Agile and Scrum in China:

Can It Work?

Will It Work?Tom Mellor, Scrum Alliance

Speaker Introduction

Chair of the Board of Directors of the Scrum Alliance

Employer: State Farm Ins Cos. (USA)

Title: Agile Coach and Project Manager

Introduced Scrum and agile development into the IT Dept (5000+ people) in 2003

Certified Scrum Trainer, Certified Scrum Product Owner, Certified Scrum Professional, Certified ScrumMaster

Worked on and coached over 25 Scrum projects

Speaker Confessions

30+ years in business with 8+ in IT as a business analyst and project manager

Wrote code in 1978 (Basic and Fortran); returned in 2005 to university to learn java

Have been around development long enough to fundamentally understand its concepts (not true for me for the Chinese language)

A bit anxious that I might receive many for my talk since it isn’t technical

That is a risk I am willing to take because I feel the message I bring is important

Some Common Project and

Team Problems (Nontechnical)

Despite adoption of Scrum and/or other agile processes, the business and team(s) still do not often communicate well

Organization management does not honor the difference between knowledge work and physical labor

Nontechnical people believe all developers have equal skill level and developers tend to establish a ―pecking order‖ and are not inclined to do cooperative work such as pair programming

Some Common Project and

Team Problems (Nontechnical)

People believe we do magic and that we can

predict time and cost up front with precision

even though we deal with a large amount of

uncertainty and ambiguity

Developers know that Test Driven Development

is good, but they resist doing it because they

believe it slows them down too much

The development is done emergency room

style – and developers do not know who to

please

The Root of Agile Created in

2001: The Agile Manifesto

www.agilemanifesto.org

The 4 Values

We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

While there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on

the left more.

The 12 Principles of the Agile

Manifesto

1. 我们的最高目标是，通过尽早和持续地交付有价值的软件来满足客户。

2. 欢迎对需求提出变更——哪怕是在项目开发后期。要善于利用需求变更，帮助客户获得竞争优势。

3. 要经常性地交付可用的软件，周期从几周到几个月不等，交付时间越短越好。

4. 项目过程中，业务人员与开发人员必须在天天一起工作。

5. 要善于激励项目人员，给他们以所需要的环境和支持，并相信他们能够完成任务。

6. 无论是团队内还是团队间，最有效的沟通方法是面对面的交谈。

7. 可用的软件是衡量进度的主要指标。

8. 敏捷过程提倡可持续的开发。项目方、开发人员和用户应该能够保持长期稳定的进展速度。

9. 对技术的精益求精以及对设计的不断完善将提升敏捷性。

10. 要做到简洁，即尽最大可能减少不必要的工作。这是一门艺术。

11. 最佳的架构、需求和设计出自于自组织的团队。

12. 团队要定期反省如何能够做到更有效，并相应地调整团队的行为。

Scrum In a Picture

Scrum Defined

A (very) light weight work organization

framework with a minimal set of rules

based in empirical process theory where

product is delivered iteratively and

incrementally in 30 days or less.

It is suitable for technical and

nontechnical product development.

The Three Scrum Roles

The Product Owner: the person responsible

for representing the customer and end user

and for prioritizing work

The ScrumMaster: not a traditional project

manager, but rather a servant to the team

whose job is to remove impediments (noise)

and coach the team in the use of Scrum to be

as productive as possible

The Team: cross-functional group of 5 to 12

people

The Three Scrum Documents

Product Backlog –prioritized list of features

that the Product Owner desires

Sprint Backlog – list of tasks needed to get

chosen stories completed in an iteration

Simple Progress Charts – called Burn Up or

Burn Down Charts

The Four Scrum Ceremonies

Sprint Planning

Daily Scrum

Sprint Review

Sprint Retrospective

Why Scrum Works

Demands quality working software be delivered

quickly

Employs queuing theory and other lean principles

(e.g. removal of waste, JIT delivery, etc.)

Leverages the high performance of self-organizing

teams that decide how work should be done

Involves and satisfies the customer by having the

customer prioritize and approve the work in regular

intervals

Seeks to minimize technical risk (and other risks) by

encapsulating development into a time box

Why Scrum Works

Employs continuous improvement using periods of

reflection (hansei and kaizen)

Uses the principle of inspect and adapt to evolve

software to a satisfying state

Teams can use the scientific process to explore

solutions

One person (the ScrumMaster) is responsible for

removing noise or seeing that noise is removed and

otherwise serves the team as needed

One person (the Product Owner) prioritizes desired

functionality and represents the customer

Three Guiding Principles of

Scrum

Ask the Team

Inspect and Adapt

Deliver fast

Some Reasons (But Not All)

Why Scrum Does Not Work

Cultural intolerance and lack of trust

Ineffective (poor??) or absent software

practices and craftsmanship

Poor (or no) communication within the team

and/or between the Product Owner and the

team

People working on too many things

Project managers get in the way

Bad management practices

When Scrum Works, But Not

Very Well (Smells)

The Sprint is not honored

Outsiders interfere with the process

Lack of commitment

Team doesn’t seek to improve

ScrumMaster becomes a project manager

and assigns work and expects

The Burn Down Chart becomes a Gantt

Chart

Team members say ―That’s not my job.‖

When Scrum Works, But Not

Very Well (Smells)

Done is not defined or misunderstood and

technical debt piles on

Team delivery pace fluctuates widely

No attention to continuous improvement by

the team

Team dwells on problems rather than fixing

them

Rewards focus on individuals, not teams

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“Scrum doesn't

work in China!”With regards to Bas Vodde, CST

Lesson 2: Wrap-up

Summarize important points.

Allow time for questions.

“Agile could work in

China because it is

communist country”

Is Culture The Biggest Obstacle

to Adoption of Agile (in China)?

Certified Scrum Trainer Bas Vodde from

Singapore presented this in Shanghai at the

recent Scrum Gathering

His caution: generalizations about culture are

typically untrue!!

He developed the Cultural Agility Index based

upon assessing countries based upon survey

feedback using Hoftede’s Power Distance

Index and the Agile Manifesto

Is Culture The Biggest Obstacle

to Adoption of Agile (in China)?

The Power Distance Index:

the extent to which less powerful

members of organizations and

institutions (like the family)

tolerate and expect that power is

distributed unequally

(Agile promotes low power distance)

Is Culture The Biggest Obstacle

to Adoption of Agile (in China)?

Lesson 3: Objectives

List the intended outcomes for this training

session.

Each objective should be concise, should

contain a verb, and should have a

measurable result.

Lesson 3: Content

Cultural Agility Index

Dimensions

1. Power Index

2. Individualism

versus Collectivism

3. Masculinity versus

Femininity

4. Uncertainty

Avoidance

5. Long Term

Orientation

1. China 56; US 16

2. China 14; US 68

3. China 56; US 50

4. China 6; US 13

5. China 65; US 22

Vodde’s Composite Agility

Ranking

List important points from each lesson.

Provide resources for more information on

subject.

List resources on this slide.

Provide handouts with additional resource

material.

Bas’s Assessments

Prepare a quiz or challenge to assess how

much information participants learned.

Survey participants to see if they found the

training beneficial.

Bas’s Assessments

Bas’s Assessments

Prepare a quiz or challenge to assess how

much information participants learned.

Survey participants to see if they found the

training beneficial.

Scrum and Agile In China:

Some Conclusions

Can Scrum and agile work in China?

Vodde presents a compelling argument that

―Yes, it can.‖

Will Scrum and agile work in China? Only

time will tell; success will be based upon how

well companies are willing to adapt.

QUESTIONS?