Scrum Training

In November of this year, three of our team mates, CEO John, COO June, and CTO Mancio went to Manila to have themselves trained and certified for Scrum. Held at the swanky Hotel Intercontinental in Makati, it was administered by international Agile coach and certified Scrum Trainer Adam Weisbart. Adam (below, in plaid shirt) is based in California, USA and helps organizations deliver high quality software through Agile/Scrum training, coaching, and consulting.

L-R: Mancio, June, Adam, John, and friend

Needless to say, our 3 boys successfully passed all exams and received their certification with flying colors.

Last Saturday, these now Scrum masters administered the same training to the Ingenuity Team to update the workflow processes and project handling and needless to say, it was a great success. Everyone came full force on a sunny Saturday morning, ready and eager to learn from the masters.

The activity started with a group game, just to get the blood flowing. It's called the "Self-organizing Ball Game" and it was facilitated by Mancio. To get a point, the ball should be passed around to all group members, but never to someone next to the passer. And the ball should also have a hang time of a few seconds in the air before being caught by the next person. The goal is to amass as much points as they can.

The participants were given just a few minutes to finish the game. Afterwards, they were made to understand the point of the activity by answering the question: "which is better, one try of 8 minutes or 4 tries of 2 minutes per try?"

All of the participants said that indeed, the 4 tries with 2 minutes time frame yielded better results because as they went forward with the game, they were able to plan how to optimize the time given and they were able to amend the incorrect strategies from previous tries.

This served as the first illustration of how Scrum is a great management tool - whether it be for projects or for personal use. In a nutshell, this also made it very clear to the participants what Scrum was all about.

John handled the introduction to Scrum, Mancio is the activity facilitator, June talked about Scrum roles and articles, and Dan talked about Scrum meetings.

The participants gamely did all the activities for the training as well as listened very intently during the lecture parts. Even the IngeNoobs, our latest team additions, were there in full force and were readily soaking up all the new information they are getting from this training. Aside from learning Scrum, the IngeNoobs actually felt thankful to have taken part in the exercise as it became an avenue for them to get to know other team mates they have yet to work with.

in the zone and taking it seriously

The Ingen Team doing the "Myth or Fact, Thumbs up or Thumbs down Exercise"

Chanly, one of the IngeNoobs, doing a report as her co-Noobs take note

Of course, this being Ingenuity, any activity would not be complete without fun games in between serious learning activities. So, the HR led an impromptu Trivia ice breaker Game after lunch to keep the interest and enthusiasm going for the afternoon session.

Congratulations to the winners, Group 2!

And then it was time for the participants to actually apply what they had learned from the morning session by making their own Scrum charts and reporting it to the team to see if they came up with something airtight and practical.

After the activities were done, the participants then had an exam to measure what they had learned about Scrum from the training. After completing the test, the results were instantaneous as June used a very helpful online app that checks exams using a camera.

Resident Trivia nut Jefford got the highest score out of everyone, while all the rest fared well beyond expectations. So bright, these Ingenuity kids!

All in all, this Scrum training is successful! And this is only Part 1. Everyone on the team is eager to follow it up with the second part, slated for sometime this coming weekend. Our December schedule is becoming quite hectic, but we are taking everything in stride because we are having fun (lots of it!) and also learning at the same time. And if there is one thing we all learned from the Scrum philosophy - it is that as one, we can work through anything together to achieve our common goal.

KUDOS to the trainers and trainees! You have done a very good job, indeed!