5am Mester Scrum

Take advantage of any free education while you can.  In my 20's my employer offered tuition reimbursement for 1 class per semester, so they paid for 3/5 of my Masters.  That was 30 years ago.  I still use it today, despite what others say.

Education is not all about the now but mostly about the future you.

On this Getting to Next Level episode of out Tuesday programming here on the #5amMesterScrum show 1286.

This is our audio podca...

Join A Team to Learn a Lot or Little?  Depending on what you are looking for in a position or a new team or even an existing team.  My tendency to find a team I can learn a lot vs. a little.  A good scrum team allows their teammates to dabble in a little bit of everything as it is a win-win option.

Early in my career I had the option to join large companies that would have me work in one area of the business, but what was really u...

Investing in yourself is something I have been thinking about more as I provide for after school stuff for the kids and really try to convince my wife to take some classes in her field.  Plus I'm renewing a bunch of my certifications lately and it is not cheap when You have as many as I do.

You would be amazed at how many people have not taken a professional class  or done something to learn a new skill in years.  Or better yet com...

No One Likes to Retrospect...Why? and let me offer this thought.. Is it because: they are not entertaining?  nothing gets improved? we already meet enough?  We are perfect the way we are?

I would like to add No one Likes to Change or realize they could improve, even a little bit.  There is real resistance to improvement.

On today's program 4R Thursday (Requirements, Reviews, Retros and Roles) on the #5amMesterScrum show 1282

Reach ...

What is your Career or Business Next Level Mindset?  I was chatting with a connection the other day and they were in the same position for the past 3 years.  It made me realize how many people or businesses have not shifted into a Next Level Mindset.  To be honest many people and businesses are already there, but lack the challenge to take that step or the slight adjustment that brings that Next Level to Light.

This is our Tuesday ...

So a Team I coached held a retrospective which I facilitated and I went around post retro and greased the action plan with other managers, so people were not caught of guard.  I greased the future actions so they might go over smoother.

Now this scenario does not happen all the time but does every so often especially when the retrospective actions involve people outside of the core team.  There are cases when the effort a team want...

I wanted to celebrate getting together anytime the team is in the office as a part of a hybrid work environment.  Today for one of my team I coach they were altogether in a room for their daily scrum or standup.  It was a great sight to be seen as I think it may have been a first.

Remote is ok but when teams are on-site they should really meet together so they can see how the others on the team are really reacting to discussion.  ...

Late evening or afternoon show talking about Getting to the Next Level and I wanted to expand on the post we made today about the two turtles with the bigger one the coach and the smaller one the coachee. There are lots of ways to look at this. I'm going to gove two: one being knowledge shared and two patience sometimes pays off and don't in such a hurry to mark everything urgent.

I saw something on news media program and a gen Z e...

I just realized a subtle characteristic for sprint time box length.  If teams are working to 3 week or longer time boxes that is a good indication of teams working as individuals vs. as a group on a problem that needs to be solved.  There are cases in where maybe there could be lots of testing that would require the longer period yes. However..

I realized this just the other day as I was pondering why I was having troubles complet...

Watch out for social media as well as Metrics and Ranking published before your use them for your own decisions.  The other day I was at a meeting and the leader share a Ranking for the city of Philadelphia and we were at the bottom.  So I was curious as to what the measure was.  I googled the ranking info and its AI brought the study right to the top.  I was impressed and I saw some social media posts recently referencing the same...

Get better 4x as fast with 4 retros per day.  I was listening to Ed Mylett and he was talking about his shorter days o he actually does 2 days in one.  Morning and afternoon?  Well I kind of do the same but with some twists. 

He talks about a sort of retrospective at the end of his shorter days.  Well I break my days into 4 parts 1) Morning (pre kid leaves for school), 2) Morning, 3) after lunch and 4) post leaving work after 4 or ...