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Is Enterprise Architecture Relevant To Agile?
Updated on 26 June, 2017
10.22K+ views
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Competitive people usually adopt new working ways for their organizations to stay afloat with the evolving technology landscape. Agile is one of the working ways which has been befriended by a lot of the organizations. It is capable of resolving various issues that software development has been facing for a number of years.
The role of Architecture in the Agile context has been a debate issue for decades, where supporters of an Agile points architecture as a “Big Design Up Front” which is a contradiction to the Agile philosophy. In the meantime, Enterprise Architecture has improved itself as a vital tool for translating strategy to operations. So are these two approaches conflicting each other or can you accept them together?
To arrive at a conclusion over this point, you need to understand the concept of the Agile and the Enterprise Architecture, which is as follows:
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Enterprise Architecture (EA)–
Enterprise Architecture provides an insight into the various interrelated aspects in an enterprise. EA translates strategy to concepts, principles and models that provide vision to future and guide to design and development. EA provides a general review and the direction and considers the developed system as a black box system. Solution Architecture opens the black box and describes the structure and the decisions in the box. TOGAF and ArchiMate are the important standards of an enterprise architecture.
Agile–
Agile is the software development technique comes under the Agile Manifesto. Agile focuses on the individuals and interactions, working software, customer collaboration and on those who are responding to change. The manifesto provides a set of principles providing tangible guidance. One of the principles is “Simplicity –the art of maximizing the amount of work not done — is essential”. The most popularly used Agile method is Scrum, considered as the simplest method to instantiate Agile.
Following are the insights over the Agile and the Enterprise Architecture to decide whether they can be blended together or not.
Insight #1: Pre-condition can be stated as Enterprise Architecture
The first important insight is that EA is valuable to determine the future of pivotal Agile projects. It provides better vision to realize, identify the application and projects which are needed to support this vision. In EA, applications can be introduced as a black box. The Agile Project can open this black box. Agile projects can refine the high-level business requirements into the epics and the user stories in EA.
Insight #2: Agile needs other Scaling mechanisms
Another important insight is that the focus of Agile will only be the teams, and not the enterprise. Dean Leffingwell designed the Scaled Agile Framework for small teams and it does not scale to the enterprise level. Enterprise Architects are also working under this framework. The responsibilities of the enterprise architect constitute of maintaining the goals, facilitating reuse of emerging solutions, knowledge and patterns.
Insight #3: Agile, SCRUM can be successful Enterprise Architecture
Finally, Agile and Scrum can be considered as enterprise architecture. They can be illustrated in the form of principles and models, core elements of architecture. This insight is for Agile proponents to convince them how Enterprise Architecture (EA)
really works. It also reveals how you can handle an EA in an Agile environment. Similarly, it shows in which project, you should handle the Agile principles and Scrum concepts. Basically, it works earnestly if carried out seriously but at the same time can be risky to adopt it if it doesn’t fit in your organization.
Insight #4: Enterprise Architects should assist to maximize the “Not Done” work
There are lots of misunderstanding related to the enterprise architects. A general misconception or you can say pitfall about the enterprise architects is that they think solely about the thing which is less prioritized. This behaviour accounted for contradiction in the enterprises. Enterprise architects should do work collaboratively with others, concentrating on “the most prioritized matters”.
Similarly, Agile teams work together, discussing each and every matter and maximizing the “not done” work. Soft skilled work is more important for every team member. Best practices like multi-disciplinary teams, collaboration, co-acts and communication should be applied in each and every organization. Thus EA should work according to the Agile manifesto.
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These are the ways in which Enterprise Architecture not only performs, but does so well enough, if integrated with Agile principles.
Did you find this article helpful?
Lindy Quick, SPCT, is an experienced Transformation Architect with expertise in multiple agile frameworks including SAFe, Scrum, and Kanban. She is proficient in leading agile transformations across diverse industries including manufacturing, defense, insurance/financial, and federal government. She is a strong communicator, manager, leader, and problem solver, seeking a challenging role in an organization that values effective and efficient value delivery. Lindy, is the SAFe Practice Lead where she is responsible for fostering Lean-Agile principles and mindset in organizations and individuals through coaching, training, leadership development, and successful execution of transformations. Over her career, she has facilitated adoption of innovative ways of thinking and working within the context of organizational transformation, established a Lean-Agile Center of Excellence and Guiding Coalition to ensure transformation success, and provided recovery support for underperforming ARTs, ensuring the delivery of high-quality and predictable systems. She has a Bachelor of Science degrees in Computer Science and German from Doane University, Crete, NE, and a Master of Business Administration degree from Baker University, Overland Park, KS. She holds several relevant certifications, including SAFe 6.0 Program Consultant Trainer, Certified SAFe 6 Program Consultant, Atlassian Managing Jira Projects for Data Center and Cloud, ISTQB Certified Tester, ICAgile Certified Professional in Agile Test Automation and Agile Testing, and Certified Scrum Master. Lindy is also an active member of the professional community, serving as the Women in Agile Mid-Atlantic Chapter Co-Chair and a speaker at various events including the IT Revolution DevOps European Summit, Scrum Alliance Summit, and SAFe Gov’t Day.
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Agile Best Practices for an Effective Team 2024
The use of agile approaches has fundamentally transformed the information technology sector. However, what is Agile exactly? Small development cycles, or "sprints," are part of the agile project management style, which lays the emphasis on providing continual improvement to a product or service. A sprint is a set period during which the team is expected to finish a specific task. The team reviews their performance and discusses ways to improve the work at the end of each sprint.
Agile is the umbrella term for several frameworks and the techniques that govern them. A few well-known agile project management frameworks are Scrum, Kanban, Lean, and XP. Implementing the best Agile practices can help leverage your Agile team and make it effective.
Why Should Organizations Implement Agile and Require an Agile Team?
Organizations should first understand and build their best agile practices and culture around the fact that agility is ultimately a mindset shift from traditional ways of working. Business or organization agility involves creating that structure or framework, which helps and allows operations to flourish positively in the wake of adversities, change, or challenges. Organizations need to bring in that shift-left approach to ensure that agility is a harbinger of a multitude of benefits over merely making it an adjective and not yielding its real power. This is why the business needs agility in every space of its operations to be flexible, fast, and responsive to the new-age challenges.
20 Best Practices for Agile Teams
Let's look at some general practices for efficient, agile project management before moving on to Agile best practices for implementing each. You can even get an Agile management certification to learn professional skills. Some of the best Agile practices used for creating an effective team include:
Some more Agile practices for an effective team include -
Build projects around motivated individuals
Convey information face-to-face
Form self-organizing teams
Tasks Prioritization
Reflect on how teams can become more effective
Creating the sprint backlog during a planning meeting
Encouraging self-organizing teams
Maintain charts to monitor progress
Sprint retrospectives to learn from the previous sprint
Sprint reviews to present work
Release planning meeting to create a release plan
Cross training
Creating an ideal Agile workspace where the team enjoys working
Setting a sustainable pace
Estimating the projected velocity
Always having the customer available
Creating spike solutions to reduce risks
Work together with the client
Build projects around motivated people
Transmit information in person
1. Build projects around motivated individuals
This is undoubtedly one of the most underrated best practices of agile methodology which involves maintaining the trust and belief to keep team members exhilarated to adapt, collaborate, communicate, and achieve greater heights as they progress ahead. Organizations need to foster a culture of growth and minimize distractions to keep team members engaged in the right direction along with ensuring no disruptions to either the team, the process, or the deliverables. Team members need to collaborate as well as get their think time or my time for thoughtful and focused development.
2. Convey information face-to-face
To build trust and engage positively without any perceptions, there flourishes another important best practice of agile methodology which lays impetus on face-to-face and collaborative communication over traditional methods. Whether it involves having co-located teams in a common building or team members spread across geographies, having face-to-face communication channels opens up avenues to deeper insights, as well as helps build sustainable and persistently evolving agile teams.
3. Form self-organizing teams
Agile scrum best practices involve creating deliverables or working around team members who focus, share responsibility, adapt, and can self-organize with minimal to no supervision. Agile propagates delegation of authority and responsibility to teams to ensure they are aware and make decisions to support overall goals beyond individual aspirations. These teams can quickly acclimate to the critical needs, and feedback or avoid pitfalls by thoughtful practices and addressing the "how" work gets done.
4. Tasks Prioritization
It is one of the well-known daily scrum best practices that the product management function or the business can help teams mature on the path of agility by ensuring their bit of prioritization and detailing is done thoroughly. To support agile teams in their endeavor to thrive as a cross-functional, self-organizing, result-oriented, innovating, and problem-solving unit, the organization must lay down a framework that defines the "what" of work and keeps it detailed to form a healthy product and sprint backlog which meets the definition of ready by all means for the agile team to take up. Having a healthy product backlog is not only one of the important agile scrum best practices but also an important OKR on which an agile team is continuously assessed.
5. Reflect on how teams can become more effective
Agile teams need to constantly reflect on their ways of working to ensure the right set of agile best practices for effective team functioning are being followed and also to weed out any frictions/processes that may be slowing down productivity. While teams focus on continuous delivery, they also need to reflect on celebrating wins and improvements that can bring in innovative approaches over mundane practices. There are various formats of a retrospective that agile teams can use to master this agile best practice, they all essentially address the 3 important questions:
What went well (What can teams continue doing)
What can be improved (What can teams stop doing)
Key Action Items (Takeaways/learnings to adopt changes)
6. Creating the sprint backlog during a planning meeting
The product owner presents high-priority features at these sessions, and the team answers questions and develops specific tasks for the sprint backlog.
7. Encouraging self-organizing teams
The ability to make decisions and adjust to shifting demands is a benefit of self-organizing teams. Team members offer their services instead of waiting for the team leader to assign work. This guarantees a stronger sense of dedication and ownership.
8. Maintain charts to monitor progress
Burndown charts can be kept up to date to monitor development. A burndown chart plots the amount of work remaining against the amount of time. When estimating when all of the work will be finished is quite helpful.
9. Sprint retrospectives to learn from the previous sprint
This meeting is held to review the most recent sprint and decide what could be altered to make the following sprint more fruitful.
10. Sprint reviews to present work
The team displays the product backlog items they finished during the sprint during this meeting. A PowerPoint presentation or a demonstration of fresh features could be used.
11. Release planning meeting to create a release plan
The primary goal of the release planning meeting is for the development team to estimate the number of ideal programming weeks needed to complete each user story. The customer then determines which tale has the highest priority for completion and is the most important.
12. Cross training
The project's progress may be slowed down if only one member of your team is capable of working in a particular area and that individual decides to quit or simply has too much to accomplish. Cross-training makes your team more adaptable and helps to avoid this problem.
13. Creating an ideal Agile workspace where the team enjoys working
The following elements should be present in the ideal agile workspace:
large, readable charts (a visual reminder of the current state of the project)
the opportunity to observe each team member (everyone should be visible in the team workspace)
massive whiteboards (at least one where developers may share problems and seek solutions)
a calm and intimate setting (for relaxing, working alone or private calls)
14. Setting a sustainable pace
A manageable pace assists the team in planning releases and iterations and prevents overtime.
15. Estimating the projected velocity
Project velocity's major goal is to assist teams in estimating how much work they can complete in a specific amount of time based on how quickly earlier iterations of the same task were finished.
16. Always having the customer available
The consumer must be accessible at all times. It is preferable to designate a customer or clients to the development team.
17. Creating spike solutions to reduce risks
A very basic software to investigate potential solutions is called a spike solution. It aids in finding solutions to challenging technical or design issues.
18. Work together with the client
When needs and wishes are met, expectations are met, and requirements are satisfied, the consumer is happy. Software engineers have devised several methods, short of mindreading, to ascertain what the customer wants and provide it. At one end of the funnel, teams often record user needs before delivering the product at the other end with little to no client engagement in between. An agile team keeps in close contact with the client to clarify expectations, work on fixes, and present possibilities that hadn't been thought of before.
19. Build projects around motivated people
To push through a demanding development cycle and complete the work correctly, one needs motivation. Agile teams are committed to their job, laser-focused on the collective objective, and collegial. Agile teams create a fast-paced, predictable rhythm to their work when there is mutual trust and respect among the team members. It's challenging to create an environment where this can occur.
20. Transmit information in person
Agile team members like in-person interactions, whether discussing a challenging issue with a coworker or reporting on the day's accomplishments during a daily meeting. Progress is slowed down or blocked by information lost in a busy email box or voice mail queue. The daily meeting is the only time the complete staff gets together to discuss any problems that can result in delays.
Agile Best Practices: Scrum Project Management
Agile scrum is established as the most widely adopted and successful framework of the agile bandwagon bringing in best practices of agile into a lightweight framework for teams to fly-off with agility as they commence. Here are some top best practices adopted by scrum teams to reduce chaos:
Effective Daily Standup - The daily stand-up of any scrum team is not merely a simple scrum ceremony but, it nourishes the scrum process of the team driving effective planning, transparency, inspection, and adaptation to the team, customer, and process sentiments. Apart from being an important part of the testing practices in agile, effective daily stand-ups steer the feedback loop from strategic planning to daily planning.
Planning at all levels - A virtuous planning exercise involves team involvement at all levels of planning right from understanding the product vision to reviewing the roadmap, participation in release and iteration planning, and contribution to the daily stand-up by all team members. This encourages team members to be accountable for their activities while also allowing the core principles of the team to define the "how to" of getting things done.
Besides these, key practices of agile of realtime projects include:
Having at least 2-3 sprints of a healthy and prioritized product backlog for the team which meets the Definition of Ready metric
Maintaining progress on visual indicators for the team to be aware and constantly course-correct.
Establishing clear communication guidelines, team agreements, and templates that allow the team to focus on innovative work over operational tasks
Regular maturity assessments and checks to understand the progress of agile processes.
Agile Best Practices: Kanban Project Management
Kanban project management is a framework within the agile methodologies umbrella that is focused on visualizing the workflow i.e. to discern how work items 'flow' from business to the teams, after which to embrace the agile best practices checklist to limit work in progress, reduce turnaround time and enable continuous execution. Much like scrum, kanban is a framework or a set of tools focused on laying down the principles of agility and maturing them over time. Here are some best practices of agile that Kanban teams can apply to maximize their throughput:
Visualize and Manage Workflow - It is important for teams working in the Kanban framework to understand project intricacies, stakeholders, operational needs, and business exigencies to visualize work, workflow, and impending risks/challenges and position items, team members, and deliveries accordingly.
Limit Work-in-Progress (WiP) - Team members working in agile teams need to inculcate the mindset shift to be self-organizing and sustaining but with this also comes an important attribute of finishing items that have been started. A visible behavior over time that agile teams can showcase is to start everything but not be able to finish anything which maximizes the amount of WiP items without their actual delivery. This is where the best agile practices and OKR metrics such as lead time and cycle time help teams keep a tab of how much work enters the system and values output over work in progress.
Process transparency and collaborative evolution - All processes, policies, and procedures of the team must be explicitly made visible to all team members who share the onus of upholding them and evolving experimentally. Team members need to respect the WiP limits, and process guidelines to ensure they plan, do, check, and act on observations to ensure tranquil delivery and symmetrical alignment of the team, work, and achievements.
Agile Best Practices Associated with Extreme Programming (XP)
Extreme programming (XP) is a popular and structured agile project management framework that envisions simplicity and smaller iterations of development. Here are some crucial practices of agile recommended for this framework:
Pair programming - Pair programming is almost synonymous with extreme programming as it is one of the core practices on which the framework is established. Pair programming involves two or more engineers working side-by-side to design and code together to achieve optimistic programming methods and built-in quality.
Devops - Devops which helps organizations establish continuous integration processes has its origins in XP, as it spearheads delivery by shortening cycles and focusing on faster and coordinated deliveries between development and operations.
Coding standards - To achieve the definition of done after validating individual story level acceptance criteria, and reduce hiccups in the CICD cycles, development team members need to establish stringent coding and quality standards that stand out as the guiding best practice of the framework.
Agile Best Practices for Global Teams
Every organization squabbles to scale their agile practices from the team level to the organization level by ratification of practices of agile such as:
Embracement of agile for all business and enablement functions of the organization
Taking up enterprise-level scaled agile practices/principles to ensure synchronous planning and delivery mechanisms.
Effectively engaging team members by having breakout sessions, and team-building activities apart from the agile ceremonies to keep the team bonded.
Supporting teams through initiatives such as automation, DevOps integrations, big-room planning, etc to usher constant progress.
I am sure you by now have a vivid overview of how each framework of the agile project management canopy has its own best practices in helping teams ace a perfected governance framework and processes. A lot of organizations that use hybrid frameworks may tailor processes and take benefit of overlapping practices which culminate to bring in the best of both into their processes, policies, and procedures.
Lean Development Model
Implementing lean manufacturing principles into project management procedures is the core of lean project management. These guidelines generally concentrate on getting rid of the trash or anything else that doesn't offer value to the work. Identifying values, cutting waste, and continual improvement are a few strategies for implementing lean project management success.
Extreme Programming (XP)
Using the extreme programming framework of agile project management, developers may produce software of greater quality while also working more productively and figuring out the best approach to work together on code. Important XP-related Agile best practices include -
Planning game: Every team member should come together and participate in the planning game.
Test-driven Development: Before writing the final code, continuous tests are executed to validate each line of code's functionality.
Simple Design: Software with a simple design is easier to build and requires less work to fix issues.
Small Releases: This idea emphasizes small releases throughout product development, operating on an iteration-like premise.
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Take a deep dive into the trending Agile Category Courses
CSM Certification
CSPO Certification
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PSM Certification
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Key Benefits of Using Agile
Agile encapsulates the achievement of strategic objectives and corresponding team-level goals in shorter cycles and iterations of activities which include changes and evaluation of how the outcome is going to shape out. This cycle helps teams deliver to customer needs and more importantly shorter time to market which is one of the critical metrics of organization assessment in today's volatile environment.
Apart from this embarking on the journey towards agile offers several benefits such as:
Flexibility - Agile teams face better flexibility in terms of ways of working, change management, and domain/technology adoptions due to their abilities to switch contexts, cross-functional skills, self-organizing abilities, and collaborative functioning.
Built-in Quality - In an agile way of working, quality becomes everyone's responsibility as well as a key OKR for the team to progress smoothly from one iteration to the other without causing too many process hiccups. Also, defects found either by the QA or UAT team members or by the business tend to get fixed in a short time considering iterative development.
Customer Satisfaction - Agile involves close customer involvement in building products based on continuous and immediate feedback loops. This results in positive customer engagement, higher net promoter score, and appeased customers driving sales, revenues, and reputation.
Final Thoughts
Many sectors that focus on developing products or services through a continuous cycle of incremental adjustments are widely utilizing the agile methodology. Many firms have found success in implementing Agile. However, this success depends on how effectively the best practices in Agile are being executed. As you can see, there is a wide variety of options to pick from when it comes to these Agile best practices. Understanding your team's and business's needs and then meeting those needs effectively are the keys to implementing a "best" practice.
The best way to scale Agile is for businesses to use it regardless of how big or complicated the project is. Small teams, short iterations, quick customer feedback, value-based business priorities, and including users in requirement refinement are all examples of effective approaches.
Agile methodologies are durable because of the underlying ideals and tenets that shape how people collaborate. Agile teams that prioritize cooperation, everyday engagement, individual motivation, face-to-face communication, self-organization, and continuous improvement will be more likely to succeed when they come together in businesses of all sizes.
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Read Moreby Lindy Quick
14 May'1711.24K+
Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: The Difference Stated
Agile methodology is a simple, flexible, and iterative product development model with the distinct advantages of accommodating new requirement changes and incorporating the feedback of the previous iterations over the traditional waterfall development model. In comparing Agile Coach vs Scrum Master, it's important to recognize that both play pivotal roles in project management within Agile environments Agile methodology is the new mantra for new-age product development or project management. Agile welcomes change and can incorporate the dynamics of the ever-changing world in the product development lifecycle. Scrum is an agile framework that is widely used by teams and organizations across the software development world.Go for certified Scrum Master training and get experiential learning with case studies. Now, let us deep dive to understand the differences between scrum master and agile coach.Scrum Master vs Agile Coach: Table of DifferencesThe distinction between a scrum master and an agile coach is frequently raised when organizations wish to transition from their old waterfall software development culture to the Agile approach. A Scrum master with enhanced training and a higher level of competence and experience are what an agile coach is. The primary distinction between a Scrum master and an agile coach is that a Scrum master coaches a team, whereas an agile coach coaches an entire enterprise. As we all know, transition is the most challenging component of any development process. During this critical stage, firms must look into the Agile coach vs Scrum master:Parameters Scrum Master Agile Coach 1. Focus Areas Scrum master focuses on a single team and assists the team with daily workflow. Focuses on all organizational teams and developing an overall system for teams and leadership. 2. Roles and Responsibilities A Scrum master ensures that everything flows smoothly in the scrum and solves the problems that a team finds hard to solve. An agile coach works with all teams and stakeholders and defines the workflow framework. 3. Specialization Area A Scrum master must adequately understand the Scrum framework. An Agile coach is familiar with various Agile approaches, such as Scrum, Kanban, Scaling Methods, and others. 4. Duration Long-term Short-term 5. Training Responsibilities The Scrum master teaches agile principles and ideals to his team. Coaches the leadership team on agile principles and processes, such as scrum masters, product owners, and executives. 6. Salary $104,205 per year.$134,438 per year.Agile Coach vs Scrum Master ComparisonLet us discuss the agile coach and scrum master differences parameters in detail: Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: Focus Area An agile coach typically focuses on organizational vision or is responsible for equipping a team with external expertise and experience. Agile coaches are concerned with the entire organization. There are three main focus areas of the Agile coach: Team: An agile coach focuses on team alignment around a shared goal and establishes a healthy team environment to make decisions collectively. Product: An agile coach assists teams and organizations in discovering the advantages of customer-centricity, design thinking, and discovery. Leadership: An agile coach enhances leadership skills by establishing commitments, creating an accountable culture, and facilitating behavioral change. A scrum master, on the other hand, concentrates on a single team, influencing and interacting with each team member to help them grow and prosper in the results. There are two main focus areas of the Scrum master: 1. Coaching: Three views can be used to characterize the Scrum Master as a coach: the individual, the team, and the organization. Individual Coaching: Explain the desired mindset and behavior to individuals, assist them in seeing new views and possibilities, and persuade individual team members to implement scrum effectively. Team Coaching: Create a learning culture, encourage continual development, and help the team solve problems and resolve conflicts. A scrum master changes the attitudes, mindsets, and behaviors impeding the team's ability to conduct scrum well. 2. Organization: A scrum master assists the organization in achieving extraordinary achievements by providing high-quality, valued products; and coaches the entire organization in product management with an emphasis on adding business value constantly: support and foster collaboration and cooperation with Scrum teams. Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: Roles and ResponsibilitiesAn agile coach's role is to help teams become more effective, transparent, and cohesive and provide consumers with better outcomes, solutions, and products/services. Responsibilities of an Agile Coach Train teams to use agile working methods. Create governance regulations that support agile-based activities. Determine the appropriate metrics to guarantee a consistent measurement. Allowing for changes in working methods Use systems thinking to solve challenges. Evaluation and recommendations Frameworks for Agile Senior management training in agile methods Advocating for enterprise-wide structural and procedural reforms Create enterprise policies to back up agile approaches. Change opposition must be neutralized. Mentoring for Business Models A Scrum master serves as both a facilitator and a coach, assisting the Scrum team and the more significant business in understanding and applying Scrum theory and practice. NetmindResponsibilities of Scrum Master Conducting and coordinating Scrum Events as needed or asked. Assists the team in understanding the need for short and unambiguous Product Backlog items. To help developers create high-value products. Coach developers on self-organization and cross-functionality. To remove barriers to the Developers' progress Scrum Events will be facilitated as needed or requested. To coach developers in organizations where scrum is not fully understood or implemented. AtlassianTop Cities where Knowledgehut Conduct CSM Certification Training Course OnlineCSM Certification in BangaloreCSM Certification in SydneyCSM Certification in ChennaiCSM Certification in New YorkCSM Certification in LondonCSM Certification in ChicagoCSM Certification in SingaporeCSM Certification in Pune CSM Certification in WashingtonCSM Certification in TorontoCSM Certification in DubaiCSM Certification in Los AngelesCSM Certification in HyderabadCSM Certification in MelbourneCSM Certification in AtlantaAgile Coach vs Scrum Master: Knowledge AreaAn agile coach has a broad scope and is not limited to scrum, which is why they have more excellent knowledge, expertise, and influence. A scrum master is also an agile coach specializing solely in scrum. A scrum master needs to understand the scrum framework. In contrast, an agile coach must be familiar with many agile approaches, such as Scrum, Kanban, and scaling. Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: DurationThe Scrum master works with the Scrum team during each sprint and remains with it throughout its life. When compared to the duration of a scrum master. An agile coach remains with the organization until the goal is met and then leaves. Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: Training Responsibilities The Scrum Master coaches or trains scrum teams and mentor organizational workers to learn how they work and who they can help. The scrum master must ensure that the team can handle all obstacles independently. Undoubtedly, the scrum master position is always present to assist in resolving the issue by accepting full accountability and ownership. Agile coaches train the team and provide theoretical and practical instruction to the client and their personnel on important themes, like agility, the application of Kanban, etc. Agile Coach vs Scrum Master: SalaryAn agile coach earns an average of $134,438 per year, whereas a scrum master earns an average of $104,205 per year. Both salaries can vary depending on the job's location, the organization's size, and the professional's level of expertise. Become a project management expert with our PMP certification online classes. Boost your career and confidently lead successful projects.How are Agile Coach and Scrum Master Similar?Apart from the difference between an Agile coach and Scrum master, Scrum masters and agile coaches share numerous similar duties, given below: They are both scrum and business agility experts. They both coach and mentor teams and companies to improve performance and create value. They both ask probing, thought-provoking questions and aim to teach others how to do things better for themselves. Both are agile advocates who set an excellent example for everyone in the workplace. Both contribute to high-performing teams. As the team gains proficiency in the fundamentals, both focus on removing increasingly challenging organizational constraints. They are both servant leaders. What Should you Choose Between Agile Master vs Scrum Master?The roles of Scrum master and Agile coach may appear similar, yet they are pretty different and valuable to the firm, making scrum master vs. agile coach a hotly debated topic. It is not possible to substitute one for another. The difference between Scrum master and Agile coach lies in their scope of responsibilities and influence on the team and organization, especially in the context of project management. Organizations must recognize that these jobs cannot be filled by someone who lacks the necessary competence and that these are two distinct responsibilities that cannot be replaced by each other. An Agile coach and Scrum master have distinct tasks, and foci, and it is advantageous for these two to collaborate for organizational progress. Suppose you want to succeed in your business and have sustainable organizational agility. In that case, you must contact the best agile software development firm to deliver the desired outcomes.Engage with the top trending Agile Category CoursesCSM CertificationCSPO CertificationLeading SAFe CertificationPSM CertificationSAFe Scrum Master CertificationSAFe SPC CertificationSAFe RTE CertificationSAFe POPM CertificationICP-ACC CertificationTransformation of a Scrum Master into an Agile CoachThe transition of an individual from the role of the scrum master to the role of an agile coach is a gradual process. The experience of working as a scrum master is invaluable. It is a pre-requisite for someone to become an Agile coach, apart from other requirements like maturing and mastering the role of scrum master, undergoing necessary training or certifications in SAFe Agile such as SPCT [SAFe Program Consultant Trainer], on successful completion of which the professionals will be allowed to train SPCs [SAFe Program Consultants]. Apart from these, exhibiting leadership and training faculty qualities such as excellent communication, interpersonal skills, patience, and other soft skills are of paramount importance at the individual level for aspiring candidates who would like to transition from the role of Scrum Master of a team to the role of Agile coach who would play the role of trainer, mentor and role model of agile values across all teams of the organization. On a timeline front, a decade of professional experience and at least 5 years of experience as the scrum master is desired by organizations to allow the smooth transition of an individual from the role of the scrum master to being an agile coach.ConclusionIn conclusion, Scrum master is a role specific to a scrum team tasked with eliminating obstructions and bottlenecks to help the scrum team perform as a collective high functioning unit in accordance with agile process, principles, and agile values. Whereas an Agile coach performs an independent role of a subject matter expert (SME) for all agile frameworks, principles, and values and is tasked with training product owners, scrum masters and leadership teams in agile principles and values. An agile coach is expected to lead by example and be a role model for agile values of transparency and openness in the organization. Understanding Agile Coach vs Scrum Master helps organizations and businesses determine which guidance and leadership style suits their teams for improving agile processes and expanding. If you are on your road to becoming Scrum Master, check out KnowledgeHut best Agile certification.
Read Moreby Lindy Quick
19 Aug'199.5K+
Is CSPO Worth it? Career Benefits of CSPO Certification
In the current cut-thrust business environment, many people are looking for ways to boost their careers. The Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) certification has recently increased in popularity. Is CSPO worth it? Absolutely, as it is a highly sought-after certification for product owners and those who are responsible for leading the development of quality software products.Becoming certified provides invaluable knowledge and experience to professionals seeking a niche in an ever-evolving industry. Here we will explore how a CSPO certification can significantly add to your career. Also, going for CSPO certification training will help you excelling in addressing challenges through Scrum as an effective product owner. Scrum AllianceIs Obtaining a CSPO certification a Valuable Investment? Any certification adds to improving the skill set of the individual and gives them a competitive edge, expands their knowledge and skills, professional credibility, and higher earning potential. Similarly, is CSPO worth it, certification benefits: Is valid across multiple domains and industries beyond IT Provides credibility to the individual abilities to manage the backlog, team, and overall product goals Helps ace larger roles in a scaled agile with proven knowledge of product backlog management and prioritization Pushes the individuals to work closely with agile practitioners and scrum masters in optimizing the agile setup and constantly looking for improvements Helps you get recognized as the professional manager of the product backlog. Prioritize and change items on the product backlog. Makes you learn from the scratch. Gets you jobs in reputed companies. Provides approaches to handling customers. Helps you understand the team. Aids you in networking with professionals Enhances the knowledge base, career opportunities and earning potential of the individuals The CSPO® certification does not have any prerequisite as it looks to build the knowledge of agile/scrum from the scratch. This helps individuals open a new career path while also learning and specializing in the agile space. This is beyond any doubt, one of the most important and untold benefits and a steppingstone for individuals who are interested in starting their careers as product owners. With this CSPO certification, you can lead the team much more confidently. You will also be able to learn new things about this, which will motivate and boost the entire team to operate smoothly. KnowledgeHut A-CSPO training will help you focus on maximizing business value and product backlog optimization.Benefits of CSPO CertificationBelow are the top advantages and CSPO certification benefits: 1. Wider Spectrum of Career OpportunitiesThe CSPO certification validates that the candidate is a qualified Scrum Product Owner with extensive knowledge of Product Owner roles and duties. The CSPO certification stands out in resumes and catches the eye of respected firm recruiters. It boosts the candidates' chances of being hired by reputable companies.With this CSPO certification, you can lead a team much more confidently. You will also be able to learn new things about this, which will motivate and boost the entire team to operate smoothly. Knowing everything, there is to know about CSPO will help you in any way if you want to work in the industry.2. Demonstrating and Applying Core ScrumThe certification includes a thorough study of Scrum methodology and proper Scrum training. It leads to developing a fundamental understanding of Scrum and how to cope with daily challenges. A CSPO, whose primary responsibility is business optimization, has a solid understanding of Agile methodology and can demonstrate how they set up tasks and use them to the firm's benefit.It implies that you will gain from understanding all the scrum concepts from the ground up. If you skipped or did not wish to become CSM certified, don't worry because CSPO will discuss the agile manifesto and its impact on the scrum framework. You will also learn about the Scrum cycles and roles. This training will give you a thorough grasp of the scope of a PO.3. InterfaceProduct Owners with CSPO certification can be liaisons between clients and developers. They will be able to communicate client needs to developers to prioritize work in the product backlog. They solicit consumer feedback regularly to guarantee that the developers create a product that satisfies the customers' expectations. It allows for innovation and the development of products with business value.4. Product BacklogThe candidate will develop the Product Backlog as a Certified Scrum Product Owner. A Product Backlog is similar to a to-do list for a developer. For a Developer to perform effectively, the Product Backlog must be well-defined so that each feature is clearly understood. As the Product Owner does not frequently communicate with the Scrum Master, a clear Product Backlog must be a top priority for any effective Sprint Planning and product development.Chisel LabsCSPO training course provides applicants with a real-world example of defining product backlogs and helps them learn how it is done. As a result, candidates learn the fundamentals of the product owner's tasks and responsibilities and are prepared to become professional Product Owners. 5. Prioritizing BacklogsIdentifying the product backlog items is essential to product development and critical to the product's success. Product owner's role is to prioritize the Product Backlog items required for the next Sprint. The CSPO certification course consists of several systematic ways that teach the candidate how to prioritize Product Backlog items. Prioritizing your product backlog items would boost business and product values. Still, it would also increase the product owner's respect and reputation as they are praised for their prioritization decisions. CSPO training provides scenario-based content to applicants to help them understand how to manage the product backlog. They are taught how to convert themes and epics into user stories. They also learn how to connect with the client and the developer to explain the Product Backlog priority.6. Ease with Agile Practitioners Nowadays, all businesses utilize Agile techniques for software development and testing. Agile has made things considerably easier and much faster than they were previously. Agile practitioners, in general, have a different perspective than others. You will appreciate the usefulness of CSPO certification in this process since you can communicate with the practitioners.CSPO certification candidates are trained from the ground up in the Agile approach, making them masters after completing the certification training. It, in turn, makes it easier for them to operate and adopt an Agile product owner certification.7. One for the Team CSPO-certified members are educated to work with groups to complete tasks more efficiently and quickly. The CSPOs frequently force the firm to collaborate to generate goods that meet the client's needs. CSPO is in charge of the business side, but their grasp of the team is also critical to the successful and timely delivery of work.They cannot impose backlogs on developers, and understanding the team and their capabilities is essential. The CSPO assists the team in points in the right direction. CSPO certification will help every Product Owner drive their team and meet the needs of their customers.8. Planning to OptimizeA CSPO-certified professional is responsible for the overall planning and scheduling of the team's work. They are trained to optimize the product through effective time management tasking, allowing each team member to offer the greatest outcomes and keeping them on their toes at all times to maximize production.9. Enhancing Earning PotentialAfter becoming certified, CSPOs have a greater ability to optimize a company's growth. They are valued employees who ensure that the developers' overall operations run smoothly and without major hiccups, increasing their earning potential. They are typically compensated more and can boost their earning potential with more experience. For example, a certified scrum product owner's salary in India with 1 to 4 years of experience will be 9% higher than those without certification. Similarly, throughout the experience, you can see the benefit of getting qualified. Certified Scrum Product Owner SalariesThe salary of a certified Scrum Product Owner varies from country to country. Collated below are the average salaries for three important countries:The average Scrum Product Owner salary in India is 18 Lakhs per year.The average salary of the Scrum Product Owner in the US is $ 100,831 per year.Note: This data is based on the salary report by Glassdoor and Payscale.Top Companies Hiring Certified Scrum Product OwnersFurther understanding our initial question - is CSPO® worth it, certification benefits, let us see some top companies that hire certified professionals in this space:Company Name Average Pay p.a.* Google $2L - $4L AirBnB $2L - $4L Meta $2L - $3L LinkedIn $2L - $3L Google Cloud $2L - $3L Twitch $2L - $3L YouTube $2L - $3L TikTok $2L - $3L Apple $2L - $3L Asana $2L - $3L Source = Glassdoor for all the above pay packages Top Cities where Knowledgehut Conduct CSPO Certification Training Course OnlineCSPO Certification in BangaloreCSPO Certification in SydneyCSPO Certification in ChennaiCSPO Certification in New YorkCSPO Certification in LondonCSPO Certification in ChicagoCSPO Certification in SingaporeCSPO Certification in Pune CSPO Certification in BerlinCSPO Certification in TorontoCSPO Certification in DubaiCSPO Certification in Los AngelesCSPO Certification in HyderabadCSPO Certification in VancouverCSPO Certification in DelhiDesigned to help you achieve mastery with ease, our course provides a comprehensive project management course overview, making it the key to enhancing your skills and succeeding in your career. Enroll now and start your journey to success!Conclusion The CSPO® certification lays the foundation for a bright and prosperous future in agile product management by starting from scratch and giving certified professionals the competitive advantage and universal acceptance of this powerful credential. While the question, is CSPO certification worth it, certification benefits is largely answered with relevant data in the above few sections, this certification opens up the avenue for the professional to become the face of the product and take up one designation of the product owner, but multiple roles and responsibilities of the sponsor, customer, product manager, and agile practitioner. Beyond this, it also teaches the individual the art of maximizing the value delivered by the team which is most crucial in any agile setup.
Read Moreby Lindy Quick
04 Jan'19