When a flower doesn't bloom,
you fix the environment in which it grows,
and not the flower

Alexander Den Heijer

If you’re applying Scrum in your project you are most likely aware of the three questions from the Scrum Guide that can be used to structure your Daily Standup:

  • What did I do yesterday that contributes to the sprint goal
  • What am I going to do today that contributes to the sprint goal
  • What is blocking me

I was never really convinced and didn’t see real evidence with the teams I worked with that they help to organize the work for the Day.

Before disconnecting your remote meeting allow a few minutes for team members to provide praise for others who helped them out or performed some action worthy of recognition

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.

Leo Tolstoy

“Hybrid Meetings” where most attendees are physically in a room and a few connecting remotely over video is pretty standard in my organization. This setup has a lot of disadvantages. In fact I can’t think of any advantage for the meeting structure and facilitation.

Do you have more meetings with your manager since you started working from home? Have you been told to communicate more? Is your manager suddenly more present on your team slack channel? Do you have to send status reports more regularly? If you answer one or more of these questions with yes, you seem to be dealing with a micromanager.

In this new “everybody-works-remotely” world it is easy to lose the connection to your colleagues you’ve seen every day in the office. Keeping these connections alive is more important than ever.