You can read the post for yourself, here: A Conversation on Agile Long Overdue.

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“…we all safely interpret dangerous things in ways that don’t require us to change our lives.” — Orson Scott Card

I was honored to co-facilitate an Introduction to Scrum session recently for sixty-eight Project Management Institute (PMI) folks, who were all willing and open-minded. Even the ones I had known in past years who were not so open minded to Scrum raised their hands high and proud when asked, “Who is excited to try this in their work?” Within an hour of starting the session, though, I was compelled to stop it. My co-facilitator was introducing the group to Scrum and hands were popping up everywhere. The questions being asked were all some version of “How does this match what I already know?” “So, the product backlog is your requirements document, right?” “You can’t really expect people to sit together. That would never fly where I work.” “I just don’t get what you do without a plan. How will people know what to do everyday?”

When I stopped the group, I asked that they give themselves the gift of learning something new without forcing it into the categories already in their heads. “Perhaps,” I said, “just perhaps you will need new categories to understand what’s being given to you. So rest for now and learn Scrum for the sake of learning Scrum – without relating it to plan-driven project management, without worrying about whether or not it will work in your current situation.”

As I peruse the submissions for the Agile 2009 conference, I see the same tendency in the community as a whole. It’s a fervent desire to map Scrum to something else, something more familiar and, therefore, at least seemingly safer. PMBOK, CMMI, Lean, Kanban, the list goes on.

As the Orson Scott Card quote says, there is something in us that desperately wants to “safely interpret dangerous things in ways that don’t require us to change our lives.” Is Scrum dangerous that way? Absolutely. If you are doing Scrum well it will require you to change your life. You will have to give away your belief that having a checklist makes things run smoothly. You will have to stop chasing the perfect process and, instead, start cultivating your ability to trust the resourcefulness of others. You will cease using line items checked off on a plan as your measure of value. You will face your fears, all of them, about yourself and other people. You will stop making progress and start making products.

If you must map Scrum to something you already know, go ahead. Use that door to come to Scrum if that’s what makes sense to you. Heck, for PMBOK, you don’t even need to do it yourself. Michele Sliger and Stacia Broderick have done a fine job of it for you [ref]. If you come through that door though, don’t stop just inside the foyer. Keep moving. Immediately seek out people who allowed their brains and hearts to expand when they learned about Scrum and go learn from them. Allow the simplicity and depth of Scrum to rock your world and open your mind up to news ways of being in the workplace and getting work done, together. Try on some of the radical practices recommended by good Scrum coaches, even if you think, “Oh, no. I could never…” The practice you have that reaction to is the one you need most. So, do it. Let the dangerous thing into your life and allow it to change you. It’s absolutely for the better.

© Lyssa Adkins, 2009
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Lyssa Adkins is a personal coach, a Certified Scrum Trainer and a PMP.  She authors the excellent cricketwing blog and is the the creator of the well-respected and oft-cited YouTube video The Road from Project Manager to Agile Coach.  Lyssa presents regularly at Agile and Scrum conferences and gatherings, and tends to make friends wherever she goes — look out for her on your Agile journey

Having both CMMI and PMI representation at the gathering was an odd choice, and given the energy and creativity often found at Agile conferences these guys had much to do to impress.  No easy task, especially given the resistance from many (including this blogger) to their very presence. It seems reasonable that when in enemy territory, so to speak, a person would tread with caution.  Fair enough, but reasonable people rarely inspire and that was the case here.  Nevertheless Gregory Balestrero’s talk was not without value.

In describing the work of the PMI Mr Balestrero mentioned that the new version of the PMBok has a chapter on iterative development and incremental delivery.  Bear in mind that IID has actually been practiced in software companies since the 1970s.  That it has only come to the attention of the PMI recently is odd, to say the least.  IID is not the same as Agile, of course, it is one small part.  Still, progress is progress, and credit to the speaker for seeking alignment between Scrum and PMI values.

The one thing that jumped out at me from the talk was Mr Balestrero’s announcement that since he took over as CEO of the PMI seven years ago the organization has become more focused on value.  This is good news, as Agile is, and has always been focused on value, so we can all see alignment there.  Of course, the question this raised for me was “what was the PMI focused on before that time?”  I decided to ask.  As there was limited time in the session for questions I waited to speak with Mr Balestrero after the keynote was complete.  With all the powerpoint events of the morning I was hungry for some actual dialog.  In the event my question turned into an hour-long conversation about the nature of management.

Raffi Simonian (CSP), Alan Cyment (CST), Jesse Fewell (PMP) also took part in the discussion.  Raffi’s particular interest was on how a CSP could fast-track his way to becoming a PMP, given that there was some cross-over of skills, and to their credit the two PMI representatives didn’t shoot this idea down, but instead offered Raffi a number of direct contacts with which to further explore the idea of how CSP and PMP could dovetail.  The gesture offers potential for open dialog, for collaboration.  All good.

— As an aside, Gregory Balestrero publicly congratulated Raffi and his co-worker Anu on the excellent PMO set up at their organization, saying it was one of the best there was.  In fact, Raffi and his team have been slowly working over the past few years to remove this same PMO as it is actually considered an impediment.  —

Back to my question, what was the PMI focused on before it decided to focus on value?  Gregory Balestrero explained that the PMI was originally set up to focus on value (of course it was, what else would its purpose be?) but over the years lost that focus and became transaction-orientated, focusing on delivering certification to the individual rather than supporting organizations in successful outcomes.  This seems to have resulted in a large group of people with impressive knowledge of how to manage projects, but perhaps with some loss of focus as to why they needed to do this.  Seven years is a long time, and many of us in this community do not yet see that focus on value over certification.  Big ships take a long time to turn around.

Mr Balestrero went on to say that when he joined the PMI he asked the question “do we need project management?”.  Good question.  Apparently the answer was “Duh, yeah!”  I challenged that answer.  Perhaps the “duh yeah” applies when the processes we use cry out for management.  Upfront requirements, definition, work-breakdown structures, dependency charts, critical path analysis, efficient assignment of resources… all of this needs to be managed.  Sure.

But what about an agile process?  I suggested that management, as we know it, is inappropriate, and that instead projects need support and guidance through a process of visioning, reflecting, facilitating and inspiring.  Does the PMI teach that, I asked.  The answer was vague.

I felt that Gregory Balestrero didn’t understand Scrum beyond the concept of iterative development and possibly collaboration, so in the short time we talked Alan, Raffi and I introduced some of the underlying values of Scrum to him.  He listened (he appeared to listen).  What if we took away the names PMI and Agile and Scrum, I asked, what if we went right down to underlying values and principles: openness, trustfulness, visibility, courage, self-organization, collaboration, beauty, inspiring visions… early delivery of working software.  Are we seeking the same thing?

I think this is a question that Gregory Balestrero will need to consider if he is serious about PMI and Scrum collaboration.  The sense I had from our discussion is that perhaps he will.  Time will tell.

Jesse Fewell captured (and captioned!) the discussion.  Take a look.

Disclaimer: the views I express here do not reflect the views of the Scrum Alliance, nor of any other individual member.  They are my views.  That is all.

The Orlando Scrum Gathering is approaching.  Gregory Balestrero, the Chief Executive Officer of the Project Management Institute (PMI) has been invited, with much fanfare, to be one of the keynote speakers at the event.  I object to this.  Not because I have anything against the man (I’d never heard of him until now) but because I feel uncomfortable with the idea that the Scrum Alliance is turning to the PMI to learn… what?  I don’t know.  After three years of seeking to understand I haven’t yet found a good reason to listen to the voice of the PMI.  This is hard to say as I know it upsets a lot of people.

Inviting someone to do a keynote speech implies they have something important to say, that we need to hear.  Gregory Balestrero, the man, may have something important to say, but Gregory Balestrero the CEO of PMI does not.  The PMI is an outmoded organization which represents, and promotes, a particular way of working now known to be largely flawed.  That the PMI wants to change itself is good news.  That the PMI has an important message for Scrum practitioners is unlikely.

If Gregory Balestrero is interested in learning about Scrum, then have him attend the Scrum Gathering, and have him pay his entrance fee along with the rest of us.  I welcome him there, as I welcome anyone who wants to learn about Scrum.  I have no reason to believe Mr Balestrero is anything other than a lovely man, with a desire to learn new things.  No doubt he is a very smart and passionate man to be where he is today.  Such drive and passion are always welcome in the Scrum world.  I would just rather have him attend the gathering simply as Gregory, not as “the chief ambassador for advancing the profession of project management on behalf of PMI”.  And I have no interest in hearing “powerful messages about the importance of project management in achieving success in today’s global business environment.”  I am tired of corporate rhetoric, and I don’t buy this.

Scrum, as I understand it, has nothing to do with project management, and personally I eschew the term “Agile Project Manager” and consider it an oxymoron.  Ken Schwaber has often made the statement that there is no Project Manager role in Scrum.  Indeed there is not, so why partner with the Project Management Institute?  It starts to feel like compliance to the existing status quo, and appeasement to what is still a very powerful organization, albeit one whose power is threatened.

I have always seen the move to Agile as a software revolution, throwing off the weight of oppression and releasing into a new way of being.  The  tragedy of many revolutions is that once successful the leaders tend towards the same behavior that caused the need for the revolution in the first place.  The oppressed become the oppressors, i.e. they take on essentially the same behaviors because they don’t know how else to behave.

George Orwell characterized this tendency in the novel Animal Farm, an allegory for the Russian Revolution and subsequent events.  By the end of the book, the revolutionary leader, Napoleon (a pig, by some charming coincidence) is walking on two legs, dressing in human clothing and selling his best friends out for horse meat.

Why does the Scrum Alliance want to work with the PMI?  Let me be clear: I see absolute value in working with those individual members of the PMI who care about Scrum, but I see no value in working with the organization.  It has some influence today, but that influence is waning in the light of Agile.  I say leave it be, let it die.  Let’s all seek entirely new ways of collaborating and advancing our professional skills.  Giant monolithic institutions representing “the interests” of their members may not be the way of the 21st century.  Maybe small is better.  I sincerely hope that the Scrum Alliance won’t scale to PMI proportions.  I’d like to see it splinter instead, into small passionate, self-managing groups each with a slightly different agenda, and different interests.

I feel oppressed not so much by the PMI, but by monoliths in general; they are, by definition incredibly heavy and immovable.  And I feel uncomfortable with the burgeoning relationship between the PMI and the Scrum Alliance, thinking I’d rather not dress up as a farmer.
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In part two of this post I’ll explore the nature of oppression and look at how raising awareness of this mostly hidden syndrome may be useful to help us identify problem situations with more clarity, and thus change our behaviors and thinking.