<div dir="ltr">Analytics is in.</div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 2:27 PM, Ken Snider <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:ksnider@wikimedia.org" target="_blank">ksnider@wikimedia.org</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="auto"><div>Operations is absolutely interested in attending. </div><div><br></div><div>Thanks. <span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br>
<div><br></div><div>--Ken.</div>
<div><br></div></font></span></div><div><div class="h5"><div><br>On Sep 20, 2013, at 4:56 PM, Arthur Richards <<a href="mailto:arichards@wikimedia.org" target="_blank">arichards@wikimedia.org</a>> wrote:<br><br></div>
<blockquote type="cite"><div><div dir="ltr">I'd love to see this become a reality - what teams are interested in participating in something like this?</div>
<div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Sep 19, 2013 at 6:26 PM, Bryan Davis <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:bdavis@wikimedia.org" target="_blank">bdavis@wikimedia.org</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">Hello list!<br>
<br>
Two separate people forwarded this message to me and asked me to a)<br>
join the list and b) provide input, so here I am.<br>
<br>
I don't have a completely formed argument to provide on this as I am<br>
both new to the organization and not currently embedded in a true<br>
scrum team, but I'll try to provide some anecdotes from prior<br>
practice.<br>
<div><br>
> Examples of problems that I think are worth solving:<br>
> - Ensuring platform and ops are in the loop on the latest shiny<br>
> features you're building<br>
> - Surfacing perceived blockers ("we're still waiting on the Varnish<br>
> migration til we can release X, so we've moved on to Y")<br>
> - Ensuring feature developers are in the loop on new services/APIs<br>
> that are being built that can be used by feature devs<br>
> - Surfacing questions about prioritization ("Ops: we've been asked to<br>
> work on OSM" - "Mobile: we should probably talk to the mobile PM to<br>
> figure out how urgent that is")<br>
<br>
</div>These are exactly the sort of issues that led to implementing scrum of<br>
scrums communication at $DAYJOB-1. An additional problem that we faced<br>
(and I believe is faced here) was the need to interface scrum teams<br>
and non-scrum "consultants" within the organization. In our case,<br>
Operations, Accounting, Legal and Customer Services were all<br>
"consultant" roles the scrum teams. This means that there were not<br>
typically embedded representatives of these groups within the teams<br>
themselves.<br>
<br>
Experimentation is generally needed to determine the right mix of<br>
frequency, duration and attendance that produces a good level of<br>
communication without a burdensome amount of overhead for the<br>
participants. When I have employed this practice previously it was<br>
generally a weekly meeting with a duration of 5 minutes per team<br>
represented. With a large number of teams (>6) it can be very helpful<br>
to scale up by holding a scrum of scrums of scrums rather than<br>
attempting to directly interface all teams. It is also useful to form<br>
and disband smaller scrum of scrum teams meeting at higher frequency<br>
at particular project inflection points such as the last few sprints<br>
of a major feature release or the run up to a cutting a new shippable<br>
product version.<br>
<br>
This should be a meeting for pigs[0] meaning that the purpose is not<br>
to provide management with yet another view of the roadmap progress of<br>
the individual teams. The intent is to surface inter-team issues as<br>
early as possible before each team's individual increment is<br>
endangered by roadblocks.<br>
<div><br>
> In our context, this may be the kind of meeting where note-taking<br>
> would be useful. For example, a daily email to engineering@ including<br>
> the notes could be helpful. But that's just an idea.<br>
<br>
</div>A scrum of scrums should be treated as any other scrum team. This<br>
means that their workings should be visible and inspectable at all<br>
times. There should definitely be tangible artifacts that are<br>
available to all members of the organization. At $DAYJOB-1 this took<br>
the form of a hallway whiteboard that documented the next week's<br>
milestones and current blockers. The scrum of scrums team was<br>
responsible for keeping this artifact up to date on at least a weekly<br>
basis. In this environment I would imagine that a wiki page would<br>
replace the whiteboard to be more accessible to remote staff.<br>
<br>
<br>
[0]: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicken_and_the_Pig" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicken_and_the_Pig</a><br>
<span><font color="#888888"><br>
Bryan<br>
--<br>
Bryan Davis Wikimedia Foundation <<a href="mailto:bd808@wikimedia.org" target="_blank">bd808@wikimedia.org</a>><br>
[[m:User:BDavis_(WMF)]] Sr Software Engineer Boise, ID<br>
irc: bd808 v:<a href="tel:415.839.6885%20x6855" value="+14158396885" target="_blank">415.839.6885 x6855</a><br>
</font></span><div><div><br>
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</div></div></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br>Arthur Richards<div>Software Engineer, Mobile</div><div>[[User:Awjrichards]]</div><div>IRC: awjr</div><div><a href="tel:%2B1-415-839-6885%20x6687" value="+14158396885" target="_blank">+1-415-839-6885 x6687</a></div>
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