impediments: silent killer of agile teams
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Impediments: Silent killer of agile teams Pooja Wandile
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I did xxx, I will do
yyy
I did xyz, I will do abc, I
don’t ve impediments
I did ssss, I will do
zzzz
I did xxx, I will do yyy but the
UX design is still awaited
I did ….., I will
do ,,,,,
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So, what is an Impediment?
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A blocker, an obstacle, an issue or a barrier that can block or slow down a team's progress and not help them being productive
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Local impediments Inadequate skills Slow or unstable builds High tech debt Third party dependency Ineffective tools integration
Global/organization impediments Insufficient training Appraisal policies Conflicts and politics Delayed decisions Inadequate infrastructure
Types/Examples of impediments
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Why raise impediments?
• Get out of the endless loop of impediments
• Enable the team to deal with issues early
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Where are impediments hidden?
Slow or no movement of tasks Waiting for instructions
Mindset and Attitude Infrastructure
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Unable to realize ‘something’ as an impediment. You cannot fix problems until you know they exist.
‘Culture fabric’ of the teamFear of being perceived as ineffective/incompetent‘Working on it, No need to discuss’Behavior issueNot serious enough to become an impedimentWaterfall to agile transformation
Difficulty in raising impediments
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Hunting ground
• Daily Scrum• Sprint Reviews• Scrum of Scrums• Sprint Retrospectives• Agile Maturity Assessment• Metrics
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Impediment impact diagram
By Ken Power
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Levels of impediment management
Team members resolve issues
Scrum Master gets involved
Scrum Master can escalate to Scrum of Scrums
Escalated to executive stakeholders
Can get escalated to inter group stakeholders
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Whose responsibility it is?
Team members, Scrum Master, Management
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Speak outTrust is importantPrioritize issues by impact on valueBe sympathetic, especially with new teamsImpediments are real, don’t turn a blind eyeEscalate earlyPut a process in placeDefine and track impediment metrics
Lessons learned
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Never hide impediments, escalate if not resolved in 1 working dayImportantly, make the impediments visible using impediment boardDon’t let the impediment backlog growDiscuss the root cause of the impediment during retrospection meetingDifferentiate between local and global impediments, some impediments
are beyond your controlDon't always depend on the Scrum master to resolve the impedimentEffectively manage impediments by logging, prioritizing and
systematically addressing themUse metrics such as turnaround time for managing impediments
Few tips
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Thank You!!!@poojawkhttps://in.linkedin.com/in/pooja-wandile