“THEBIGWORD'S SCRUMMASTER WINS THE SPRINT TO FAME”
I was so proud that Amy Thompson, our
ScrumMaster, won ‘Best Agile Coach and Mentor’ at the Agile Awards by beating
off the competition from 36 other entries in London last week. You may be
confused and may think that I am talking about some strange sport but for those
who know me, you will realise - as my sporting abilities are worse than low-
that it must mean something else.
The word ScrumMaster does derive from
the rugby term, where a group of macho men stick their bums
in the air, bend over in something called a ‘scrum’ and an egg shaped ball is
then thrown into the middle. The team
who then get possession have to try get a ‘touchdown’ whilst the other team try
to stop them by almost squeezing the life blood out of them. To be honest, if
any of you had met Amy Thompson at the office, you would not believe that this
extremely glamorous lady (see film below of her receiving the award) could be
someone that tough.
What the ScrumMaster does is break
complex entities of a software project that often involve many different people
from different areas of the business into more manageable pieces of work.
Ownership of the tasks is then shared amongst the team. The expression
‘sprint’ in thebigword’s case refers to two-week programmes. All the way through
this programme there are daily ‘stand ups’, which are often known as ‘huddles’.
The meetings are held standing up alongside a board which is covered in
coloured post-it notes that are moved around depending on priority. The
ScrumMaster’s job is to manage this and do it quickly, demand answers, agree
delivery dates and G-d help you if she catches your eyes wandering off the
ball. Sorry this is a bit wordy but it is through this incredible process that
we are actually managing to deal with a huge amount of developments within our
technology department; meeting the mountain of requests from our customers.
On a personal note, I have to tell
you, I hated rugby. I could never understand why anyone would want to catch
that ridiculous ball, only to be beaten up and thrown to the ground by a herd
of wild hooligans. I used to spend most of my time on the field avoiding going
anywhere near that ball. On the odd occasion that I did in fact catch the damn
thing, I disposed of it as speedily as possible. Sometimes in my haste to the
wrong side. Was I picked to represent the school team? Yes, of course I was.
But that was for ballroom dancing!
Have a great weekend - and whatever
activity you want to do, stay safe and healthy.
Larry
P.s. for those who don’t know, rugby
is similar to American football but without the padding!
