What’s Zombie Scrum?
Zombie Scrum, sometimes referred to as Dark Scrum, is Scrum that seemingly looks as it should, but there is something missing that makes it caricatural and might do more harm than good. Although we do Scrum ‘by the book’, we’re struggling for life, just like a Zombie does. I will look into possible causes of that.
Scrum is a lightweight framework that helps people, teams and organizations generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems.
Scrum Guide
Cause 1 – lack of understanding what Scrum is for
It’s a delusion to think Scrum will fix your problems. Rather, it makes your problems visible by highlighting the areas that need improving, altering, and changing. Ken Schwaber, one of Scrum creators, said: “Scrum is like a mother-in-law. It points out all your faults”. It is a foundation on which we can build our own methodology of the process. There is no fixed “how”. The “how” is dynamic all the time, as we’re looking for “adaptive solutions”.
Scrum is a lightweight framework that helps people, teams and organizations generate value through adaptive solutions for complex problems.
Scrum Guide
Cause 2 – No or little value
Calling a Project Manager a Scrum Master, or a deadline a Sprint isn’t enough to do real Scrum. Changing the workstyle into Scrum is much more than changing the terminology. Sticking with Scrum events, working in Sprints and even having a DoD isn’t enough for Scrum to thrive either. The key is the effectiveness of the team expressed by the value it delivers. The problem is what an abstract term “value” means. There is little guidance in the Scrum Guide concerning that. The word “Value” appears 23 times in such a short document! The questions that are critically important are:
- What is value in relation to the stakeholders, our team, organization?
- How do we know we deliver value?
- How to measure value we deliver?
- How to maximize value?
Cause 3 – we do Scrum but think otherwise
To implement Scrum is hard, as most people dislike changes, continuous improvements. Change requires some effort. Without Agile way of thinking and sticking with Scrum value you can’t move on with the framework. Try to speak English thinking in Polish. Does it sound natural? Scrum requires more of a product-thinking.
Cause 4 – Scrum by the book
Zombie Scrum doesn’t give people following the rules of the game the answer why they do it. They do it because it’s written in the guide, so they must follow it. That cause ties in closely with the first one.
Cause 5 – Scrumbut, Scrumand
The Scrum framework, as outlined herein, is immutable. While implementing only parts of Scrum is possible, the result is not Scrum. Scrum exists only in its entirety and functions well as a container for other techniques, methodologies, and practices.
Scrum Guide
Scrum is intentionally incomplete, meaning your organization put any tools, techniques, methodologies and practices into it. Some organizations implement just parts of Scrum like its terminology, events taking place. That’s not Scrum. However, it’s ok not to do Scrum. Due to Scrum a Team builds up its own methodology adaptive to problems they encounter.
Cause 6 – Scrum is imposed
Forcing people to do anything hardly ever bears fruit as long as people can understand what value it might bring to them. Haste makes value. People need more time to adapt to new ways of working and thinking. Furthermore, a good Scrum Master is empathetic and supports the team in experimenting with various practices. The results the team has is the benchmark of how badly or well they’re working.
