ScrumAs a thinking toolkit

@cgosimonSimon Bennett

What is Scrum?

Why are we here?

10 years of Agile

15-25 years of “Scrum”

How’s it working out for you?

Beyond Software

Scrum vsScrum thinking

Sense Making

The Cynefin Framework

Simple(The Known)

Complicated(The Knowable)

Ordered Dom

ainsU

nord

ered

Dom

ains

Disorder

Complex

Chaotic

Cause & EffectObvious, predictable& repeatable

Cause & EffectSeparated by space & time and/or requiring analysis or expertise

Cause & EffectOnly coherent in retrospect, but not repeatable

Cause & Effectnot perceivable

Now you try it

Simple(The Known)

Complicated(The Knowable)

Disorder

Complex

Chaotic

Cause & EffectObvious, predictable& repeatable

Cause & EffectSeparated by space & time and/or requiring analysis or expertise

Cause & EffectOnly coherent in retrospect, but not repeatable

Cause & Effectnot perceivable

Movie Plots

TheMatrix

PulpFiction

GosfordPark

Star WarsClockworkOrange

Simple

ComplicatedComplex

Chaotic

Animal Behaviours

AnimalsSleeping

TermiteMounds

MigrationPatterns

AnimalsFeeding

BeachingWhales

Simple

ComplicatedComplex

Chaotic

Domain Effective Structures

Simple

ComplicatedComplex

ChaoticStrong Central

Weak Distributed

Strong Central

Strong Distributed

Weak CentralStrong Distributed

Weak Central

Weak Distributed

What strategies are effective in each

domain?

•Legitimate “Best Practice”•Standard Operating Procedures•Process re-engineering

•Analytical / Reductionist•Scenario Planning•Systems Thinking

•Pattern Management•Perspective Filters•Complex Adaptive Systems

Simple

ComplicatedComplex

Chaotic

•Stability-focused intervention•Enactment tools•Crisis management

Sense ➠Categorise ➠Respond

Sense ➠Analyse ➠Respond

Probe ➠Sense ➠ Respond

Simple

ComplicatedComplex

Chaotic

Act ➠Sense ➠ Respond

Example

What’s our objective?A complicated problem?Or a complex one?

What’s this got to do with Scrum?

Scrum was intended as a framework for

Product Development in the Complex Problem Space

Heuristics for managing Complex Systems

• Finely grained objects

• Distributed cognition

• Disintermediation

Finely Grained Objects

• Small Teams

• Scale by adding teams as “objects”

• Run many small disposable experiments

Proximity & connectivity of agents has high impactMeaning emerges through interaction

Distributed Cognition

• “Requisite perspective variety”

• e.g: A Cross Functional Team

• Stimulate the socialisation of Tacit knowledge

• e.g. Stand Up Meetings

• Perspective Filters

• e.g: The Separation of What from How

Disintermediation

• Decision makers get immediate & direct visibility of the raw results of successful experiments and can provide direct feedback to the Agents in the system

• e.g. Sprint Review

Scrum is an implementation of aProbe ➠ Sense ➠ Respond

Framework

Complexity Strategy Scrum Implementation

Probe Proposal Backlog Creation /Grooming

Probe Design Sprint Planning

Probing Work / Daily Scrum

Sensing Sprint Review

Respond New Backlog Item Creation

Co-evolution Attractor Sprint Retrospective

Probes need to be “safe fail”

Safe Fail in Scrum

• Safe Fail more often than not relates to dollars rather than actual safety

• A fixed team + Timeboxed Sprint = fixed cost (financial & opportunity)

• Decomposition of backlog items to fit inside a Sprint makes all probes in Scrum “safe fail” by default

Enter the Product Owner

But to be sure, we better make sure the person approving which probes get executed is spending their own money

The Extended Will

$100 today?Or $110 tomorrow?

What movies are on your bucket list?

...but what are you really going to watch

on Friday?

(Netflix has the metrics!)

Hyperbolic Discounting

The Sprint Commitment

A form of extended will

The ScrumMaster

Is another form of extended will

By their very nature, complex problems often require

innovative solutions...

Innovation

• Starvation

• Pressure

• Perspective Shift

Three necessary, but not sufficient conditions:

The Sprint Mechanism attempts to favour these conditions to occur...

Condition Sprint Mechanism

Starvation Fixed team, fixed time

PressureFixed Time, tight

commitment, daily cadence

Perspective ShiftCognitive Friction,

Inspiring PO’sSolution Focussing

Done?

“For each experiment to be valid its outcome must be observable, not to measure

necessarily but to allow the simple rule of amplification or dampening of good or bad

patterns to be put into operation.”

Designing Safe Fail Probes - Snowden 2009

Done == Experiment Complete

In the genuine Complex Problem Space

It also provide additional “innovation favouring Pressure”

It’s the only really meaningful measure

Pattern Management

• Every system produces Outcomes at a certain rate of Output, both of which are co-evolving along with the Agents that produced them

• Because of the loose coupling between cause & effect it makes sense once again to apply a perspective filter

Separating Concerns

• Discerning Outcomes is a distinct skill from discerning Output patterns

• The ScrumMaster / PO divide

• Each senses patterns made apparent by probes, then seeks to amplify or dampen based on desirability of what emerges

Human beings are pattern spotters

Not information processors

Can you spot the pattern?

Pattern Entrainment

...and its effect on interpreting practices

Revolution vs Evolution

Evolution

Simple

Complicated

Disorder

Complex

Chaotic

IncrementalImprovement

Exploration

JIT Transfer(exploitation)

Revolution

Simple

Complicated

Disorder

Complex

Chaotic

EntrainmentBreaking

Liberation

Beyond the Obvious

Failing & Succeeding with Scrum

Becoming a Chef

Thanks!

Sense MakerCoachTrainerLASTing Benefits

Simon Bennetthttp://uk.linkedin.com/in/bennettsimon

Twitter: @cgosimon

Some References

A Leader’s Framework for Decision Making

Tim Hartford TED Talk: The God Complex