TL;DR: Scrum Master Salary Report 2023 — An Anonymous Poll by the Community for the Community The purpose of this anonymous Scrum Master salary report 2023 is to create a clear, data-backed benchmark that allows everyone in the agile community to understand whether their compensation is adequate. (And yes, the report will cover Scrum Masters as well as Agile Coaches, both employed and freelancing.)

TL; DR: Top One Percent Product Managers — Food for Agile Thought #378 Welcome to the 378th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,661 peers. This week, we reflect on the (product management) industry’s obsession with the top one percent, given the ambiguity about what product managers do. Also, we analyze why Lean Startup is an excellent blueprint for…

TL; DR: Agile Transformation with ChatGPT or McBoston? This article is another excursion into this nascent yet fascinating new technology of generative AI and LLMs and the future of knowledge work. I was interested in learning more about a typical daily challenge many agile practitioners face: How shall we successfully pursue an agile transformation? Shall we outsource the…

TL; DR: Spotify Model Critique — Food for Agile Thought #377 Welcome to the 377th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,609 peers. This week, we start with a Spotify Model critique: Jason Yip dissected what many consider an agile framework from an insider’s perspective. Also, we point to issues contributing to management’s failure to keep pace…

TL; DR: Scrum Master Interview Guide 2023: The Scrum Master Role If you want to fill a Scrum Master position in your organization, you may find the following interview questions helpful in identifying the right candidate. They are derived from my seventeen years of practical experience with XP as well as Scrum, serving both as Product Owner and Scrum Master, as…

TL; DR: Product Team Performance — Food for Agile Thought #376 Welcome to the 376th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,564 peers. This week, we listen to our two product heavyweights, Lenny Rachitsky and John Cutler, delving into the performance of product teams. We continue with suggesting abandoning the popular framing that Waterfall is the opposite…

TL; DR: ChatGPT Prompts for Scrum Practitioners Last week, I ran an “interview” with ChatGPT as an applicant for a fictitious Scrum Master position based on questions from Scrum Master Interview Guide. (See below.) While the overall results were broadly acceptable, I thought that changing the ChatGPT prompts might deliver better results. So, this time, I chose…

TL; DR: Acceleration Beats Velocity — Food for Agile Thought #375 Welcome to the 375th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,502 peers. This week, we add new layers to the old ‘is velocity a useful metric’ discussion, pointing at physics, acceleration, and its multi-dimensionality. While at it, we also analyze the delicate tension between leadership and…

TL; DR: The Hidden Micromanager, Defining Product Outcomes — Food for Agile Thought #374 Happy 2023 and welcome to the 374th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,453 peers. This week, we share a short assessment of whether you fall into the category of the “hidden micromanager.” Speaking of which, we delve into nurturing a blame-free learning organization, from accepting…