reputation Precedes You

How do scrum masters search for jobs?

Just like anyone else.  We check openings on places like Indeed, Dice, and LinkedIn.  We submit resumes.  We go to interviews.  We network as much as we can.  In fact, we network A LOT.  Most people in the tech industry get jobs based on recommendations from their peers.  Let that sink in for a moment. 

How others perceive you – your reputation - can possibly determine whether or not you get a position you really want.

However, the tech industry is both smaller and larger than you think.  A scrum master’s reputation can either be a great boost to his/her chances for employment, or it can be the biggest hindrance there is.  Take Denver, for instance.  There is a large tech industry here, but as far as metropolises go, it’s also a small place.  Therefore, many people who call Denver Metro their home have worked with each other in some way, shape, or form.   Project managers, developers, testers, system architects… they all may  have worked together at previous companies.

Recruiters know this and leverage social media sites like LinkedIn to dig up any dirt they can while pushing candidates through the hiring process.  I once applied for a job through a recruiter; her client searched for me on LinkedIn and discovered that one of her QA Managers used to work with me.  So, she pumped him for information and even got him to contact me via email.  Because I trusted him, I gave him a little too much info about why I was leaving my then employer, and she decided she didn’t want me after all.  It was sneaky on my former colleague’s part, but it was my fault, too, for not being a little more reserved.  Had my former colleague worked with me beyond one crazy project, he would have known I was a capable leader and scrum master and probably could have defended my position a little better… that is, if he had been so inclined…

My point is this: your reputation can depend on anyone’s perception of you, and ANYONE can gain access to your former colleagues through LinkedIn.   For more reasons than this, you should always conduct yourself in a professional manner.  You never know when a bad day will come back to haunt you. 

In addition, never underestimate the power of cultivating the relationships in your network.  Touch base once in a while just to say hello.  I know that seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people ignore this little gem of social etiquette.  One woman I worked with years ago recently contacted me out of the blue and asked me to critique (aka edit) a cover letter.  She even asked me for a reference.  I hadn’t corresponded with her in over two years.  She didn’t even bother with the niceties of asking about my family or my current job situation.  I told her no on the basis that I hadn’t worked with her in the field for which she was applying.   I also had no time to edit cover letters.  Asking for favors is difficult enough as it is.  Asking for them without having an established relationship is even more so.

Should you continue to leverage your network to gain employment?  Absolutely.  In this Age of Information, however, be proactive in cultivating your reputation AND your relationships.  Make the most of everything, and you’ll increase your chances of landing the job you want.  

Don’t Take Daily Stand-ups for Granted

For the uninitiated, gathering every day for 15 minutes to discuss the goings-on of current work might seem a little redundant and useless.  All the same people say many of the same things over and over again.  But to the experienced, there’s a lot more to it than that.

As I've previously blogged, at my current engagement my team is limited to only two stand-ups per week.  These stand-ups are open to everyone on the team, yet only the same three or four people show up each time.  As a result, communication seems to flow like molasses rather than a swiftly moving mountain stream.   Still, what we have now is far better than the black hole that existed before.  We are still light years from where we COULD be, however.  That old adage “You don’t know what you've got until it’s gone” made me reflect on why daily stand ups are so important. 

Daily stand-ups bring the team together.

This is not just in the physical sense, but in a social sense as well.  It forces the team to connect rather than just code or test away at their desks.  When you’re at a stand-up, you LOOK at your peers.  You interact with them.  You acknowledge them as PEOPLE rather than just the titles they hold.  Of all the purposes of a stand-up, I think this is the most vital because it physically embodies teamwork at its most basic level by forcing us to accept that we work with other people.  This may seem very rudimentary, but you can throw a bunch of people together in a group, and they won’t start becoming a team until they can at first acknowledge one another.  Think on that for a moment.

Daily stand-ups foster communication.

This is a no-brainer since we share what we’re doing with the rest of the team.  Beyond this, however, is the discussion that can spark from the simple phrase “This is what I’m doing today…”  Often, what you’re doing affects the person standing next to you.  I don’t know about you, but I’m not one of those scrum masters who make us adhere to a strict script in our stand-ups.  I give the guidelines and let the team’s discussion blossom.  The stand-ups that diverge from the traditional what-I’m-doing scripts are usually the most productive.  The team sees dependencies.  They strategically plan their work.  They start troubleshooting impediments.  They plan extra meetings for topics needing more in-depth discussion.  These kinds of communications are hard to get started via an email chain or by one-off conversations between isolated teammates.  Face-to-face contact on a regular basis somehow gives the team permission to meet whenever they have a need.   

Daily stand-ups reveal impediments early and often.

When we talk about our impediments in our stand-ups, we are in a sense asking the team for help.  Of course, we’re keeping them aware of issues, but chances are likely that one of our teammates may have dealt with the same problem and can offer a solution.  If they can’t, then perhaps they know who can.

 In my experience, it is also incredibly difficult for the PM/Scrum Master to run down solutions for impediments if they have to do it one person at a time.  This takes too long and can be detrimental to the success of a project.  Letting everyone know at once cuts out the middle man – the PM/Scrum Master – and gives the team a better chance of solving problems as they arise.     

Daily stand-ups create accountability.

If we daily stand together as a team stating our goals and asking for help, then we become accountable to one another.  In those stand-ups we tell each other what we intend to accomplish.  We make a commitment to our teammates in that regard.  Pretty soon teammates learn they can trust one another if everyone meets their commitments.  If you don’t accomplish one day’s goals, then invariably someone at the team level will want to know why.  This sparks discussion and perhaps solutions are born from the temporary setback.  It is better for this to happen at the team level than at the executive level.  If you can’t meet your commitments at the team level, then what makes you think you can meet commitments beyond that?  Your team is depending on you, and you depend on your team.   When we meet our commitments to one another, we make our team stronger.  We establish trust. 

There are no guarantees that you’ll have open, trusting, communicating, or accountable teams just by having a daily stand-up.  However, you have a much better chance of getting there by meeting regularly. 

What are your experiences with daily stand-ups?  Do you find that the more frequent they are, the better?  

Traditional Project Management vs. Agile Project Management: Week 7

How the heck are you supposed to have an up-to-date status of your team’s needs, let alone an up-to-date status of project progress? 

As of last week, we have twice-a-week scrums on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  I can glean only a smattering of what the team is working on at these meetings since said meetings seem to morph into I-have-a-problem or I-can-help-you meetings.  This format is actually great for this team since they aren't communicating otherwise.  I see very little email traffic.  I hear very little of anything, really, and I find that I’m pulling information from reluctant teammates.  I pushed for a daily scrum, but many people – including my project sponsor – balked at that idea. 

So in light of the fact that I was not having any daily meetings until last week (sort of), I resorted to using the weekly status meeting that the project sponsor set up.  I asked how I thought we were tracking and then asked about blocking issues.  To my surprise, the project sponsor wanted these meetings to be about the PM (me) reporting to the team how things were going.  I find this very limited, and I end up getting updates from the team anyway. 

I’m learning that Traditional Project Management is more about going to each person on the team – daily, if need be – and asking them how they’re doing or where they’re at.  While this can be great from a relational standpoint, it can also be detrimental.  The PM eventually becomes a pest in the eyes of his/her teammates instead of being a trusted source of roadblock-removal.   In an environment like the one I’m in, the fact that these teammates are matrixed resources who are far too overloaded doesn't help me when I have to ask them about the status of the project for which I am responsible.  They are not happy to see me, so this immediately drives a wedge between us that is sometimes difficult to pry loose. 

Gathering status one teammate at a time is also a waste.  By the time I get status from everyone, the status of the first person I talked to has changed.  Also, if I hear of roadblocks, then I have to bounce around from person to person to see if I can clear the roadblock before it becomes an issue.  This is why I think daily scrums are so valuable.  We can get everything out of the way all at once and keep the team moving forward one day at a time.    

Don’t even get me started about the tools we’re using to track progress.  We have a very high level project schedule in Smartsheet.  If you aren't familiar, Smartsheet is an MS Project clone that is all online.  We then have a “test control sheet” that lists high level test case names.  (Remember my post a few weeks ago pondering the reasons why I, as a PM, was required to put together a test plan?  Yeah, this “control sheet” was the end result of that.)  On top of the “control sheet,” we have test scripts and individual test plans we’re updating.  I have to peruse all these places to see where things are and then somehow keep track of it.  I've created a private Trello board just to keep all of this straight.  I would much prefer that we had everything tasked out… user stories… something!  This is what we have, though, and I have to work with it.

While I think Traditional Project Management definitely has its place, in the software world, Agile is a much more efficient way of getting things done.   

Traditional Project Management vs. Agile Project Management: Week 5

I love how everyone assumes that the project manager - ME - already knows everything.  I can only wish I was omniscient.

• It is assumed that I know everyone who is responsible for certain test areas.  When I don't and I ask who these people are, I am met with the "duh" look and a brief pause before they answer.  
• It is assumed that I know exactly where to go to get past test scripts and documents, and it is assumed that I will search out said documents for the team... when THEY know where to get them to begin with.  
• It is assumed that I know everyone's schedules and need to set up meetings according to my omniscience.  No. I will not rearrange everyone else's schedule for one person, so please stop asking me to.  
• It is assumed that I already know that the project is going to be late.  My spidey senses tell me this, but as of now I have no empirical data to prove it.

These are just a few examples.  I CANNOT wait for my daily stand-ups to begin with this team! I'll at least have SOME idea what everyone is working on.