Christiaan Verwijs aims to unleash organizational superpowers. He is co-founder of The Liberators, experienced Scrum Master, developer, Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) and Steward of the Professional Scrum Master II course at Scrum.org. He has spoken at Scrum Day Europe (2013-2018), XP Days 2017, and Liberating Structures Global Gathering 2018. Verwijs founded the Dutch Liberating Structures User Group (900+ members) and Liberators Network Meetup (250+ members). He blogs at medium.com/the-liberators and zombiescrum.org.

Foreword by Dave West xiiiForeword by Henri Lipmanowicz xviiAcknowledgments xixAbout the Authors xxiChapter 1: Getting Started 1Purpose of This Book 4Do You Need This Book? 5How This Book Is Organized 6No Time to Lose: Off You Go! 8Chapter 2: First Aid Kit 11Part I: (Zombie) Scrum 13Chapter 3: A Primer on Zombie Scrum 15The State of Scrum 17Zombie Scrum 18Is There Hope for Zombie Scrum? 24Experiment: Diagnose Your Team Together 25Now What? 29Chapter 4: The Purpose of Scrum 31It's All about Complex Adaptive Problems 32Problems 33Complex, Adaptive Problems 34Complexity, Uncertainty, and Risk 35Empiricism and Process Control Theory 36Empiricism and the Scrum Framework 37What the Scrum Framework Makes Possible 38Scrum: An Evolving Set of Minimal Boundaries to Work Empirically 39Zombie Scrum and the Efficiency Mindset 40What about Simple Problems? 42Now What? 44Part II: Build What Stakeholders Need 45Chapter 5: Symptoms and Causes 47Why Bother Involving Stakeholders? 49Who Are the Stakeholders, Actually? 50Why Are We Not Involving Stakeholders? 52Healthy Scrum 68Now What? 71Chapter 6: Experiments 73Experiments: Getting to Know Your Stakeholders 74Experiments: Involving Stakeholders in Product Development 81Experiments: Keeping Your Focus on What Is Valuable 88Now What? 96Part III: Ship It Fast 97Chapter 7: Symptoms and Causes 99The Benefits of Shipping Fast 102The Bottom Line: Not Shipping Fast Is a Sign of Zombie Scrum 105Healthy Scrum 116Now What? 121Chapter 8: Experiments 123Experiments to Create Transparency and Urgency 124Experiments for Starting Shipping More Often 131Experiments for Optimizing Flow 141Now What? 150Part IV: Improve Continuously 153Chapter 9: Symptoms and Causes 155Why Bother Improving Continuously? 157Why Are We Not Improving Continuously? 163Healthy Scrum 179Now What? 182Chapter 10: Experiments 183Experiments for Encouraging Deep Learning 183Experiments for Making Improvements Tangible 190Experiments for Gathering New Information 195Experiments to Create a Learning Environment 200Now What? 204Part V: Self-Organize 205Chapter 11: Symptoms and Causes 207Why Bother Self-Organizing? 209Why Are We Not Self-Organizing? 217Healthy Scrum: What Self-Organization Looks Like 234Now What? 238Chapter 12: Experiments 239Experiments to Increase Autonomy 239Experiments to Encourage Self-Organization 246Experiments to Promote Self-Alignment 254Find Local Solutions 259Now What? 263Chapter 13: The Road to Recovery 265A Global Movement 266What If Nothing Helps? 267More Resources 268Closing Words 268Index 271

Writing for all individuals, teams, and organizations who want to achieve more with Scrum, Zombie Scrum Survival Guide combines theoretical foundations with practical approaches, exercises, and facilitation techniques for making progress in widely diverse situations, and engaging everyone in the organization to get more out of Scrum. You’ll find specific guidance for building what the user needs, shipping faster, improving continuously, self-organizing your teams, and more. Drawing on extensive experience empowering developers, the authors also introduce powerful Liberating Structures patterns for enriching group interactions, so Scrum makes development more effective and fulfilling for everyone involved.