Short Overview
When talking about agile methodologies, scrum is emphasized as a framework intended to guide teams in the iterative and incremental delivery of a product. The successful implementation of Scrum in Project Management allows teams to inspect and adapt to current conditions, thus ensuring the project stays on schedule.
Since Scrum has been introduced to the project management community, there have been numerous books, papers, articles, and presentations written on this topic. Written by experts, Kim H. Pries and Jon M. Quigley who have successfully deployed and implemented scrum across multiple companies and departments, Scrum Project Management is one book that caught our eye.
Keep reading the book review below to find out how Scrum Project Management can be helpful in understanding and applying scrum within your organization.
Table of Contents
Scrum Project Management introduces Scrum basics and explains how to apply this adaptive technique to effectively manage a wide range of programs and complex projects. By focusing on the team aspects of scrum, this book emphasizes the concept of a self-directed work team, suggesting we must have a motivated and skilled team capable of achieving project goals.
The idea of Scrum Project Management is not to diminish the traditional waterfall approach. In the authors’ words: “It is unwise to condemn conventional tactics across the board when frequently the conventional tactics are not executed well”. Hence, they are presenting the scrum framework, a modified version of the agile software development tool as an alternative to traditional program management, and as a tool for standard line management. Throughout the book, they discuss improvisation, creative problem solving, and emergent phenomena―detailing the methods needed to ensure your team achieves project success.
Often referred to as high-intensity management, this book highlights the importance of implementing the Scrum approach in the acceleration of the tempo, focus completion of tasks, and improvement in the project backlog, as never seen before. As an example, the authors illustrate they were able to drop an automated production test equipment department’s project list from sixty items to thirty items to twenty items in less than three months. Results that have never been achievable, until the relevant application of the scrum approach to accomplishment.
Moreover, this book demonstrates how to:
- Combine traditional project management methods with scrum
- Adapt the familiar work breakdown structure to create scrum backlogs and sprints
- Use a scrum of scrums to manage programs
- Apply earned value management, critical path, and PERT in the context of scrum
This book is suitable for everyone who is interested in learning more about scrum practices. Professionals from the project management community, regardless of their years of experience can benefit from the insights provided by Kim H. Pries and Jon M. Quigley and understand not just the benefits, but the pitfalls of this method as well.
Scrum Project Management, features an extra orderly structured and highly comprehensive content. It provides clear guidance for everyone who is interested in what is scrum and the basics concepts of scrum. Furthermore, it exemplifies topics such as the link between Scrum and Conventional Project Management, Scrum and the Waterfall Method, Scrum and Education, Scrum and Six Sigma, Scrum and the Service Industry, Scrum and Hospitals…
By underlining the complexity of product development and the pace of technological change, Kim H. Pries and Jon M. Quigley, present the scrum framework as an alternative to traditional program management and as a tool for standard line management. Thus, trough the course of their discussion they do not overlook the downsides of this method, nor they obscure other traditional project management approaches. Taking into consideration that Scrum Project Management embodies the complications one faces when managing projects within an organization, and provides valuable solutions on how the scrum approach can be implemented, it is a must-read for every project professional who has experienced difficulties of this scope.
To buy or download Scrum Project Management check out this link.
We hope that this book will help you understand the Scrum framework and how it can be successfully implemented within your organization.
Have you read this book? What is your opinion about it? Feel free to post your comments in the section at the end.
Kim H. (“Vajramanas’’) Pries has four college degrees: BA History from the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), BS Metallurgical Engineering from UTEP, MS Metallurgical Engineering from UTEP, and MS in Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science from Carnegie Mellon University. In addition to the degrees, he has the following certifications:
- APICS
- Certified Production and Inventory Manager (CPIM)
- American Society for Quality (ASQ)
- Certified Reliability Engineer (CRE)
- Certified Quality Engineer (CQE)
- Certified Software Quality Engineer (CSQE)
- Certified Six Sigma Black Belt (CSSBB)
- Certified Manager of Quality/Operational Excellence (CMQ/OE)
- Certified Quality Auditor (CQA)
Mr. Pries worked as a computer systems manager (“IT”), a software engineer for an electrical utility, and a scientific programmer on defense contract. For Stoneridge, Incorporated (SRI), he has worked as:
- Software manager
- Engineering services manager
- Reliability section manager
- Product integrity and reliability director
In addition to this, Mr. Pries provides Six Sigma training for both UTEPand SRI, cost reduction initiatives for SRI. Mr. Pries is also a founding faculty member of Practical Project Management. Additionally, in concert with Mr. Quigley, Mr. Pries is the co-founder and principal with Value Transformation, LLC, a training, testing, cost improvement, and product development consultancy. Mr. Pries is also a lay monk in the Soto tradition of Zen Buddhism and functions as an Ino for the Zen Center of Las Cruces.
Mr.Pries’s first book was Six Sigma for the Next Millennium: A CSSBB Guidebook, now in a second edition as Six Sigma for the New Millennium: A CSSBB Guidebook, Second Edition (ASQ Quality Press).
Jon M. Quigley PMP CTFL is a principal and founding member of Value Transformation, a product development training (from idea to product retirement) and cost improvement organization established in 2009. Jon has an Engineering Degree from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and two master’s Degrees from City University of Seattle. Jon has thirty years of product development and manufacturing experience, ranging from embedded hardware and software through verification and project management.
Jon has authored or contributed to more than 15 books on a range of product development and project management topics. His books are used in master level classes at universities across the globe, including the Eindhoven Technical University, Manchester Metropolitan University, San Beda College Manilla in the Philippines, and Technical Monterey University.
Jon has membership in SAE, AIAG and PMI (holding Project Management Professional Certification) and has spoken at numerous PMI events throughout North Carolina and Virginia. Jon also has the CTFL certification from ISTQB.
This book review was written by Julijana Kekenovska