Scrum Facilitators Community podcast

Facilitate change - Wim van Baaren

• Scrum Facilitators • Season 2 • Episode 3

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In the renewed Scrum Facilitators community podcast we talk about Scrum with practitioners in the community.

In this episode Jasper Alblas is talking to Wim van Baaren about how Scrum Masters should facilitate change instead of sessions!

Also, Wim and I wrote a blog post about this (well, mostly Wim actually) which can be found here.

And buy the book that Wim wrote with his son! It can be found on: https://landvandevierbergen.nl/

Do you have a story to share? Get in touch with us at podcast@scrumfacilitators.com.

Are you working with Scrum/Agile and have similar stories and tips to share? Or do you know someone that you want to voluntell to be a guest? Reach out! podcast@scrumfacilitators.com

Also check out our website, LinkedIn and Meetup


Steve Trapps:

Welcome to the scrum facilitators community podcast, the place for real conversations around Scrum.

Jasper Alblas:

Welcome to the scrum facilitators community podcast everyone. Today we're here with Wim van Baaren. Wim and I actually are in the process of writing a blog post, which probably will be in the show notes as well. Wim is a Scrum Master, Agile Coach worked with DevOps teams and Scrum teams. And he will talk a little bit more about that later on. So welcome, Wim.

Wim van Baaren:

Thank you, Jasper, for having me in this podcast. I really admire you guys and what you do. So it's an honor and a pleasure.

Jasper Alblas:

It's nice, because we love to talk to people that are in the field, working with teams, facilitating change, which is actually actually going to be the topic for today. And the thing we're writing about, right, so. So what do you love most about your job?

Wim van Baaren:

Ah, a couple of things. I well, many things, but for the sake of this podcast, I'll stick to ...

Jasper Alblas:

Yeah, we have to be breaf. Right. So

Wim van Baaren:

I really love seeing, you know, change happening over time. And that is the most rewarding feeling I get from an assignment, when we all have noticed, or maybe experienced the awkwardness and the discomfort in the beginning of a change. Jasper, right. You felt it also, I guess. And I always try to help create a environment or atmosphere where a constant change or an in collaboration innovation can thrive. And that's what I love doing. And if you really, you know, see that happening over time, that that is the thing I love the most. And experiments. That really is helpful as well to achieve stuff.

Jasper Alblas:

Right? So do you have an example of something that was a big change for, for maybe a team or a company that you worked for?

Wim van Baaren:

We're kind of, you know, we're diving into the topic of the podcast? And if you don't mind? Yeah,

Jasper Alblas:

right. Yeah, just Sure. Sure. Let's do that.

Wim van Baaren:

Okay. Okay. Because the Agile world is full of misconceptions. If you ask me, which is fine, you know. And I don't blame anyone for that. But I believe we have a role

Jasper Alblas:

That's a bold statement. there and try to get rid of them one by one. And the, well, the most interesting experience I did lately is that I kind of experienced the fact that every action you take has an effect on in terms of sustainability. And some effects are only, you know, valuable in the short term. And after a while, they quickly fade out, which is actually a waste of time. But others are valuable in the long run. And I tend to go for the latter. So to aim for those long term effects. And the best example is the topic of this podcast, right? facilitate change and not sessions. So I have this theory that Scrum Masters or agile coaches, aren't facilitators.

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah, many, many people frown when I say that, which is also fine, because that that is exactly the reason why I say this out loud. And so, I ask, why, you know, they asked me, What do you mean when right? Our Scrum Master is facilitating always every sessions even even non scrum events, you know, and then I ask Okay, but why? And they they give me an honest answer, like okay, otherwise the the sessions are not effective or people do not come prepared or no one is taking the lead or, you know,

Jasper Alblas:

somebody has own the responsibility of leading stuff, right and

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah, and even the thing is, they say, Okay, well, the Scrum Master, we need to organize it ourselves. And I'm okay, bam, there you go. Right. Yeah, there it is. That that is the best reason for for Scrum Master is not to facilitate.

Jasper Alblas:

So, so if we, if we examine that a little bit, right, so if we can, because it's an interesting question because a lot of Scrum Masters I think are struggling with this as well, right? Things that are asked of us as Scrum Masters, sometimes we just step into that. Sometimes maybe a pitfall, or sometimes it's maybe a good thing, you know, it's a balance that you have to, to look for. And when people start looking at you and asking you to facilitate a session, well, you do so right. Let's take for instance, that that's just pick the retrospective, right? So this, this is one of the most one of the things that was something that I discovered, you know, recently just found that it's when you look at the scrum guide, it doesn't say the scrum master has to facilitate a retrospective, right? It says the scrum team is responsible for inspecting and adapting itself. And you know, and, and the scrum master is responsible for the effectiveness of the scrum team that that is what it says as well. So there's a, there's a difficult balance there. So so how do you think about that?

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah, yeah, it's funny, they show the retrospective, right? That is about, you know, I look back and then I look ahead again, right. Okay, so what have we learned? And what can we do to improve step by step baby steps. And I think one of the strongest skills of a, of a team is the ability to keep changing and cope with the everlasting poor uncertainties and unknowns we face every day. And, and by, by having a big role as a scrum master, within those sessions, you kind of, you know, become an impediment to the team. When you help the team self organize a bit by not facilitating. And then you tend to go for the long term effect, which I said in the beginning, and

Jasper Alblas:

So how does that how does that work? How does it work? Not facilitator retrospective. So as a scrum master, so you're listening to this and you're thinking, okay, so I have a retrospective coming up. And, you know, what's going to be my role? How I'm going to play this out?

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah, well, my advice would be, please stick to what you're doing right now. And then have a conversation in that retrospective like, Okay, guys, I'm going to have a step back, do a step back, and let you, you know, try to facilitate and try to host this session, I will help you. We will prepare, wherever, you know, whatever is necessary. And take it slow, because you don't want to, you know, be evasive or attack them like, Okay, right. I've done done these now. Now. It's your job. No, don't do that. So take it slow. Yeah. And do it together, there always are volunteers who are willing to do this and and by doing that, people you know, tend to come more prepared to the, to the session to the retrospective, right?

Jasper Alblas:

So so what would be the Scrum Masters role, or accountability mayby on in the long run when, say, for instance, this team is picking that up, you know, starting to facilitate retrospectives more, or other sessions, apart from the retrospective just opening up their process more, I guess? Would you like be able to step back completely? Or how, how would that be?

Wim van Baaren:

It is an interesting role, right? The scrum master role. The guide describes it a bit, but that's it, you know, and you can you can do whatever you like as a scrum master. And it also depends on on the organization on the environment on the situation there. But, you know, they're always development teams, or DevOps or BisDevOps, but they essentially are building products to to create impact for customers, and customer value. And so the main focus of the team is to improve on that and sometimes you need to change the approach, you're doing it, right. And sometimes it's product development, sometimes the way we iterate or communicate with stakeholders, or even the team itself, the composition of it skills, well, you name it I even even backlog. And for this, everyone involved there in this process needs to grasp the concept of change. Right. And this, I think, is essentially our goal as Scrum Masters and agile coaches. So help people understand this concept of change, and experiment with it. And oh, we're not there to teach Scrum. It's also a bold statement, I guess. But it's, it's, it's there. But well, it is mainly important to to grasp the concept of change.

Jasper Alblas:

Yeah. Yeah. So that's interesting, would you say because teaching Scrum is more like the mechanics or you know, having an understanding of what Scrum is, or what scrum means maybe. But ultimately, people of course, working with Scrum, ultimately, should experience change in how scrum helps you inspect and adapt your product and your process, right. So it's actually to create that experience, that experience to be able to have teams and organizations to be able to cope with that and to cope with change and complexity in their environment where they're in. Right. So. Yeah, so So I think that's a good, it's the answer that you're given also, sort of makes sense as in. It's not just about the team. Right. So sometimes Scrum Masters maybe are too much focused on the team was more change in the behavior and the process around the teams and the organization that needs help as well.

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah, definitely. I think I spend most of the time outside of the team. And, you know, because, yeah, that is basically the hardest part of our job, you know, to to influence that that part of the environment of the organization. And, you know, it's interesting, you said that, Jasper, let them experience it by by doing experiments, because we need to always keep in mind that we work with highly skilled, intelligent people. And we don't not want to teach them anything because they invented Scrum. Right. Right. developers created Scrum. So, yeah, it's their thing. And we just need to help on the sideline there and be kind of oxygen to the team and, right, yeah.

Jasper Alblas:

So is there is there's some technique, a theory, a tool, something that you may be used in the past that could help Scrum Masters, or anybody listening to this podcast, any, you know, help them in their journey.

Wim van Baaren:

I love experimenting. And it's very easy, you know, and it's not science. So let's keep it simple, right? So put down a hypothesis, okay, let's try this, to have an outcome like this, and just go ahead, have few people on board and give it a try, and then do a retrospective on it and learn and, you know, when stuff just isn't working, you can stop and do another experiment, but you learn always something and that's very interesting.

Jasper Alblas:

So that will be the goal, right? Of the experiment is to learn, right? What the Yeah,

Wim van Baaren:

so every every experiment you you have is successful, basically. Right?

Jasper Alblas:

In my experience, that it's it's some it's difficult, some organizations find the word very frightening, almost. If you name the word experiment in an organization, they think, Oh, we're going to do things that might go terribly wrong and falls backward. Do you have some some tips or ideas about how we can approach that

Wim van Baaren:

I get it, I get it. And I've seen that. Jasper. Yeah. Well, that's basically also a a tip for when you just started as a scrum master, you know, if you take it easy in the beginning, and not be on the foreground all the time in the beginning, and don't be pedantic, you know, like a like a school teacher, but just wait days, weeks, even months, when, of course you will help out you know, you ask questions, you do whatever you can but but still be patient and someday, someone will come to You and you will ask for help. And, and probably there's a chance that an experiment, you know, will suffice. And don't call it an experiment, just, you know, go ahead and do it. And then later on, okay, thanks for the experiment, this is what we learned. So shall we keep on doing this? Or shall we? Shall we pivot a bit, but Right, there's always a change coming along.

Jasper Alblas:

Yeah, so actually, the word experiment is maybe something that might be frightening. For some, it's more like, the way you approach things, and that you explain to people well, let's just try this out. And, as you said, like, what's the hypothesis that we want to test? And what are we going to do to find to find out if that leads to results and then go from there again, and, and also so be patient? So the experiment doesn't have to be done in a day or? Yeah,

Wim van Baaren:

takes days, you know, weeks, sometimes even months, and sometimes an experiment will lead to another experiment. And when you get in, in the, you know, cycle of one experiment leading to another one, okay, I think then, then you have a great environment created together, you know, with with the team or teams or management whoever, right, this is, this is also applicable on sessions without without Scrum teams. Right? Or scrum of scrums sessions, or? Yeah.

Jasper Alblas:

And it's a way to cope with, with the complex environment we're in, it's actually a way to, to help enable change, right to do these experiments. So, so are there? Is there a sort of a strategy you have, when it comes to these experiments that that is sort of a default that you use? Or how do you approach these experiments?

Wim van Baaren:

Let's start with a conversation, actually. Right. I don't have a recipe Jasper for this. And it is not science at all. So no, no pre work is always needed there. Sometimes. In the middle of a session, the need for an experiment will pop up. And there's your chance to do it. And then yeah, no recipe at all. No strategies, as long as you, you know, inspect the outcome, and maybe pivot a bit or as long as you learn from it. It is an experiment. Yeah. Yeah.

Jasper Alblas:

Right. So, so have the conversation. And learn from the, from the, from the outcome, and have a conversation again, I guess, and, like, in that way, inspect and adapt constantly, right, yeah.

Wim van Baaren:

Yeah. And help them you know, find their way in really grasping that, that concept of experimenting and change over time. So long term, right, remember?

Jasper Alblas:

Yeah, we're not, we're not here for the short term and change. Change takes a while change can take a while. And it requires patience, being patient also, of course,

Wim van Baaren:

and it feels awkward, like I said in the beginning, and if you if you sense it awkwardness, things are moving. So right, things might, you know, end up end up in a better way. So go ahead and give it a try.

Jasper Alblas:

So if we go back to where we started, right? We've talked about experiments and Scrum Masters are there to facilitate change, and it can be hard. What can we.. What kind of tip or advice could you give Scrum Masters about, you know, stuck in the sessions? Okay, so we can do experiments. I heard you say go slow, actually, you've given quite some, some some tips, I guess, about how we how we can cope with that. It's, yeah,

Wim van Baaren:

yeah, I think if I could give one more tip, it's combination of things. So if you take it slow, and you know, it's all also about timing. You don't learn that right from from your first assignment or you just go out there and and this took me to be honest, a while to realize this, that and I learned that based on feedback, I asked constantly for feedback like okay, what can I do to improve and so nowadays, I really tried to take it slow and therefore the Well, for a long time, perhaps and it's also your own journey, but especially, it's a journey of the team. And once you have the team's trust, and they see you as their companion or travel companion, it's a journey, then perhaps it's an opportunity to guide a bit more. So it's timing as well. And you cannot learn it in a training, you know, you guys train a lot of people and but you cannot, yeah, you give examples, but you you only

Jasper Alblas:

know, your field. Yes, you have to experience it. Exactly. And, in my experience, it's exactly what you say, sometimes you have an idea, right? That will maybe work for a team and you get this great idea. And you, you bring it to the team, and they just maybe they don't get it or, or they're not at a point in time where they are able to take on that challenge or to do that experiment. But then, you know, couple of weeks, couple of months later, this problem arises that they got, right. And then then you have that moment where you think, Alright, so now, now I can maybe give this introduction or give a hint, or do an experiment that does help them for that. And they can own that as well. Right. And and then you while you would, then you're facilitating change, right? It is it's timing is of the essence.

Wim van Baaren:

There you go. Timing is everything. And yeah, there's only one way to learn this, you know, in the trenches and need right in the mud. Yeah. And, yeah, really and fail and get the feedback and do it better next time. So

Jasper Alblas:

nice. Excellent. So, so Wim I want to talk about something else a little bit, because we've talked about change, and we, we haven't talked to really about it, but you're you write as well. Right? So you are a writer, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Isn't that the writer? Can you tell us a little bit about your writing, which is an interesting story.

Wim van Baaren:

Well, I started writing articles, like, like we all do, perhaps. But lately, I've been writing a book, or we published it already. And I did that together with my son. We started when he was six. And now he's nine. And we finished the book. And it's out there. So it's a children's book, book. And it's for readers for it's about roughly eight years, to 12.

Jasper Alblas:

So it's a children's book that you wrote together with your son. Yeah. And what is it about?

Wim van Baaren:

It is about a boy and a girl going on an adventure. And it's kind of a fantasy story as well, a happy ending. You know, it, it is really about the experience I had there. It was kind of funny, if I look at it from a scrum perspective, I did it in iterations. And I use feedback to improve the story. And I did not it's kind of in the blood, right? I guess so I guess Oh, yeah. I did not knew the end of it. And, but gradually, we find an ending. And it was a very nice process. Yeah, I really enjoyed it.

Jasper Alblas:

Wow. So this actually really ties in to what we talked about, right? So having feedback, doing experiments, and not knowing the outcome, not knowing the outcome of the story, but still trusting in the fact that, you know, it will be a good story, and it will end well. It wasn't happy at all. And and your son actually helped writing it as well. Right? Yeah, thinking about the story. And you did that together.

Wim van Baaren:

There were many uncertainties, but the things we could you know, start writing in the beginning, like the characters and the names and some plots, and we did that upfront, you know, so we have you have a kind of a framework and but we change that many times during the process as well.

Jasper Alblas:

That's awesome. So well, actually, we are quite a bit quite already in the podcast. What I would like you to think about maybe we have this, this sort of chain question that we that we ask people and actually there was a question from our previous guest. And it is about having what have you could have one skill that you could Like, learn overnight and have for the rest of your life.

Wim van Baaren:

So an extra skill. Jasper. Yeah.

Jasper Alblas:

So yes. Rebecca, Rebecca Dainton had this question as Yeah. So what would it be?

Wim van Baaren:

Oh, wow. I would, I would definitely go for a skill or ability to cure diseases. Sounds heavy, but you know, and I start with cancer. So that is the one skill I definitely want when I wake up. Yeah.

Jasper Alblas:

I couldn't argue with that. All right. And so what what question would you have for our next guest? What would be your question? Okay,

Wim van Baaren:

here it is. What what is the most important decision you ever made? And why?

Jasper Alblas:

Wow. Well, that could be a big question.

Wim van Baaren:

I'm very curious.

Jasper Alblas:

Very curious what the answer will be. So it has been amazing having you talking about change, of course, the blog that we are writing will be will be in the in the show notes eventually, as well as of course, the link to your book. Which we hope we hope, of course, everybody out there will, will will buy and then read with their children which, which would be awesome, of course. Is there any way we can? people that listen to the podcast? Reach you do you have any talks? Or maybe things you're going to associate you're going to join? Or? Well, how can they find you?

Wim van Baaren:

Well, you can find me on LinkedIn and on my website, and of course, through my website for the book as well. So yeah. Okay, let's

Jasper Alblas:

play so well, we'll make sure we'll make sure that that the link is in the show notes as well. So you can find him on LinkedIn, and of course, buy his book. It has been great having you been talking about this. And if there are any questions, of course, please let us know if you have any suggestions. Also, of course, feedback that we're very open to to listen to to improve this podcast. Please let us know.

Wim van Baaren:

It was a pleasure Jasper. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for having me. It

Jasper Alblas:

was awesome having you. Have a great day.

Steve Trapps:

Thank you for listening to the scrum facilitators community Podcast the place for real conversations around Scrum. Do you have a story to share in this podcast? Get in touch with us at podcast at scrum facilitators.com