Ways to Enhance Team Autonomy in Agile

Scrum as a Service: When Agile Teams Become Ticket Processors Scrum as a Service is when Agile teams are execution units, taking orders instead of owning value delivery. They don’t solve problems; or shaping the product, they just code and close Jira issues. It’s what happens when companies adopt Scrum mechanically but keep traditional thinking and control structures intact. Symptoms of Scrum as a Service 1) No Product Ownership The PO is a backlog manager, not a decision-maker. Teams can’t challenge priorities. The backlog is a job assignment queue. Sprint Planning is a scheduling exercise, not a conversation about functional or technical trade-offs. 2) No Cross-Discipline Collaboration UX, DevOps, and Security exist outside the team, creating slow handoffs. Developers get fully fleshed-out requirements, not problems to solve. Agile teams are ticket processors, not value creators. 3) Nothing Changes Daily Scrums become status meetings for managers. Retros don’t lead to improvements, just performance reviews. Teams are judged by team outputs like velocity, not business outcomes. How This Happens 1) No Organizational Change Leadership keeps command and control, just renaming old roles. 2) Waterfall Thinking Teams have fixed scope and deadlines, no room for continuous discovery or progressive elaboration. 3) POs as Middlemen, Not Leaders POs relay stakeholder demands instead of shaping product strategy. 4) SMs are Managers. Not Coaches SMs push teams to move faster rather than helping them achieve a sustainable pace. How to Fix It 1) Give Teams Ownership Let teams define and prioritize their backlog. Facilitate direct feedback loops with users, not just stakeholder requests. Make POs strategic leaders, not order-takers. 2) Tear Down Silos Embed UX, DevOps, QA, and Security into the Scrum team. Stop treating devs as coders for hire. Make them coequal partners in product thinking. 3) Shift to Outcome Metrics Stop measuring success by velocity, throughput, or tickets. Track customer impact, retention, usability, and product adoption. Ask: Are we solving problems or just releasing code? 4) Decentralize Decision-Making Replace top-down roadmaps with team-driven prioritization. Let teams influence scope, trade-offs, and release planning. Encourage teams to experiment and innovate. 5) Foster Continuous Improvement Make retros actionable. Give teams time for technical excellence, like refactoring, automation, and innovation. Shift from feature delivery to sustainable, high-quality product development. From Execution Teams to Product Teams Scrum teams should be value creators, not feature factories. Agile is meant to empower teams, not turn them into Jira clerks. If teams can’t challenge priorities, shape solutions, adjust processes, or innovate, then you don’t have Agile. You have Scrum as a Service. Does your organization trust teams to own the product? If not, Scrum isn’t the problem. Your structure is.

Set aside 20% of your experimentation budget (slash time) and let your team run wild. Forget about the prioritized roadmap for a bit. Make research-backed hypotheses totally optional. Just purely self-directed exploration. One engineer tinkering with an idea that nobody else thought was worthwhile (lengthening ad headlines) led to the "best revenue-generating idea in Bing's history" - worth well over nine figures. (per the Kohavi et al book) But beyond the reality of how often we are surprised by our experiment outcomes, this is a powerful way to get teams more interested in running experiments. Autonomy is a powerful driver of motivation. And intrinsic motivation like a feeling of autonomy can be far more powerful than offering some "carrots" of promised career growth or "sticks" via making experimentation mandatory. The Post-It Note was invented because 3M gave engineers 15% of their time to work on whatever side projects they'd like. Google's version was "20 Percent Time", which led to AdSense, Google News, search autocompletes, and (according to some) Gmail. The reality of these often-cited programs is a little hazier than the simple headlines suggest... (I feel like I can sense some ex-Googler ready to comment and say "nobody actually did this" 😂) But the principles are sound: 1) Use autonomy as fuel to get people experimenting 2) Make progress by tinkering Nassim Taleb in "Skin in the Game": "The knowledge we get by tinkering, via trial and error... is vastly superior to that obtained through reasoning" How much space have you made for your teams to freely explore and experiment?

Leaders: forget the idea of being “hands-on.” Freedom makes teams perform better. Delegation inspires confidence. It fosters growth. It unlocks team potential. Done right, it is a tool any leader can use to build thriving, autonomous teams. Here’s 9 ways to revolutionize your leadership by delegating with trust: 1/ Clarify Expectations: Set the Stage for Success → Define goals, deadlines, and outcomes clearly upfront. → Ensure team members understand the “why” behind tasks. 💡 Leaders: Use one-on-one meetings to align priorities and confirm understanding. 2/ Choose the Right Person: Match Tasks to Strengths → Assign tasks based on skills, interests, and growth potential. → Avoid overloading the same high-performers repeatedly. 💡 Leaders: Map team members’ strengths to projects to boost engagement and results. 3/ Grant Autonomy: Let Go of Micromanaging → Give freedom to decide how the work gets done. → Resist the urge to hover or dictate every step. 💡 Leaders: Set check-in points for progress updates, not to control the process. 4/ Provide Resources: Equip for Success → Ensure access to tools, information, and support needed. → Remove roadblocks that could derail progress. 💡 Leaders: Ask, “What do you need to succeed?” and act on the answers. 5/ Encourage Questions: Foster Open Communication → Create a safe space for team members to seek clarification. → Reward curiosity to build confidence in decision-making. 💡 Leaders: Model vulnerability by admitting when you don’t know something. 6/ Accept Mistakes: Turn Errors into Learning → View missteps as opportunities for growth, not failure. → Provide constructive feedback without blame. 💡 Leaders: Share a past mistake you made and how it shaped your growth. 7/ Recognize Efforts: Celebrate Wins, Big and Small → Acknowledge contributions to reinforce trust and motivation. → Publicly praise specific actions to inspire others. 💡 Leaders: Send a quick thank-you note or shout-out in team meetings. 8/ Build Accountability: Empower Ownership → Encourage team members to take responsibility for outcomes. → Avoid swooping in to “fix” things unless absolutely necessary. 💡 Leaders: Ask, “What’s your plan to move this forward?” to promote initiative. 9/ Reflect and Refine: Improve Delegation Over Time → Seek feedback on your delegation approach from the team. → Adjust based on what works and what doesn’t. 💡 Leaders: Hold quarterly reviews to discuss delegation experiences and optimize. Delegating with trust redefines leadership by blending empowerment with accountability. Start leveraging these strategies to transform your team into a powerhouse of independence and impact. Which one of these delegation techniques works best for you? Comment below! ♻️ Repost if your network needs these reminders. Follow Carolyn Healey for more leadership insights.

Critique this (real) team's experiment. Good? Bad? Caveats? Gotchas? Contexts where it will not work? Read on: Overview The team has observed that devs often encounter friction during their work—tooling, debt, environment, etc. These issues (while manageable) tend to slow down progress and are often recurring. Historically, recording, prioritizing, and getting approval to address these areas of friction involves too much overhead, which 1) makes the team less productive, and 2) results in the issues remaining unresolved. For various reasons, team members don't currently feel empowered to address these issues as part of their normal work. Purpose Empower devs to address friction points as they encounter them, w/o needing to get permission, provided the issue can be resolved in 3d or less. Hypothesis: by immediately tackling these problems, the team will improve overall productivity and make work more enjoyable. Reinforce the practice of addressing friction as part of the developers' workflow, helping to build muscle memory and normalize "fix as you go." Key Guidelines 1. When a dev encounters friction, assess whether the issue is likely to recur and affect others. If they believe it can be resolved in 3d or less, they create a "friction workdown" ticket in Jira (use the right tags). No permission needed. 2. Put current work in "paused" status, mark new ticket as "in progress," and notify the team via #friction Slack channel with a link to the ticket. 3. If the dev finds that the issue will take longer than 3d to resolve, they stop, document what they’ve learned, and pause the ticket. This allows the team to revisit the issue later and consider more comprehensive solutions. This is OK! 4. After every 10 friction workdown tickets are completed, the team holds a review session to discuss the decisions made and the impact of the work. Promote transparency and alignment on the value of the issues addressed. 5. Expires after 3mos. If the team sees evidence of improved efficiency and productivity, they may choose to continue; otherwise, it will be discontinued (default to discontinue, to avoid Zombie Process). 6. IMPORTANT: The team will not be asked to cut corners elsewhere (or work harder) to make arbitrary deadlines due to this work. This is considered real work. Expected Outcomes Reduce overhead associated with addressing recurring friction points, empowering developers to act when issues are most salient (and they are motivated). Impact will be measured through existing DX survey, lead time, and cycle time metrics, etc. Signs of Concern (Monitor for these and dampen) 1. Consistently underestimating the time required to address friction issues, leading to frequent pauses and unfinished work. 2. Feedback indicating that the friction points being addressed are not significantly benefiting the team as a whole. Limitations Not intended to impact more complex, systemic issues or challenges that extend beyond the team's scope of influence.

How to build a highly motivated team (using positive psychology not fear) So many founders and leaders get this wrong They think a productive team needs: ⤷ Constant surveillance ⤷ Goals dictated from the top ⤷ Every part of the job documented ⤷ Rigid schedules, systems and workflows All of this ↑ kills motivation in the knowledge economy. If you want a team lit up, on fire with drive? You need to be creating: 🔥 AUTONOMY SUPPORTIVE JOBS 🔥 Humans have a deep inner desire for freedom. You have it — it's a big perk of your role. (It's why you worked so hard to get here) 🤯 Your team wants freedom too. When you give it to them? 💡... they'll give you their best work. Here's how: 1️⃣ Ask them to set their own goals ⤷ The agency will inspire ownership 2️⃣ Don't surveil — measure outputs ⤷ who cares if their mouse moves if they hit the goals? 3️⃣ Stop dictating how-tos for everything ⤷ Coach people through solving problems themselves. 4️⃣ Let them design their day ⤷ People wake up motivated when they set the schedule 5️⃣ Encourage experimentation ⤷ Let your team try new ideas—they’ll grow faster. 6️⃣ Ask for feedback on processes ⤷ When people co-create systems, they own them for life. 7️⃣ Provide clarity, not micromanagement ⤷ Set the “what” and the “why," ... then trust them to figure out the “how.” Motivated teams build incredible companies. 🔥 Empowerment beats control every time. ♻️ Repost if you believe in autonomy over fear-based leadership. Follow me Peter Shallard for more like this.