Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile storytelling from the trenches

Zvonimir Durcevic: How Feedback Transforms Product Owners 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: Embracing Feedback and Adapting Over Time  Zvonimir shares his experience with a Product Owner who demonstrated exceptional growth over a two-year period. What made this PO stand out was their willingness to receive feedback from the team and adjust their behavior accordingly. When the team expressed difficulty accessing the PO for questions and early feedback, the PO responded by rearranging their schedule to sit near the team part-time. Zvone emphasizes how these incremental changes, driven by openness to feedback, transformed this person into an exemplary Product Owner. The key insight: great Product Owners honor past practices while embracing necessary changes for the future. Self-reflection Question: How might your willingness (or reluctance) to accept feedback be affecting your development as a Product Owner? The Bad Product Owner: The Reluctant Subject Matter Expert In this segment, Zvonimir describes working with a Subject Matter Expert who was assigned the Product Owner role despite not wanting the responsibility. While this person excelled at documenting requirements from their extensive knowledge, they resisted taking on core PO duties. The organization assigned them the role but didn't push for proper adoption of responsibilities. Consequently, the team and Scrum Master were forced to assume PO duties to fill the gap. Although this arrangement functioned temporarily thanks to the team's capabilities and the SME's knowledge, it created an unsustainable situation where role accountability was unclear. [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 Zvonimir Durcevic Zvonimir has worked in agile product development since 2005, holding roles such as Scrum Master, Agile Coach, IT Project, and R&D Manager. He works with teams to co-create tailored solutions to increase engagement and improve customer focus and effectiveness, enabling accelerated value delivery and rapid adaptation to change. You can link with Zvonimir Durcevic on LinkedIn.

4 Apr 17min

Zvonimir Durcevic: The Solution-Focused Retrospective for Agile Teams, Turning Problems Into Goals 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. Zvonimir defines Scrum Master success as being explicit and intentional about defining and achieving goals. He references Richard Hackmann's model of team effectiveness as a framework to evaluate whether he's helping teams become truly effective. For Zvone, success comes from creating structures that provide teams with feedback about their performance and being explicit about the team's purpose through practices like chartering. By focusing on these elements, Scrum Masters can help teams build the foundation for sustainable success. Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Problems Are Disguised Goals This solution-focused retrospective format, inspired by the work of Ralph Miata and Veronika Jungwirth, allows teams to briefly acknowledge problems before pivoting quickly to what they want to achieve instead. Zvonimir explains that while teams need space to express challenges, the format redirects energy toward envisioning a better future through solution-focused questions. The process includes validating problems, using scale questions (0-10) to assess current status, reviewing past attempts at reaching goals, and designing small experiments to move toward desired outcomes. This approach helps teams shift from problem-orientation to goal-orientation. Self-reflection Question: How might reframing your team's persistent problems as goals change your approach to addressing 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 Zvonimir Durcevic Zvonimir has worked in agile product development since 2005, holding roles such as Scrum Master, Agile Coach, IT Project, and R&D Manager. He works with teams to co-create tailored solutions to increase engagement and improve customer focus and effectiveness, enabling accelerated value delivery and rapid adaptation to change. You can link with Zvonimir Durcevic on LinkedIn.

3 Apr 17min

Zvonimir Durcevic: From Command to Collaboration, An Agile Leadership Team's Transformation 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 episode, Zvonimir discusses his experience supporting a leadership team transitioning from a traditional command-and-control management style to a more collaborative approach involving people in change decisions. Drawing from EDGE Theory of Change (based on Arnold Mendel's work) and Organization and Relationship Systems Coaching (ORSC) training, Zvone helped the leadership team understand what awaited them on the "other side" of this transformation. Through multiple half-day coaching sessions, he guided them in defining their new leadership identity and developing self-reflection skills. A critical element of this work was creating a conflict protocol that allowed leaders to discuss different perspectives constructively. Zvone emphasizes the importance of helping teams create a "third identity" – a new collective self that emerges through transformation. Self-reflection Question: What elements of your current leadership identity would you need to let go of to embrace a more collaborative approach to change? [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 Zvonimir Durcevic Zvonimir has worked in agile product development since 2005, holding roles such as Scrum Master, Agile Coach, IT Project, and R&D Manager. He works with teams to co-create tailored solutions to increase engagement and improve customer focus and effectiveness, enabling accelerated value delivery and rapid adaptation to change. You can link with Zvonimir Durcevic on LinkedIn.

2 Apr 16min

Zvonimir Durcevic: Context Diagramming, Helping Agile Teams See Their Complex Communication Network 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. Zvonimir shares a story about a five-person team developing an important product who maintained good internal dynamics but limited their interaction with the rest of the organization. Despite delivering quality work, they were viewed as a "difficult team" by stakeholders. When Zvone joined, he conducted assessments and introduced context diagramming to map the team's relationships and dependencies. This exercise revealed the complexity of their communication network and helped the team understand that cutting off relationships with stakeholders was counterproductive. The breakthrough came when the team began using the context diagram to explain their situation to others, helping stakeholders recognize how organizational factors were affecting the team's work. Self-reflection Question: How might mapping your team's communication network reveal disconnects that are affecting your effectiveness? Featured Book of the Week: Agile Transformation by Michael Spayd Zvonimir recommends "Agile Transformation" by Michael Spayd as a resource that helped him understand how to examine systems through different lenses. The book provides multiple perspectives for gaining deeper insights into the systems we work with. Zvone particularly values the book’s ability to help practitioners look beyond surface-level issues and understand underlying dynamics in organizations undergoing Agile transformations. In this section we talk about the Integral agile transformation framework. [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 Zvonimir Durcevic Zvonimir has worked in agile product development since 2005, holding roles such as Scrum Master, Agile Coach, IT Project, and R&D Manager. He works with teams to co-create tailored solutions to increase engagement and improve customer focus and effectiveness, enabling accelerated value delivery and rapid adaptation to change. You can link with Zvonimir Durcevic on LinkedIn.

1 Apr 18min

Zvonimir Durcevic: Establishing Communication Channels, Lessons From a Scrum Master's Failure  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 episode, Zvonimir shares a pivotal experience that shaped his approach as a Scrum Master. His team started strong with excellent stakeholder relationships, but gradually team members began missing refinement meetings as they took on more outside responsibilities. Despite conversations with management, the issue persisted, leading to a growing backlog that no one wanted to trim down. Zvone learned critical lessons about the importance of establishing clear working agreements with stakeholders and sponsors from the beginning. He emphasizes the need to create proper communication channels, as successful Agile work depends on reaching the right people when problems arise. Self-reflection Question: How might the communication agreements in your organization be contributing to your team's ability to focus on their work? [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 Zvonimir Durcevic Zvonimir has worked in agile product development since 2005, holding roles such as Scrum Master, Agile Coach, IT Project, and R&D Manager. He works with teams to co-create tailored solutions to increase engagement and improve customer focus and effectiveness, enabling accelerated value delivery and rapid adaptation to change. You can link with Zvonimir Durcevic on LinkedIn.

31 Mar 19min

BONUS: AI and Cybersecurity - An Introduction to The Hidden Threats in Our Connected World with Dr. Eric Cole In this BONUS episode, we explore the evolving landscape of cybersecurity in the age of artificial intelligence. Dr. Eric Cole, a renowned cybersecurity expert and author of Cyber Crisis: Protecting Your Business from Real Threats in the Virtual World, shares critical insights about how AI is transforming security strategies. From the privacy concerns of our always-connected devices to practical tips for protecting your business and personal information, this conversation offers essential knowledge for navigating our increasingly digital world. The Double-Edged Sword of AI in Cybersecurity "We are giving away our IP, our data, and our privacy. The data set is what gives value to AI." The rise of artificial intelligence presents both opportunities and serious risks in the cybersecurity landscape. Dr. Cole emphasizes that while many focus solely on AI's benefits, we often overlook the fact that we're surrendering vast amounts of our sensitive information, intellectual property, and private data to AI providers. This data becomes the foundation of AI's value and capabilities, creating a significant privacy concern that many organizations fail to properly address. As we embrace these new technologies, we must carefully consider what information we're willing to share and what safeguards should be in place. Modern Attack Vectors: The Human Element "Attacks today are mostly social engineering. We end up having to retrain people to not trust their email." Today's cybersecurity threats have evolved beyond traditional technical exploits to focus primarily on social engineering—manipulating people into compromising their own security. Dr. Cole explains that modern attackers increasingly target the human element, requiring organizations to fundamentally retrain employees to approach communications with healthy skepticism. Particularly concerning are mobile threats, as our phones constantly record audio and other personal data. Dr. Cole warns that "free" apps often come with a hidden price: your privacy and security. Understanding these attack vectors is essential for developing effective defense strategies in both personal and professional contexts. Cybersecurity as a Business Enabler "Security is not a barrier, not an obstacle. Cybersecurity is a business enabler." Dr. Cole challenges the common perception that security measures primarily restrict functionality and impede business operations. Instead, he reframes cybersecurity as a critical business enabler that should be integrated into strategic decision-making. Organizations need to make deliberate decisions about the tradeoffs between security and functionality, understanding that proper security measures protect business continuity and reputation. Dr. Cole particularly warns about supply chain attacks, which have become increasingly prevalent, and emphasizes that awareness is the foundation of any effective protection strategy. He recommends centralizing data for easier security management and advises that client devices should minimize storing sensitive data. Mobile Phones: The Ultimate Tracking Device "You don't go anywhere without your cell phone. Your cell phone is never more than a foot from you it's with you wherever you go... which means if somebody wants to track and monitor you they can." We often worry about theoretical tracking technologies while overlooking the sophisticated tracking device we voluntarily carry everywhere—our mobile phones. Dr. Cole points out the irony that people who would never accept being "chipped" for tracking purposes willingly keep their phones within arm's reach at all times. These devices record our locations, conversations, messages, and activities, creating a comprehensive digital trail of our lives. With access to someone's phone, anyone can trace their movements for months and access an alarming amount of personal information. This risk is compounded when we back up this data to cloud services, effectively giving third parties access to our most sensitive information. Understanding these vulnerabilities is the first step toward more mindful mobile security practices. Business Opportunities in the Security Space "We have too much information, too much data. How can we use that data effectively?" The cybersecurity landscape presents significant business opportunities, particularly in making sense of the overwhelming amount of security data organizations collect. Dr. Cole identifies data correlation and effective data utilization as key investment areas. Modern security systems generate vast quantities of logs and alerts, but transforming this raw information into actionable intelligence remains a challenge. Companies that can develop solutions to effectively analyze, correlate, and extract meaningful insights from security data will find substantial opportunities in the market, helping organizations strengthen their security posture while managing the complexity of modern threats. Essential Training for Security-Conscious Developers "Go for secure coding courses. This helps us understand how software can be exploited." For software developers looking to build more secure applications, Dr. Cole recommends focusing on penetration testing skills and secure coding practices. Understanding how software can be exploited from an attacker's perspective provides invaluable insights for designing more robust systems. By learning the methodologies and techniques used by malicious actors, developers can anticipate potential vulnerabilities and incorporate appropriate safeguards from the beginning of the development process. This proactive approach to security helps create applications that are inherently more resistant to attacks rather than requiring extensive security patches and updates after deployment. About Dr. Eric Cole Dr. Eric Cole is the author of "Cyber Crisis, Protecting Your Business from Real Threats in the Virtual World." He is a renowned cybersecurity expert with over 20 years of experience helping organizations identify vulnerabilities and build robust defense solutions against advanced threats. He has trained over 65,000 professionals worldwide through his best-selling cybersecurity courses and is dedicated to making cyberspace a safe place for all. You can link with Dr. Eric Cole on LinkedIn, or visit his company’s website Secure-Anchor.com.

29 Mar 37min

Marina Lazovic: Leadership Skills Make the Difference for Product Owners 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: The PO as a Leader Marina identifies that while product skills are important, it's leadership abilities that truly distinguish exceptional Product Owners. Great POs demonstrate strong empathy and lead by example, creating an environment where the team feels supported. Marina emphasizes the importance of availability – outstanding Product Owners make themselves accessible to their teams when needed, establishing a presence that goes beyond just attending ceremonies. This leadership through presence and support fosters trust, enabling teams to approach challenges with confidence knowing their PO has their back. The Bad Product Owner: The PO Who Did Not Understand Their Team Marina describes a problematic pattern where Product Owners fail to understand their team's strengths and weaknesses. These POs lack awareness of team composition – not recognizing the balance between senior and junior members or understanding their specific challenges. This blindness leads to unrealistic expectations about what the team can accomplish in a sprint. Marina suggests addressing this by establishing regular sync meetings with the PO to discuss team dynamics and challenges. By helping Product Owners understand team composition, Scrum Masters can bridge this knowledge gap and foster more realistic planning and expectations. Self-reflection Question: How might you help a Product Owner better understand the unique composition and capabilities of your team without creating an adversarial dynamic? About Marina Lazovic Marina is a Scrum Master and Kanban Trainer from Belgrade, Serbia, with nearly a decade in the IT industry. Though not from a technical background, she is passionate about helping development teams and organizations optimize processes and build great products using Agile. She thrives on driving efficiency and fostering collaboration. You can link with Marina Lazovic on LinkedIn.

28 Mar 18min

Marina Lazovic: Measuring Agile Team Success Through Stable Delivery Flow 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. Marina reflects on how her understanding of Scrum Master success has evolved, noting that delivery optimization is an aspect she previously undervalued. For her, success means supporting teams to deliver in an optimal way with stable flow. She emphasizes that since software is built for users, delivery is the ultimate measure of value creation. Marina recommends discussing with teams what "delivery" actually means in their context and focusing on aspects within the team's control. She suggests using the "circle of influence" concept to define what constitutes delivery and to identify actionable improvement options during retrospectives. By concentrating on sprint-level delivery metrics, teams can establish a concrete definition of success that ties directly to value creation. Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Lean Coffee Marina prefers keeping retrospectives simple and direct, recognizing that developers typically appreciate getting straight to the point. She particularly recommends the Lean Coffee format, which provides structure while allowing teams to focus on what matters most to them at that moment. What makes this format effective is its adaptability and efficiency. Marina emphasizes the importance of asking teams which retrospective formats they prefer rather than imposing a particular structure. To make retrospectives actionable, she insists on specifying WHO will do WHAT and by WHEN for every action item, ensuring clear accountability and follow-through on improvement initiatives. Self-reflection Question: How clearly defined is "delivery success" for your team, and what specific flow metrics could you introduce to make it more concrete? About Marina Lazovic Marina is a Scrum Master and Kanban Trainer from Belgrade, Serbia, with nearly a decade in the IT industry. Though not from a technical background, she is passionate about helping development teams and organizations optimize processes and build great products using Agile. She thrives on driving efficiency and fostering collaboration. You can link with Marina Lazovic on LinkedIn.

27 Mar 18min