Are you familiar with Scrum?
If not…
It’s not an acronym. It’s what rugby players do when they huddle together and push the ball toward the goal line one step at a time.
And it’s also a management framework for technology projects.
The idea is: you set smaller milestones, i.e. getting a very small piece workable or testable within a short period of time (usually a week or two) and then you create specific steps that a single person can get done in one day.
Of course, there’s more to it than that. But there’s one particular part I wanted to focus on today and tell you about: a simple set of questions Scrum team members ask each other (and themselves) every morning:
(1) What did I do yesterday?
(2) What will I do today?
(3) What obstacles could get in the way of today’s goal, where others can help?
These questions take just seconds to answer.
The first two hold each person accountable, and the third one gives other team members an opportunity to share advice and/or offer to help.
Now, personally, I don’t use the Scrum method, but I do love these three questions, and I make it a habit to ask and answer them every day.
You can borrow a page out of the Scrum playbook, and use a variation of these three questions to help you focus and make progress on your most important career goals:
(1) What have you done so far in 2018?
(2) What would you like to do now?
(3) What obstacles could get in the way, where I can help?
Pardon the cheesiness — but I’d really like to be on your team for this.So if you have a moment, please send a reply and let me know your answers to these three questions. I’d like to lend a hand and help.
