Certified ScrumMaster Course

Overview

2 days

Surveys show that Scrum is by far the most popular agile method worldwide -- and with good reason.

There are three roles in Scrum: Team(s), Product Owner, and ScrumMaster. This latter role is NOT a project manager in any traditional sense. The ScrumMaster is a process coach -- someone who is a master of the Scrum method and helps the teams and product owner apply it and maximize value with it.

Agile management is as radically different from traditional project management as agile processes are different from traditional methodologies. Rather than plan, instruct and direct, the agile coach facilitates, coaches and leads. This person is called a ScrumMaster in the Scrum agile process to denote the difference and remind the person filling this role of the new responsibilities. Accepted participants learn how to be a ScrumMaster and how to make a development team, a product group, or an organization agile. Exercises, case studies, and examples used to bring home the realization of how to be a ScrumMaster instead of a project manager.


Methods of Education

Discussion, presentation, Q&A, workshop exercises


Audience

Anyone interested in adopting Scrum should take the CSM as a foundation -- including potential Product Owners, and the leadership team. And certainly, anyone wishing to serve as a ScrumMaster.


Level

Introductory: This course assumes no prerequisite skills, other than the readings listed in the Prerequisites section. Students will learn and apply skills (both "hard" and "soft") during the session.


Prerequisites: Pre-readings

Participants must read (available online), before the course:


Unless otherwise arranged, every participant is also required to have read the following chapters from Scaling Lean & Agile Development: Thinking and Organizational Tools for Scrum (Larman & Vodde), before the course:

  • Chapter 2: Systems Thinking
  • Chapter 4: Queuing Theory
  • Chapter 8: Teams

NOTE! Your company may have an online Safari account that you can use to read the book chapters online free. Please ask your colleagues if you have a Safari account.

Objectives

Through education and practice, a ScrumMaster should be able to:

  • Remove the barriers between development and the customer so the customer directly drives development;
  • Teach the customer how to maximize ROI and meet their objectives through Scrum;
  • Improve the lives of the development team by facilitating creativity and empowerment;
  • Improve the productivity of the development team in any way possible; and,
  • Improve the engineering practices and tools so each increment of functionality is potentially shippable


Outline

  • Agile and Scrum Overview
  • Scrum Background
  • Scrum Overview
  • Scrum Roles and Responsibilities
  • Scrum Artifacts
  • Scrum Events
  • Sprint Planning Meeting
  • Sprint
  • Daily Scrum
  • Sprint Review Meeting
  • Backlogs and Burndown Charts
  • Release Planning
  • The Art of the ScrumMaster
  • Tools for Fostering Self-Organizing Teams
  • Introducing Scrum into the Organization


Graduation/Certification

Not everyone who attends may achieve certification; it depends on demonstration of values and knowledge consistent with Scrum, and at least fulfilling the course prerequisites. Certified ScrumMasters will be recorded at www.scrumalliance.org.


Maximum Participants

35


Environment - Room, Tools, Texts

Read this: Course Environment - Workshop Style1


Text and Notes

  • There is a course PDF for the presentations. We may decide to give the students a file copy to view on a laptop or a paper copy, depending on situation.