Expanding your Agile Footprint

​When you work in the software industry, you hear a lot about the new up and coming fads.  You hear about the next new language or process improvement.  This was the case with “Agile” when it first came out. Now, however, it is a known standard in the industry.  If you haven’t had experience with Agile, you may be at a disadvantage in today's market.  Don’t worry!  There are TONS of resources out there to help you gain insight into the world of Agile.

Think about what your goal is when it comes to learning more about Agile.  Many times, our first instinct is to get a certification or become a new role like a Scrum Master.  But these are not your only choices!  There are many aspects to the Agile methodology.  The trick is thinking about what your goals are with regards to learning.  Are you interested in learning more about facilitating meetings so that everyone in the group has a voice?  Are you interested in learning all you can about Agile and/or Scrum? Do you really want to be a Scrum Master?  Depending on your question, your training and reading material can be different.  Here are some suggestions:

Facilitation
    So, you want to learn how to be a more efficient facilitator.  This is GREAT!  No matter your role, you will either be leading meetings or attending them.  In both cases, it can be helpful to have tools in your toolbox to help keep the meeting focused and have full participation.  Here are a couple of books you might find helpful:

• Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision Making - This is a great book for referencing how a group may think.  It gives you great insight into how different decisions can be approached so that the most is gained from the meeting
  
• Improv-ing Agile Teams - This book takes a unique way of approaching meetings; The same way improv actors approach a performance.  It focuses on how individuals interact and how to keep positive attitudes while still arriving at a solution to the problem at hand.
  
• Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great - This is the original books on Retrospectives.  This gives a great background on why retrospectives are important as well as some tools for facilitating the Retros.
  

Scrum Practices
    You are interested in Scrum.  Did you realize that Agile doesn’t mean Scrum?!  I know...that is crazy talk!  There are many implementations of Agile, but scrum is the most popular in the industry.  If you have limited time or budget, I would recommend starting here.

• Scrum.org - This is the same organization that gives out the PSM.  But if you are just interested in learning more about Scrum, they have a great reference section.
  
• Google is your friend.  There are so many different articles about Scrum.  Focus on the roles and meetings.  Then start looking into what interests you the most.
  

Agile as a Methodology
    So, you realize that Scrum is not the only Agile implementation.  Where do you start to learn about more implementations of Agile?  Well, I would start with the Agile Manifesto, then move on to a couple of the other well known practices: Lean, Kanban, and eXtreme Programming (XP).  Some resources:

• Agile Manifesto - this is the core of Agile.  There are 4 values and 12 principles.  Read them. Learn them. Live them.
  
• The Lean Mindset - This is a book by Mary Poppendieck a well known leader in the industry.  Lean focuses on reducing waste and energizing workers.  
  
• Kanban - Kanban is often used with other implementations.  You may already be using it in your scrum team!  But there are multiple layers to Kanban and it can also be a stand alone solution.  I highly recommend reading more about the history and reasons behind Kanban.
  
• Extreme Programming (XP) - Extreme programming focuses on the most valuable work (MVP), story mapping, and test driven development.  You may find that you are already using some of the aspects of XP!
  

Scrum Master
    As you research more about Scrum, you hear a lot about the Scrum Master.  The Scrum Master is a servant leader that helps the teams follow Scrum and removes impediments for the team.  Being a Scrum Master well takes a lot of the knowledge mentioned above.  You have to be a good facilitator, a mentor, think out of the box, work with other groups, as well as help your team in multiple capacities.  If you are interested in being certified, there are multiple options for you.  There are philosophical debates on whether the CSM or PSM is the more valuable test.  Please take the time to go out and research what will work best for you.

• Certified Scrum Master (CSM) exam - The CSM is administered by the Scrum Alliance.  The prerequisite for taking the test is to attend a class.  This class will go over everything that is on the test and should give you the prep needed to be a Scrum Master.   The class is in person and the test must be taken at a test center.
  
• Professional Scrum Master (PSM) exam - The PSM is administered by Scrum.org.  There are no prerequisites for this test, however, it has to be passed with an 85% or higher making it a fairly hard multiple choice exam.  You can do self study with practice tests to get prepared for this test.
  
• Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP) exam - the PMI-ACP is a comprehensive certification that requires 21 hours of study and covers everything from Scrum to Lean and budgets to scrum meetings.  You will come out of this test knowing the history about agile and many of its implementations.  This certification must also be renewed every 3 years with continued study being documented. If you want the most comprehensive certification on Agile, study for this certification.
  

Each of the books that are linked have other recommended books in Amazon.  Do some research, look for blogs, and go to conferences.  It is amazing how a single conversation with someone at a conference or reading a blog can open up doors and answer questions you have been thinking about.  When you go into research mode with a focus on what you plan to gain, you will gain so much more than just another certification.  The sky is the limit!  If you are already a scrum master, maybe you should research being an Agile Coach!  As long as you are impassioned and interested, keep learning and gain as much knowledge as you can!

Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any other interests or would like to work on a detailed path for your own interests in Agile.

Heather