As software testers, it is very important to be able to understand your emotions. They can be a great heuristic which can guide your testing. But it is more than just that; understanding your emotions and the effect that they can have on others who you work with in your team is a key skill for all team members. One’s position within a team is often dictated by how well one can interact with others in the team. People who express extreme emotional reactions to events, particularly in cultures where this is not normal behaviour, risk becoming isolated and ineffective. This can be a particular problem for testers who are typically fewer in number, and frequently perceived to be the bearers of bad news. Paul’s behaviour above is not the best way for anyone to act.

The software industry has created two separate roles: The developer and the tester. Traditional software development put these two at odds. Now, agile practices are bringing them together again.

I often encounter mature Agile teams, well trained in Scrum, some of them doing Scrum of Scrums and having already participated in several releases. These teams' retrospectives frequently bring in opportunities for improvement in a number of areas connected to processes, techniques, and, occasionally, impediments at the organizational level. This is very good, but I wonder why personal issues are rarely discussed in retrospectives. This I have learned personally: Teams that do not discuss personal matters openly pay the price of missing considerable opportunities for improving an already good team performance.

Why is it so hard to break bad news? Why is there a cult of people who do not want to give bad news about their projects to stakeholders? Why do we let our fears cloud our judgement? Things can seem bad when they don’t go as we planned and hoped, but in reality things ‘just are’. As Esther Derby] notes "The ability to ‘face the truth’ and take effective action rests on the ability to be in a mental state where our emotions and fears aren’t running us". How do we remove that fear and emotion, create an environment in which we are not afraid to break ‘bad news’, into ‘news’ that allows us to make informed decisions.

Software craftsmanship is an approach to software development that emphasizes the coding skills of the software developers themselves. It is a response by software developers to the perceived ills of the mainstream software industry, including the prioritization of financial concerns over developer accountability.

Adopting Agile takes courage, perseverance, and continued reinforcement. To meet these needs, a community of Agile Coaches organically emerged at Capital One to provide support and mentoring for projects and organizations seeking to adopt Agile. The community has evolved into an influential body of change agents, which routinely meets to address team or organizational initiatives in Agile projects across the enterprise. By creating an environment where true community can exist and grow, we have added sustainability to our Agile adoption processes and enabled continuous innovation of practices and principles.

We all understand that Scrum teams should be self-managed and self-organized. Empowered is the commonly used term, because without empowerment it's difficult for self-management and self-organization to happen.

Building great agile software development teams is challenging using traditional hiring methods. Candidates might be able to answer your questions and prove C++ skills, but what you really want are people who are competent and capable, who will work well with others and fit with your Scrum team. Immersive interviewing is the best way I know to hire for agile software development teams, or for any other position in your organization. And like all good agile practices, it begins and ends with the team.

Widely recognized as the “father of modern economics,” Adam Smith’s seminal book, “The Wealth of Nations,” included both tangible assets (machines, buildings, and land) and humans as essential wealth-generating resources. Our present high-technology industries are eager to invest in and protect their tangible assets (such as computer networks), but the modern accountancy paradigm forces the view of an employee as merely a cost. Humans are indeed primary assets, and this article provides guidance in assessing, utilizing, and enhancing their value.

In this second and final part of our article on self-selecting teams, you will learn how to get your self-selection event off the ground. We will also provide tips on how to get the most out of it and keep the momentum going afterwards.