Leadership Red Flag—When Managers Care More About Career Than Team Success | Lilia Pulova

Carmen Jurado: Lean Change Management, How to Design Change with Those Affected 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. Carmen discusses the critical mistakes organizations make when implementing change without adequate communication and employee involvement. She highlights how employees are often simply informed of new methods without any prior communication, creating resistance and disengagement. Carmen advocates for involving employees early in the change process, suggesting that representatives participate in the design phase and provide feedback on change plans. She emphasizes that Scrum Masters can grow by facilitating this involvement, encouraging co-creation of change through approaches like Lean Change Management. Carmen also shares a practical tip: involve your biggest critics in the change design, transforming them from obstacles into co-creators of the solution. Self-reflection Question: How might you better involve team members in designing change processes rather than simply announcing changes to them? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Carmen Jurado Carmen describes herself as an "agile storyteller" and has spoken at multiple agile conferences, covering topics such as psychological safety and imposter syndrome. Known for her enthusiasm and creativity, Carmen enjoys designing her own gamified retrospectives. She is an agile coach and business agility trainer, and is also active in the non-profit organization Women in Agile. You can link with Carmen on LinkedIn.

30 Huhti 202515min

Carmen Jurado: The Power of Being Heard, Turning Critics Into Agile Advocates 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. Carmen shares how she was asked to step in as a Scrum Master for a struggling team that had a particularly vocal and critical lead developer. This developer had experienced multiple transitions and transformations, leading to significant resistance that was affecting the entire team's morale and creating unresolved conflicts. Carmen focused on building individual relationships with each team member and setting clear expectations. She discovered that the lead developer simply didn't feel heard. By listening and addressing these concerns, Carmen was able to transform her biggest critic into one of her strongest advocates. She emphasizes that resistance is often a sign of loyalty to something else and that understanding this can help transform a dysfunctional team into a high-performing one. Self-reflection Question: How might you address resistance in your team by focusing on individual relationships and understanding what team members feel loyal to? Featured Book of the Week: Joy Inc. by Richard Sheridan Carmen recommends Joy Inc. by Richard Sheridan, highlighting its practical insights for creating a motivating and enjoyable workplace. The book covers everything from hiring practices to team collaboration and experimentation, yet never explicitly mentions "Agile." Carmen appreciates the inspiring stories about understanding users in their environment and how these principles can be applied to create better working environments. [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Carmen Jurado Carmen describes herself as an "agile storyteller" and has spoken at multiple agile conferences, covering topics such as psychological safety and imposter syndrome. Known for her enthusiasm and creativity, Carmen enjoys designing her own gamified retrospectives. She is an agile coach and business agility trainer, and is also active in the non-profit organization Women in Agile. You can link with Carmen on LinkedIn.

29 Huhti 202517min

Carmen Jurado: Scrum Masters, Your Team Needs to Know Which Hat You're Wearing 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. Carmen shares a valuable learning experience from her early days as a Scrum Master when she was assigned the additional responsibility of being a compliance officer for her team. During a retrospective, she noticed an uncomfortable atmosphere but didn't address it. After the session, the team requested a private meeting where they expressed their discomfort, explaining they weren't clear when Carmen was acting as their Scrum Master versus when she was enforcing compliance. This experience taught Carmen the critical importance of explicitly stating which role she was performing at any given moment and creating an environment where team members feel safe to provide honest feedback. Self-reflection Question: How clearly do you communicate your different roles and responsibilities to your team, and have you created an environment where they feel comfortable giving you direct feedback? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Carmen Jurado Carmen describes herself as an "agile storyteller" and has spoken at multiple agile conferences, covering topics such as psychological safety and imposter syndrome. Known for her enthusiasm and creativity, Carmen enjoys designing her own gamified retrospectives. She is an agile coach and business agility trainer, and is also active in the non-profit organization Women in Agile. You can link with Carmen on LinkedIn.

28 Huhti 202516min

Chris Sims: The Empathy Advantage, How Great POs Connect Teams with Users 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. The Great Product Owner: Deep Market Knowledge Creates Team Empathy Brad exemplifies a truly effective Product Owner through his exceptional understanding of end users and customers in the investment management space. What sets Brad apart is not just his deep domain knowledge, but his established relationships with gatekeepers at customer organizations. These connections provide valuable insights that inform product decisions. Most importantly, Brad regularly spends time with the development team, helping them empathize with stakeholders and understand the real-world impact of their work. His user stories consistently focus on actual users and why the requested features matter, creating clear context for developers and fostering meaningful connections between technical work and business outcomes. The Bad Product Owner: The Disempowered Proxy Problem Chris identifies a common anti-pattern: the disempowered proxy Product Owner. This situation occurs when someone performs the day-to-day PO responsibilities for the team, but lacks true authority to make decisions. Instead, an unseen "real PO" holds ultimate control and can swoop in at any time to change priorities or requirements. This arrangement quickly erodes team trust as they realize the proxy must continually defer decisions, creating delays and uncertainty. Chris suggests either empowering the proxy with more decision-making authority while keeping stakeholders appropriately involved, or having the higher-level PO commit to spending sufficient time with the team to fulfill the true Product Owner role themselves. Self-reflection Question: How might you identify and address power imbalances in the Product Owner role within your organization? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator. Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Chris Sims Chris Sims is a scrum trainer, agile coach, and recovering C++ developer who helps organizations improve their productivity and happiness. Chris is the founder of Agile Learning Labs and the co-author of two best-selling scrum books: The Elements of Scrum and Scrum: a Breathtakingly Brief and Agile Introduction. You can link with Chris Sims on LinkedIn, visit Chris Sims' Agile Learning Labs website.

25 Huhti 202516min

Chris Sims: Dual Focus, Balancing Agile Team Health with Value Delivery 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. For Chris Sims, success as a Scrum Master centers on two critical outcomes: creating healthier, happier work environments and helping teams deliver more value. Chris emphasizes that Scrum is only valuable if it helps achieve these fundamental goals. He suggests using surveys to assess team health and happiness, tracking how often team members ask each other for help, and evaluating whether daily scrums focus on problem-solving rather than status reporting. Regarding value delivery, Chris cautions against measuring the wrong things (like velocity) which can drive counterproductive behaviors. Instead, he recommends tracking how frequently teams deliver to stakeholders, having meaningful discussions about business value, and ensuring stakeholder involvement in sprint reviews to better align with what truly matters to the organization. In this segment, we refer to Chris Sims' articles on Business Value Myths, and Measuring Value With Product Hypothesis. Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: The Dixit Retrospective Chris shares an innovative retrospective format based on the card game Dixit. In this approach, teams use the game's evocative picture cards to help describe their experiences during the sprint. The visual nature of these cards engages team members in a completely different way compared to traditional retrospectives, encouraging creative thinking and alternative perspectives. Chris notes that this format is particularly effective because it creates space for everyone to think before speaking, which helps balance participation between extroverts and more reflective team members. This retrospective technique can uncover insights that might not emerge in more conventional discussion formats. Self-reflection Question: How might you better balance measuring team health with measuring value delivery in your definition of success? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator. Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Chris Sims Chris Sims is a scrum trainer, agile coach, and recovering C++ developer who helps organizations improve their productivity and happiness. Chris is the founder of Agile Learning Labs and the co-author of two best-selling scrum books: The Elements of Scrum and Scrum: a Breathtakingly Brief and Agile Introduction. You can link with Chris Sims on LinkedIn, visit Chris Sims' Agile Learning Labs website.

24 Huhti 202517min

Chris Sims: Middle Management, The Forgotten Layer in Agile Transformations 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. Chris Sims recounts his experience with a rapidly growing startup that decided to adopt Scrum to address slowing delivery. When a VP championed the initiative, Chris provided training that generated excitement at the team level. However, they overlooked a critical component: the middle management layer. As teams embraced Scrum, they found themselves caught between multiple sources of direction—their direct managers, project managers, and newly established Product Owners with backlogs. This created confusion as middle managers, who weren't included in the transformation discussions, continued operating in their traditional ways. The result was teams appearing busy yet delivering slowly. Chris emphasizes the importance of considering how management roles evolve during agile transformations, deliberately redefining job descriptions, and helping managers find ways to bring value in the new structure rather than undermining it unintentionally. Self-reflection Question: In your organization's agile transformation, how are you addressing the needs and concerns of middle managers whose roles might be significantly impacted? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator. Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Chris Sims Chris Sims is a scrum trainer, agile coach, and recovering C++ developer who helps organizations improve their productivity and happiness. Chris is the founder of Agile Learning Labs and the co-author of two best-selling scrum books: The Elements of Scrum and Scrum: a Breathtakingly Brief and Agile Introduction. You can link with Chris Sims on LinkedIn, visit Chris Sims' Agile Learning Labs website.

23 Huhti 202517min

Chris Sims: The Hidden Cost of "No Time for People Stuff" in Software Teams 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. Chris Sims shares a challenging team situation involving strong personalities with conflicting opinions about how to approach their work. What began as small disagreements evolved into harmful behaviors including harsh criticisms and behind-the-back comments. As resentment grew, conflicts intensified, leading to a toxic environment that ultimately resulted in team members being dismissed. Chris highlights how the team's self-imposed belief that "we don't have time for this people-stuff" prevented them from addressing issues early. He recommends one-on-one coaching, exploring why people react as they do, using retrospectives to address latent conflicts, and explicitly discussing desired team culture with reference to the Scrum value of respect. Chris emphasizes that maintaining team health should take priority over productivity concerns, even during high-pressure situations. In this segment, we refer to the Core Protocols episode with Richard Kasperowski, and the Superchicken Paradox Ted Talk by Margaret Heffernan. Featured Book of the Week: The Elements of Scrum Chris shares his experience writing "The Elements of Scrum," a book he co-authored using Scrum principles and a story mapping approach. The process of writing the book became a significant learning experience for Chris. He also recommends "Sacred Hoops" by Phil Jackson, which explores how to manage teams of great professionals. Phil Jackson is renowned for his ability to get exceptional players to function effectively as a cohesive team, making this book particularly valuable for those managing talented individuals with strong personalities. Self-reflection Question: How might you better balance technical excellence with interpersonal dynamics in your high-performing teams? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator. Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Chris Sims Chris Sims is a scrum trainer, agile coach, and recovering C++ developer who helps organizations improve their productivity and happiness. Chris is the founder of Agile Learning Labs and the co-author of two best-selling scrum books: The Elements of Scrum and Scrum: a Breathtakingly Brief and Agile Introduction. You can link with Chris Sims on LinkedIn, visit Chris Sims' Agile Learning Labs website.

22 Huhti 202516min

Chris Sims: When Terminology Creates Misunderstandings, The "Ideal Days" Story 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. In this insightful episode, Chris Sims shares a valuable lesson from his early days implementing XP and Scrum. Chris's team had established an effective workflow using relative estimation with "ideal days" rather than story points, achieving good predictability and velocity measurements. However, things took an unexpected turn when a skeptical VP discovered their tracking spreadsheet and misinterpreted their metrics as showing only 2.5 days of work per week. Despite Chris's best efforts to explain the concept of "ideal days," the misunderstanding tarnished the team's reputation. Chris emphasizes the importance of socializing your working methods with stakeholders and communicating in ways meaningful to leadership. Working "under the radar" can backfire, so transparency about your processes is crucial for organizational alignment and trust. Self-reflection Question: How transparent are you about your team's estimation methods with stakeholders who might not be familiar with agile terminology? [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] 🚀 Global Agile Summit 2025 Join us in Tallinn, Estonia, from May 18th – 20th, 2025, for an event that will inspire, challenge, and equip you with real-world Agile success stories. 🌍 Connect with global Agile leaders. 💡 Learn practical strategies for impact. 🔥 Break free from Agile fatigue and become a Pragmatic Innovator. Check Full Program [Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends] About Chris Sims Chris Sims is a scrum trainer, agile coach, and recovering C++ developer who helps organizations improve their productivity and happiness. Chris is the founder of Agile Learning Labs and the co-author of two best-selling scrum books: The Elements of Scrum and Scrum: a Breathtakingly Brief and Agile Introduction. You can link with Chris Sims on LinkedIn.

21 Huhti 202521min