An article by Johannes Schartau, co-author of the Zombie Scrum Survival Guide
It was early 2008 when an Agile Coach sat alone in an office in Western Europe. The dim light of his desk lamp did its best to drive the evening’s gloom away. The man was lost in thought, puzzled by the day’s events. Yet another team showed signs of something he couldn’t quite grasp but had seen before. This concerning dynamic seemed to drain all life from his Scrum Team’s members. Again. Hoping against hope he worked on ideas to counteract what was happening, though his gut told him it was probably too late already. Had anyone else out there seen this before? Did anyone know what to do about it? And why were his colleagues giving him these weird hungry looks?
“What exactly happened to the man is unknown. We have a strong reason to believe, however, that he found himself in the middle of the first large-scale Zombie Scrum outbreak.”
What exactly happened to the man is unknown. We have a strong reason to believe, however, that he found himself in the middle of the first large-scale Zombie Scrum outbreak. The result definitely wasn’t pretty. Since then this terrible affliction has turned into a global pandemic the likes of which the world has never seen before. Every hour we get news of a new case.
We can still turn the tide
And yet there is still hope that we can turn the tide and reverse the infection. As founders of the Zombie Scrum Resistance, we have worked tirelessly to spread awareness and stop the virus. We started with workshops in 2016, a website soon after, blog posts, whitepapers and most recently the Zombie Scrum Infection Tracker. And yet all of this still isn’t enough. The world clearly needs more!
The Zombie Scrum Resistance at work (or pretending very much to be)
The Zombie Scrum Survival Guide
Our hope for the world is The Zombie Scrum Survival Guide. We feel fortunate to be partnering with Addison-Wesley and Scrum.org to release this handbook for the aspiring Zombie Scrum fighter in Q1 of 2021. In it, we will outline:
- The history of Zombie Scrum
- The symptoms of Zombie Scrum
- The causes of Zombie Scrum
- Many, many experiments to start the road to recovery even in environments that are very hostile to Scrum
The guide contains all the condensed knowledge we have gathered over the past decade. We believe it will be the best weapon yet against the disease. In order to verify our assumptions, we will be releasing content from the book over the course of 2020. This should make it easier for you to spot the symptoms, understand the causes and use experiments to heal infected systems. But we need to hear from you! Is what we propose actually helpful? Does it help you make a noticeable impact? What else do you need? So please comment away, reach out and talk to us in person. We won’t bite!*
Get the book
Order your book directly from us for some nice extras.