About

I have a lot of things to say about the software development profession. Like, it isn’t a profession. I was recently at a meeting of Microsoft MVPs. They could not agree on whether a unit test only applied to a small unit of code, or whether it could apply to a larger, integrated set of code.

I have put a lot of effort into improving software development. We have a lot of challenges ahead, and we are coming from far behind. In my experience, many people who call themselves software developers aren’t. I also wonder why an organization that increases its productivity by a factor of two using Scrum doesn’t need fewer developers. Where are the cost savings?

Our society is becoming more complex as our population rises, technology advances, and something weird is happening to the weather. Software holds many of the answers for holding things together. Plus, it is the last scalable resource.

My blogs may be edgy, full of unproven opinions, sometimes unsubstantiated, and critical. Some of you will find them useful, even enlightening. For everyone else, the blogs aren’t written with you in mind.

Scrum on!!!

Ken Schwaber

28 thoughts on “About”

  2. Few people have a mind of that and this;abstract and association with confirmation. I do believe that the power to be have found an application to twist cognitive to behaviorist paradigm by using Systematic persuasion induction by education media & technology as well Heuristic persuasion via social networks. Only a select bread is able to tip point and interpret one self’s controlled cognitive direction. You must be unharnessed from the mass persuasion and it’s virtual Acceptance of thought. This is my understanding.

    Ken Your Scrum and Agility methods are a eye opening direction, with an affirmative action, and are the base tact principals of the Visionary leader process…….. I like your style.

    Khail
    “AUDENTES FORTUNA JUVAT”

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  5. As an traditional infrastructure guy too lazy to learn anything more than enough simple scripting to get my job done, I am now trying to figure out the best way to turn my infrastructure into code. I have read a bunch of books, had some exposure to chef, am trying to learn ruby, and am working on understanding scrum and the way of thinking it represents. I really want to do this right, which to me means simply having a good direction to help me focus my efforts. I am hoping you can enlighten me on your idea of what a software developer really is, and possibly provide some pointers and guidance as to a path to reach infrastructure as code, continuous integration, and where to go from there.

  6. I’m blown away by the nerv for self recognition on something you certainly don’t deserve.
    It’s does not seems to be hard to amuse MVP’s :). I’m so pleased that none of you’re building airplanes.

  8. Pingback: Book Review: “Agile Project Management with Scrum” by Ken Schwaber | Bite-Sized Pieces

  9. I have been involved in many types of projects, teams, and approaches over the years. In many cases we instituted many of the concepts of scrum unaware of your guidelines or treatises on the subject. There seems to be a regular turn over in the ideas for how to execute projects and blind adoption of some that seem to be counter to the ideas of scrum. As an example the following is taken from a recent job advertisement.
    From ExecuNet job description:
    “We have multiple opportunities for project managers trained in Six Sigma, LEAN, Agile, and/or SCRUM methodologies. Must have experience working with major ERP systems. Individuals with a PMP certification are preferred.”

    Do you see a conflict in these requirements with the basic premises of scrum?

  10. If the intention is to hire someone who loves to study everything in sight, I think it is a opportunity. If they expect the person to apply all of the thinking from the various approaches, they are in for trouble. Especially since they think Scrum is a methodology.
    Ken

  11. Hi,

    I just took an PSM course and the course leader told me a story about an employee at FatBurger serving a fried squirrel to a customer, the customer then falls down sick and later ends up sueing the FatBurger. The course leader then tells that it’s a story about ‘the employee taking on risk’, and finally says the customer then ended up founding Oracle.

    To me this has all the components of an Urban legend, and it seems that the story is starting to get a life of it’s own. When I did a search on it on the internet I think the oldest references said they had heard the story from you, and that the employee was named Ken.

    I have not found any trace of a credible recall of Fatburger or any other restaturant serving a squirrel.

    It’s a nice story with a good point, but when it’s told like a true story I want it to be something that also have happened.

    Did FatBurger really serve a squirrel burger, and was the employee Larry Ellison?

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  16. Just wanted to leave a comment for what may be the guy who set off the scrum nightmare that has made programming, which I used to love, a complete nightmare of a job. Thanks jack@$$!

  19. This might seem petty, but I’ve climbed the mount to ask the question: Should I capitalize agile when writing about it?

  20. We are cosiderung using points per sprint as a metric to evaluate individual software engineers. Is this a good idea or even a valid metric? Thank you

  21. Points are a good technique to guess overall size. However, since a Scrum team is a group effort, points per engineer is like teasing apart and reason that a rugby team wins a game. The score, the overall outcome, is the only thing that matters. The team can work together to improve the score, but it is a team effort.

  22. Ken-
    Where did you get this term “Scrum”? I feel comfortable informing you that almost none of your practitioners represent my cohorts who grew up playing Rugby and Football in College. Almost the opposite. The Macho, Bleeding, Big Guys, Opposing each others faces and shoulders with extreme push and pressure in a Rugby Scrum…..this does not describe you guys!!!

    Very confused by the disparity….

    Mark A Annunziata- Winger- Not big enough for the Scrum!

  23. I want to ask if there will ever be a release of a Scrum Master exam that has no multiple choice and is all essay/short answer based. Thanks 🙂

  26. Hi Ken – my son asked me if I knew one of the developers of Agile methodology which caused me to check Wikipedia. Low and behold it was you!

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