We're Not Acting Like a Team

 

1. Smells

• Fixed Roles
• Tasks are assigned
• Not helping each other
• No mentoring is going on
• Stories aren't shared and all work is being done in parallel
• No cooperation
• Not listening to (and talking over) one and another during meetings
• No Laughter - a team thats working well together often laughs.

 

2. Discussion

 

If we don't act like a self organizing team then we lose many of the benefits of Scurm.

 

3. Causes

• Corporate structure and bonuses that reward individual heroism.
• Lone Wolf, Cowboy mentality of some developers.
• Concern that knowledge is job security.

 

4. Consequences

 

The team is less efficient than it could be and there will waste as people are blocked. In addition the team will improve more slowly without mentoring.

 

5. Prevention

 

6. Example Remedies

• Lead by example, mentor and help team members with their tasks
• Breakdown silos and fixed roles.
• Help change the Corporate  structure to reward team work and not heros.
• Encourage pair programming, code reviews and other practices that increase co-operation and communication.
• Get the team to play the 59 minute Scrum Game (pdf file, by Jean Tabaka) - key point demonstrate that job only gets done when the team works together.

 

7. Case Studies

 

Credit: this is based on material from "10 ways to screw up with Scrum and XP" by Henrik Kniberg. Personal Experience: Mark Levison