Scrum training is valuable because it introduces a radically better approach to organizing work to solve complex problems.

If the training were not valuable, people would not attend the courses, with or without the certification.

Unfortunately it is possible to offer valuable trainings which people do not attend. Why? One reason is lack of brand recognition. Even small children prefer to get their French Fries from McDonalds rather than the local diner.

Without branding, everybody has to build their own reputation. But each individual is too small, so even thought leaders like Alistair Cockburn and Ron Jefferies discover that they need the help of a recognized brand to market their courses effectively.

If we are going to talk about integrity: I think the Scrum Alliance had a big problem because it was not living its values. This is where the controversy really lies. For example, you can’t say, ‘We are transforming the world of work’ while you hire and fire your contract workers on a monthly basis. And that was least of their problems.

My hope is that Alliance has recognized its integrity deficit and take the steps necessary to correct it. The signs at the Orlando gathering were pretty positive, but I think it will be another 6 months or a year before we really know. I’m optimistic.

Cheers,
Peter

Our broader community: there is very little cohesive focused thought that is being generated in other parts of the community. I encounter too much diffusion to be helpful because of the strong drive by people to say it differently and then be recognized. Mostly just isolated blog voices (thought leaders like your voice Cory) hopefully we will continue to find better ways to represent and participate in building better teams that make better products. The ideas for agile software development have been around for 40 years to forever depending on how you dice the philosophy. Despite the efforts of the past we continue to see large amounts of horrible practice. From my view the Scrum Alliance community has improved focus on practices that work and shifted things for the better. It remains my hope the CSD will do the same.
I believe the CSD program is a good thing and has the right focus for now. I am not sure where the CSD program will wobble through time so it needs to be watched.

It also feels like a way to help CST make money now that all the potential (?) training candidates have CSM. I have a fear we will have a bunch of CST who don’t actually do Scrum, just teach about it. There is big difference about teaching this stuff and doing it.

I strongly disagree. I do think the SA-REP appears to be a good thing, but I don’t see how the CSD adds any value at all, save opening purse strings. How do you see the certification adds value over providing resources?

Thanks. I agree about XP’ers – imagine further had Ken and the SA simply said, “Well, if you are doing Scrum to build software, then you really need to be doing XP. Let’s get you some resources to help with that.” And they almost did – just never officially.

Regarding integrity: Yes, Ron and Chet were some of the first people I followed back in the day. And it baffled me when they became CSTs, and even more so with they announced support for the CSD. I admit that was difficult for me. I do believe that they, at least consciously, believe they are doing it to attempt to influence the Scrum community into better practices. It’s perhaps more about me trusting them (or wanting to trust them) rather than a simple discussion of integrity, so thanks for your point on that.

Ultimately Scrum is the flashier of the two because it is targeted at the “white collar” workers of IT, while the “blue collar” developers get the shaft by being considered replaceable commodities. That’s why I think the CSD will do so well – you can now put your blue collar trainees through a 3-day class and say, “But we trained you”.

The CSD certification, in principle, appears to be a good thing. We have too many companies attempting to implement Scrum without addressing the engineering side of software development. Project management is great, but alone it does not ensure quality. My hope is that the CSD would be a step in that direction.

Having said that, XP has already been there, and doesn’t support one technology over another (i.e. Microsoft, Java, etc.). As a Rails guy I’m left out in the dark on these certs. Would that impact my job as I can’t get a certification that an employer might value? Perhaps.

Regardless, it appears that the SA is trying to play both sides – address concerns with Scrum and make money doing so ala the certifications. I know many people on the development and management sides that see these certifications as a money making opportunity for the trainers, and therefore they put no real value in the certification.

For now, the Scrum Alliance has a louder voice to management than the development community, though I hope this will change. As long as that is the case companies will continue to trust their word as a certification body (i.e. the center of influence) over other voices, and companies will pay out the money to “get agile.”

I think it’s reasonable to see that Ron, Chet, and a host of other people can have compartmentalized integrity in some areas of their lives and not have it in others, like supporting the CSD program, for example.

I haven’t seen one single person who went into the inside to have influence on that inside actually end up having influence. Not one. Not once. Maybe Ron and Chet will redefine expectations, but my money’s on the established trend.

It’s OK for anyone who wants to support the CSD to do so. We can respect them for making money in a commercial society, but we really don’t have to credit them with more than that.

The need to continue to celebrate qualified integrity comes from our own fear of seeing our idols for the flawed humans that they are. Let’s just be OK with that and start to put an end to all this need for comfortable dishonesty.

Inevitably, many XP’ers got screwed out of a better living by the misdirected attention taken by Scrum and the efforts of the Scrum Alliance. Those XP guys deserved better for having had a more complete and compelling story, and society deserved a more productive solution than mere Scrum, and this is an opportunity for some long-overdue equity. Unfortunately, it’s also yet another in a long line of exercises that generate more mindless orthodoxy. And for that, it’s unforgivable.