Regional Scrum Gathering Tokyo 2020

Howard Sublett is the chief product owner at Scrum Alliance, a new position for him and for the organization as they continue to evolve toward sustainable agility. Howard brings a wealth of experience in a variety of agile practices to this role, including serving as an agile coach and leader at several agile consultancies. As chief product owner, his primary responsibilities are to forge coalitions, to decide which products and services best deliver value to and serve customers, and to promote agile and Scrum principles and values in the greater community. He shares the C-suite with Chief ScrumMaster Melissa Boggs. Before joining Scrum Alliance in 2018, Howard championed the SolutionsIQ culture as director of community development. As the face of SolutionsIQ, Howard could regularly be found building relationships at industry events and hosting the popular Agile Amped podcast series. Internally, Howard advocated for the individual and nurtured the company’s teams. Howard is focused on people, who they are and what they need, and lives according to the mantra that strangers are only friends he hasn’t met. He is passionate about making work places joyful, sustainable, and prosperous with agile principles, practices, and values—and about sharing this message with the world.

Greeting from a gold partner.

Most Scrum practitioners today follow the katas of their training, dutiful to all that they correctly answered during the certification exam. For many, it is a struggle to get even this far: letting go of old waterfall ways to work in small, cross-functional teams that deliver at lightening pace. Yet the framework and certification are only the beginning. Patterns drive to the why beneath the framework and its practices so you discover your most fully human self that you were born with, and which the university and your job drove out of you. We’ll explore this why a bit. But even patterns are only a taste of the transcendence that comes with insight. In that transcendence we find the secret that few know about Scrum, or that they ever find about patterns: that each is only a path to finding your own deeper self, not only in a way that contributes to its respective discipline, and to work, or to design, but to the greater good of the self and humanity.

Greeting from a gold partner.

Your organization has moved to autonomous, self-organizing teams. Everyone is trained and coached on their new role. But what about managers? The role of a manager is _undefined_. Management is told, “Go figure out your new role” or simply “Stop micromanaging”. They are often still responsible for the outcomes, yet are stripped of authority. It turns out managers are people too - and their treatment is often inhumane and unhelpful for creating lasting change. Managers were seen as the glue that holds an organization together … now what happens? How can we all journey together?

We offer an alternate view, where Agile Transformation is understood as an evolution of organizational culture. Success depends on shifts in the behaviours of both staff and management. The Agile Mindset or Being Agile is a prerequisite for making structural changes. Jumping to advanced stages of evolution where there is high autonomy is a painful trap. An incremental and iterative (Agile) approach to shifting power away from managers to individual contributors is more effective.

Greeting from a gold partner.

2011年に開催された初回のRSGTの実行委員長だったので、実行委員会を離れスタートアップに入ってからも毎回RSGTの動向はなんとなく横目で見ていました。国内でアジャイル開発やスクラムに取り組むのが当たり前になっていき、RSGTも参加者が増え、スポンサーの集まりやチケットの売れる速度が増していくさまを、途中まではヤフーのアジャイルコーチとして、そのあとはスタートアップの現場から、驚きながら見ていました。 このたびクロージングキーノートのご依頼をいただきまして、前回・前々回の登壇された方と比べて見劣りするであろう僕でいいのかと、実行委員会のメンバーに質問したくらい恐れおののいています。でも、特別ではない普通の人だからこそ伝えられることがあるのではと思いましたし、前職においては大きな成果を挙げられたとも感じているので、お話しすることにしました。前職でアジャイルコーチをすることになったきっかけを話すと「なんでその状況でそんな面倒なことに首をつっこむのかわからない」という感想を抱くらしいです。参加者の皆様は少なくとも何かを変えたいと思ってスクラムに取り組んでいるはずですし、その取り組みはきっと怖いことの連続です。怖いからこそ強がったり、理論武装したり、面倒臭がったり、見えないふりしたり、冷笑的になったりします。そういった斜に構える弱さを、何を考え、どうやって乗り越える力を保ち続けたのかを話すことはできるかもしれない、と思っています。Tipsとかテクニックを支える何かを共有できたらいいな、と思っています。どうぞよろしくお願いいたします。