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Scrum.org

Scrum.org Community Podcast

AI is joining teams faster than most organizations have frameworks to support it and that's actually an exciting opportunity, if you approach it thoughtfully. In this episode of the Scrum.org Community Podcast, Scrum.org COO Eric Naiburg and executive advisor Darrell Fernandes pick up where their popular webinar Managing Your AI Teammate left off, tackling the audience questions that didn't make it into the live session.

The conversation draws smart parallels between AI adoption and the cloud journey most organizations have already navigated, explores how to set your team up for secure and effective AI collaboration, and unpacks what it really means to treat AI as a strategic partner rather than just a tool. Eric and Darrell also take on a forward-looking question most teams haven't gotten to yet: how do we use AI efficiently and responsibly, not just effectively?

If your team is starting to work alongside AI (and it almost certainly is), this episode will give you practical language and frameworks to do it with confidence.

Your AI Teammate Is Ready, Are You? Bringing Intention and Strategy to AI on Scrum Teams

A conversation with Stephan Scholten and Cesario Ramos on transparent salaries, self-organized teams, peer-driven assessment, and what it really takes to design an HR function around people rather than processes.

Most organizations claim to put people first. Their HR systems tell a different story. In this episode of the Scrum.org Community Podcast, host Dave West speaks with Stephan Scholten, Director of People and Organization at Visma Roxit and Cesario Ramos, creator of Creating Agile Organizations, about what happens when you actually redesign HR from the ground up with agile principles at its core.

Stephan and Cesario discuss the radical steps Visma Roxit has taken: eliminating team leaders in favor of self-organization, opening up salary structures for collective input, and running peer-driven assessment processes that give employees genuine ownership over how their roles and compensation are defined. They explore the Theory X versus Theory Y tension that surfaces in nearly every organization attempting this kind of change, the slow and deliberate trust-building required before transparency can work, and how the arrival of AI fits into a system already designed around human interdependence and collective performance.

Whether you are an HR professional, an agile coach, or a leader looking for a real-world example of empowerment done seriously, this conversation offers both inspiration and practical starting points.

You can learn more about this story in the whitepaper titled Designing HR for Agile Organizations.

Rethinking HR from Scratch: How One Company Built a Truly Agile People System

What happens to organizations when the cost of outputs drops to nearly zero? That is the central question Dave West and Dr. Mik Kersten are back to explore in this episode of the Scrum.org Community Podcast. Mik, the author of the upcoming book Output to Outcome, joins Dave to dig into why so many companies are failing to see meaningful value from their AI investments and why the organization itself has become the bottleneck.

They cover the AI productivity paradox, why complexity is growing faster than outcomes in most large organizations, and what leaders need to do differently. Mik introduces the "outcome loop" as a mental model for leadership, explains why modularity and decentralization are the only structures that scale (in nature or in business), and shares why many organizations are quietly reverting to command-and-control patterns at exactly the wrong moment.

If you work in or lead a Scrum Team, manage a product organization, or are thinking about how AI is reshaping the way we structure and run teams, this conversation will give you a lot to chew on.

Output to Outcome by Dr. Mik Kersten is available for pre-order now, with release on July 14.

Rethinking How Organizations Scale with AI

For 17 years, the Give Thanks for Scrum (GTFS) event in Boston has reflected the evolution of Scrum itself, from early education and experience reports to scaling, business agility, and now AI integration.

In this episode, Dave West sits down with GTFS founder and Managing Director of Improving Agility, Daniel Mezick to explore how the event began, sparked by bringing Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber together during Thanksgiving week in Boston, and how its themes have evolved alongside the Agile movement.

The 2025 event returned to an in-person format and centered on three critical themes:

 • Delivering tangible results
 • Incorporating AI into Scrum practice
 • The evolving role of the Scrum Master

Daniel and Dave discuss why empiricism matters more than ever, how Scrum Masters must understand executive psychology, and what socio-technical design means in an AI-enabled world. They also explore whether large agile frameworks may give way to more focused, empirical approaches.

Looking further into the future, the conversation turns to AI’s expanding role, practical application over hype, and a blended in-person/online format to grow the global community.

If you care about the future of Scrum, stakeholder delight, and navigating uncertainty with empiricism, this episode is for you.

The Future of Scrum: Lessons from 17 Years of Give Thanks for Scrum

Dave West sits down with Mik Kersten, author of Project to Product and the upcoming Output to Outcome, to explore why AI amplification is exposing the real bottlenecks in how organizations work. Mik shares data from over 3,600 value streams showing that development teams account for just 8% of end-to-end delivery time which means making those teams faster with AI doesn't move the needle if the constraints are upstream and downstream.

The conversation digs into why most organizations are measuring the wrong things (hint: token consumption is not a productivity metric), why overlay agile structures have largely failed, and why the answer isn't fewer teams it's more empowered ones. Mik introduces the core models from his new book: the outcome loop, the outcome tree, and seven organizational shifts that together make up a new operating model designed for the age of AI.

Key Takeaways:

 • The bottleneck has moved from software delivery to planning, governance, and innovation and most organizations haven't caught up
 • Making development teams faster with AI delivers little value if the surrounding system isn't designed around outcomes
 • Agile as an overlay structure doesn't work it has to become the primary operating model and the actual org chart
 • Empowered, autonomous teams are not optional in an AI-driven world the speed of feedback loops makes half-measures unsustainable
 • Leadership roles need to be redefined and incentive structures realigned to match the way teams are actually working
 • The theory of constraints still applies in the age of AI the constraint just keeps moving, and finding it is now the critical management skill

Links

http://outputtooutcome.org/

From Output to Outcome: How AI Forces a Rethink of Teams, Leadership, and Value

Neste webcast “Conversa com PSTs: Scrum, o dia a dia e a IA”, dois Professional Scrum Trainers (PSTs) respondem às perguntas da comunidade e exploram como os pilares do empirismo em Scrum: transparência, inspeção e adaptação, são aplicados ao desenvolvimento de produtos, e nas situações do quotidiano, profissionais e também pessoais.

Durante a conversa, dois PSTs, Daniel Carrilho e Matheus Reis, irão refletir sobre como a Inteligência Artificial está a transformar a forma como as equipas trabalham, como pode apoiar a tomada de decisões baseada em evidência e de que forma líderes e profissionais podem tirar partido do Scrum para navegar num mundo cada vez mais complexo e assistido por AI.

Portuguese Edition: Ask a PST AI Focus - Conversa com PSTs: Scrum, o dia a dia e a IA

In this episode of the Scrum.org Community Podcast, Dave West is joined by Tony Hinkley, Chief Technology Officer for Avanade UK. Tony brings a rare combination of perspectives: seasoned engineer, Professional Scrum Trainer, and senior technology leader helping some of the world's largest organizations navigate AI adoption. Together, Dave and Tony dig into what AI is really doing to product teams, Scrum practices, and knowledge work at large. This is an honest, experienced, and energizing conversation about where we are, where we're headed, and what it means for everyone who cares about delivering value professionally and sustainably.

Key Takeaways

 • AI has disrupted professional services more than almost any other sector because knowledge, the core asset of consulting and IT services, is rapidly becoming a commodity. That's a wake-up call for all knowledge workers.
 • Scrum Teams are seeing real productivity gains from AI but those gains have moved the bottleneck. It's no longer about how fast developers can write code. It's about the quality of intent, requirements, and context being handed to the tools.
 • The principles behind Scrum haven't changed but how you implement them must. Your Definition of Done, for example, may now be enforced by an agent rather than a person. Are your standards clear and documented enough for that to work well?
 • Specialists get significantly better results from AI than generalists. First-principles thinking, clean code habits, and a strong sense of what "good" looks like are more valuable now than ever, not less.
 • Context is the new currency. Giving AI tools access to well-structured, well-governed organizational data and standards will unlock far more value than simply upgrading to the latest model.
 • Leaders face a real choice: use AI to cut costs, or use it to grow. Tony's strong recommendation is to invest freed-up capacity into the parts of your product organization that have always been under-resourced, strategy, ideation, stakeholder engagement, and product thinking.
 • Data governance isn't a dirty word anymore, it's a competitive advantage. Organizations that get serious about data quality, classification, and security will be the ones that get the most from AI. Garbage in still means garbage out, and the consequences are bigger than ever.
 • Mid-market companies should pay close attention. AI is leveling the playing field in a meaningful way, giving smaller organizations the ability to punch well above their weight in product delivery.
 • If you're feeling uncertain about your place in an AI-enabled world, start by embracing the tools. As Tony puts it: AI won't take your job, but someone who knows how to use it well might.

Context Is the New Currency: AI, Scrum, and the Future of Product Delivery

In this episode of the Scrum.org Community podcast, Dave West sits down with Dave Dame, Senior Director of Human-Centered Design at Microsoft, to explore the lessons behind his new book, “Leading with Imperfect Feet.”

Dame shares his journey of leadership through the lens of imperfection, emphasizing the value of vulnerability, humility, and learning from mistakes. Drawing on personal experiences, including overcoming the challenges of Cerebral Palsy to walk on the beach, he illustrates how embracing imperfection can empower leaders and their teams.

The conversation dives deep into inclusive design, human factors, cognitive science, and user research, showing how thoughtful, human-centered approaches create better products and more effective teams. Dame discusses how organizations can balance efficiency with creativity and human connection, and why continuous learning and adaptive leadership are essential in today’s fast-changing work environment.

Whether you’re a product leader, designer, or someone striving to lead with empathy, this episode offers practical insights and inspiring stories on how embracing imperfection can drive innovation, inclusivity, and authentic leadership.

Leading with Imperfect Feet is now available for pre-order and will be published in June!

Leading with Imperfect Feet: Dave Dame on Leadership, Inclusive Design and Embracing Mistakes

What does it really take to make AI work, not just technically, but organizationally? 

In this episode of the Scrum.org Community Podcast, host Dave West sits down with Dr. Alan Brown, researcher, advisor, and author of the new book Making AI Work for Britain, to explore the complex realities of AI adoption in large organizations and government.

Drawing on decades of experience in enterprise digital transformation from Rational Software to IBM to advising public sector institutions, Alan unpacks why AI is both an evolutionary step and a fundamental disruption, and why most organizations are struggling to bridge the gap between technological capability and organizational readiness.

Alan and Dave explore how lessons from the UK's digital government journey of consolidating demand, diversifying supply, offer a practical lens for every team navigating AI adoption today. They also dig into three principles Alan believes are at the heart of any disciplined approach to AI: value, risk, and trust and why that last one might be the most transformative idea yet for Scrum Teams.
Whether you're a Scrum Master, Product Owner, or senior leader trying to make sense of AI in your organization, this conversation offers a grounded, thought-provoking framework for moving from pilot chaos to purposeful delivery.

Book details can be found at https://futureofai.uk/

Blog: Making AI Work: What Scrum Gets Right and Organizations Get Wrong

Making AI Work: Value, Risk, and Trust in the Age of Intelligent Systems

Most Agile coaches build their careers inside large organizations — but what happens when a new opportunity calls from an unexpected direction? Scrum.org CEO, Dave West, sits down with Marina Alex, an AI & modern management expert and Founder of The SWAY Academy, who answered that call. After the enterprise market shifted in 2022, Marina pivoted her practice toward small and medium-sized businesses in Knoxville, Tennessee — and discovered what she describes as a blue ocean: many companies that have never heard of a Sprint, but are ready for one.

Along the way, Marina found that AI has become a natural entry point into these conversations. With most small businesses neither tech-heavy nor equipped with an IT department, the excitement and anxiety around AI opens the door to deeper work around team culture, structure, and customer focus. Rather than leading with frameworks, she leads with outcomes — helping business owners understand that strong teams and clear processes are what make any new technology actually stick.

Marina walks Dave through the mindset shifts, networking strategies, and practical adaptations — from one-week Sprints to sticky-note Retrospectives — that have allowed her to build a thriving practice doing work she loves, serving the local business communities that need her most.

Free Guide from Sway Systems with tips to find new clients

Connect with Marina

Agile Beyond the Enterprise: Coaching the Businesses Next Door with Marina Alex

Building on last week’s episode on AI and Operating Systems in SMBs, Dave West and PST Yuval Yeret dive into the challenges of scaling small and medium-sized businesses.

Dave shares lessons from growing an organization from a small team to over 100 people—navigating silos, new stakeholders, and keeping teams outcome-focused. Yuval highlights common scaling pitfalls and explores frameworks like EOS, Scaling Up, and D4X, emphasizing vision, strategic goals, and evidence-based management.

Learn how to maintain agility at scale, build cross-functional teams, and create an operating system that drives sustainable growth.

Resource - Mastering Organizational Traction Trail Map

Scaling SMBs Without Losing Agility

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