Tom’s role as a scrum master is to encourage practices that make the team more effective. Read why he considers trust an essential ingredient in accomplishing the goals if an “Agile” team.

Tom Bellinson asserts that “To understand what is meant by “long-range planning,” we need to go back to the traditional approach to product planning.” In addition to gathering evidence, good product managers should also be directly interacting with users and associated product stakeholders.

Tom Bellinson believes that conflict is scary, but he encourages risk-taking and change in the face of uncertainty. “Teams without a diversity of membership can fall into the group-think trap and become complacent.” Read his interesting take on the positive role conflict can play in leading to a successful outcome for the process team.

In this month’s Column, Tom urges practitioners to regularly evaluate what meetings are on their calendars and challenge their necessity. Meetings are, after all, time consuming and ultimately expensive in terms of sacrificing work time. He suggests a number of alternative communication methods and urges you to make sure that a meeting is the best option before choosing it.

Tom Bellinson discusses lessons learned in a class he took to fulfill his scrum master certification training, “We must be willing to take bigger risks in the name of continuous improvement.” Read his compelling story drawn from Tom’s personal experience.

An attitude prevails in some organizations that too much business process management will stifle change, which is fundamental to being Agile. Tom Bellinson believes that trust is a very important characteristic of organizations that enjoy successful Agile practices. Read the examples he cites in support of his theory.

Tom Bellinson’s experience as an Agile practitioner has led him to conclude that helping other teams become more Agile can ultimately increase trust throughout the organization and bring additional efficiencies to everyone. Read his Column for details.

Organizations that are serious about process management often use the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) as a means of evaluating their place on the maturity scale. Getting from Level 3 to Level 4 presents a considerable challenge to most organizations. And, although certain processes will always be managed at the organizational level, Tom believes agile practices are best left to the team level.

For several years, BPTrends author, Tom Bellinson wrote a quarterly Column titled Process Solutions. This month he begins a new series for BPTrends entitled “The Agile Practitioner.” In his first Column in this series, Tom provides a detailed explanation of what agile processes do and how they can be applied.