The Scrum Field Guide: Practical Advice for Your First Year (Agile Software Development Series)

I got the book a couple of weeks after attending a Scrum master class Mitch gave in Vienna. In my work I come across people doing Scrum (and Scrum, but...) a lot. Before I got the book, I looked up things I needed to know / verify in the Internet. Now I have Mitch's book.After reading / using the book for almost two weeks here is what I think of it:It is the perfect book to look things up. I very much like the structure of the chapters and the index. Especially the index gets very handy when you just need to know a specific thing. It gets you in most cases right to the point. The chapters are well structured "the Mitch way" illustrating the real life situation in a story - as an appetizer, elaborating the things to know in a model and summarizing everything at the end. If you leave out the story, the information is presented in a crisp and short way. The style described is sometimes demanding: "you can do it the way described - or you leave it, but if you do it the way described - it works". There is little room for weasel around.Scrum is explained in words (even understandable for non-native speakers) and supported by graphics. The diagrams, tables and pictures are presented in a way, that one can use them in a real life situation on a flipchart, keeping things simple as required. The book is a good starting point for people involved with Scrum and acting as one of the Scrum roles. If one is new to Scrum, the stories give you the right setting and understanding of the underlying problem. As a more experienced Scrum user, the book is a handy reference.The making of the Kindle-edition that I own is very well done. Having the electronic edition gives me the opportunity to have the book with me every day and the big advantage that I can follow the numerous and accurate cross-references between the chapters that avoid saying things twice in several places.The book gets my stars for:- Overall structure- Not too much and not to little information- Mitch's lively way of setting the scene using stories- The cross references and the index- The very well made electronic version

I've been working with SCRUM for a few years now, and have seen some good successes in my projects along with my share of scars.I found that once you take and pass the CSM course, you have an understanding of the theory, but putting that theory into practice under real world conditions is the real trick.In reading this book, I've lost count of the number of times where I've had the "Oh man, we totally ran into that very same problem!" moment... followed by "<groan!>, I wish I read this earlier!"What sets this book apart is that it gives you the practical information that you don't really get through the CSM course, but rather through (in this case, Mitch's) hard earned experience. Every chapter had something that I could directly relate to, and usually more than one nugget of wisdom that I thought about introducing in a future iteration or project.Some highlights (among many!)-1) determining an iteration length. The shorter the iteration, the more opportunity for feedback and course correction.2) Off-shoring. If you must, then here's what you can do to maximize the chances for success... but be prepared for a tough road ahead!3) Mixing SCRUM roles. I've done it, but here's why you shouldn't!4) Engineering best practices- hard to be successful with SCRUM if you don't have the technical practices in order.5) Story and Task decomposition- some useful techniques and guidelines.6) How to deal with maintenance work that interrupts your sprint7) Dealing with technical debt, why is it important?I found that the book itself was very easy to read. I think the anecdote at the beginning of each chapter is an effective way to get the reader to relate to the topic. You could read the book from start to end, or as I did, jump from chapter to chapter, picking out the topics that are most relevant to your situation.For those new to SCRUM, having this book is really like having access to an experienced SCRUM trainer/coach to help guide you through the inevitable pitfalls. For those who are experienced with SCRUM, this book has a lot of advanced topics as well as serving as a great reference to the SCRUM fundamentals.

After reading finding myself in the middle a transformation from waterfall to agile i bought all the required reading from Cohn, Leffingwell and Schwaber i was still missing something with more practical knowledge and tools i could use every day. Even though I had the knowledge, I didn't have much practical experience. With the organization in the midst of massive change, theory wasn't enough.Faced with challenge of pulling a very large organization forward the number of times i have pulled from this book to help bring the organization through some of the harder times is hard to count. It was like someone through me a lifeline at a time when i didn't think things were actually going to move forward.While the entire book was great a few chapters were very impactful for me.Chapter 3 saved me at one point. While i had sponsorship at some levels i didn't have people who were onboard with the plan and embedded in the teams. It so easy to go back to what sort of worked in the past when things get tough. Having the right people to help push the transformation forward was criticalImmediately after changing to agile, team capacity dropped to what from the outside appeared to be zero. This is what brings less than useful scrutiny and the knee jerk reaction to measure using waterfall methods. Chapter 4 helped me push back and get an agreement that we would wait for a few sprints before we started worrying about measuring team velocity. Chapter 7 helped me come up with the definition of done and communicate more effectively with the stakeholders. This calmed nerves and helped everyone get focused on the important work at hand.This week I am facing some issues such as defining core hours and release planning. Lucky for me that is covered in the field basics section of the book.

Fantastic guide for your first time out.Excellent advise on the pitfalls that you will routinely encounter.Super advice.Invaluable, clear easy to read and understand.

I attended Mitch Lacey CSM course in 2010 an this book it's the extension of everything explain there with tons of more examples, real stories and millions of details that clarifies what 90% of ScrumMaster or anyone interested in running Scrum in their companies are going to face during their firsts years doing Scrum. In my case, after 3 years, I'm still learning things from this book. Congrats to Mitch.

Lots of good material not covered in most of the other popular scrum books. This book looks at common failures of the Scrum framework and provides detailed explanations on why they happen. It is an invaluable book for someone starting out in scrum, as it shows how the scrum master the product owner and the team can work to solve the dysfunction.

Una muy buena guía para tener claros los conceptos sobre los que trabaja SCRUM y metodologías Ágiles. Muy recomendable, de amena y divertida lectura.