I hope your beginning of the year 2014 was as good as mine was. I wish you a great future no matter!
Crossing from one year to another is often a time for some retrospective introspections. It is a time where we more naturally step away from the daily, monthly and quarterly rush to look back and learn in the face of the upcoming times. As a result, but even besides it, it is also a good time to reground ourselves. Obviously we should retrospect and reground more often, but let’s say that this is a good time to absolutely do it.
My life has much to do with Scrum (below picture has some 2013 highlights). Here are some simple foundational aspects of Scrum I’ve ingrained over the years. They have often helped others to keep grounded or reground. These are bare basics that may seem non-essential at first sight. They have little value when respecting them. However, they become more essential when not respecting them. Not respecting them diminishes credibility in the communities, and it damages how Scrum is seen outside of the communities.
- Stop calling Scrum a ‘methodology’. It is not. It is a framework. Note that we have even overcome the perception of Scrum as a method for ‘Agile project management’, and the Scrum Master as an ‘Agile project manager’. Focus on the software product, continuous discovery and value.
- Stop writing Scrum in capitals (“SCRUM”). Scrum is not an acronym, nor an abbreviation. Write “Scrum”.
- Cherish that Scrum is incomplete. It is by design. This is not a restriction nor a dysfunction. It takes away the illusive and deceptive certainty that from the method itself every possible answer, for every possible situation, at any possible time can be deduced. It actually applies to any method but only Scrum makes it an explicit tenet. Use Scrum as a foundation, and apply the ScrumAnd thinking to address your specific problems and situation.
