Rolling out Scrum in an organisation
There is no one solution to rolling out Scrum in an
organisation; every organisation has their own challenges when it
comes to change. However, the wonderful thing about Scrum is that
it is a simple framework, it is easily transferable to others and
positive effects can be quickly felt by everyone involved.
The keys to success lie in good planning, good information,
getting people involved and helping the people grow into filling
the required roles so they can become self sufficient. At
CoreWorks we run a campaign in which we inform, involve, lead,
coach, track and grow people so they can succeed with Scrum.
Inform
When an organisation takes a decision to implement any form of
change it is critical that an clear and simple information is
pushed out into the organisation. This needs to be at all levels of
the organisation
Involve
The most effective way to ensure success in rolling out Scrum in
an organisation is to get people from the organisation involved and
give them ownership of the roll out process. While it is not always
possible to take everyone on board during the planning stage
CoreWorks ensures that everyone that is touched by Scrum has a
chance to attend an introduction to Scrum and to participate in fun
workshops designed to re-enforce Scrum principles and practices
discussed in the introduction to Scrum.
Lead
CoreWorks' experience with Scrum allow us to take the lead
when rolling out Scrum which gives the opportunity for the people
in the organisation to adjust to working with Scrum and to get
comfortable with the process. However, the goal is always to
transfer the lead to the organistaion its self.
Coach
Through coaching and tracking the Scrum Team's progress
CoreWorks helps the organisation to become self sufficient in
running Scrum projects.
Track
CoreWorks tracks the progress of the Scrum Team during the
first few Sprints in order to determine how well the Scrum Team is
working with key areas of the Scrum process. This is done during
the Sprint Retrospective where each Scrum Team member is asked to
complete a short survey originally by Bas Vodde at Nokia Siemens
Networks in Finland - funnily enough called the Nokia Test.
Grow
Using both input from the Sprint Retrospectives and Nokia Test,
CoreWorks helps the Scrum Team grow towards becoming a
hyperproduct team.
A typical roadmap to Scrum
In our experience a typical roll out looks like this:
- Introduce Scrum to and get the backing of senior
management
- Introduce Scrum to and get the backing of managers and project
leaders
- Introduce Scrum to and get the backing of the people who will
form the Scrum Team
- Run Scrum workshops that model the Scrum process e.g. play the
XpGame
- Choose the projects that will be run under Scrum
- Introduce Scrum to the selected customers
- Inform the rest of the organisation about the Scrum
rollout
- Collect and organise the Product Backlog for the selected
projects
- Run Sprint 1 - with 100% involvement from a certified Scrum
Master
- Run Sprint 2 - with 50% involvement from a certified Scrum
Master
- Run Sprint 3 - with possibly 25% with a certified Scrum Master
but most can run solo by this point
- There after it is a good idea to have a certified Scrum Master
come in for the first couple of months just to check the Scrum Team
progress.
One last thing to be prepared for, is the interest from other
areas/departments. Don't be surprised if people want to come by and
ask about Scrum and see it in action so it is always a good idea to
have a 5 minuet introduction to Scrum on hand.