I have worked in largely non-Agile, non-Scrum organisations. With my Product ambitions, ensuring my next role is Agile is something of a challenge. I have stacks of experience of handling the sort of problems that always arise in any event – mostly due to change management. My feeling is that in a Scrum environment, through its three pillars of Transparency, Inspection and Adaptation change should be immediately easier to handle, not harder.
I decided to certify. Being self-funded, the Scrum Alliance route was going to be out of my reach, so PSM via Scrum.org is my way to go. The prospect of having to pay to to re-sit the test is extra motivation to put in the work to pass first time and there really is more to it than just reading the scrum guide a few times. My route:
- Re-read the Agile Manefesto
- Read and understand the Scrum Guide
- Take advantage of special offer pricing when available for a couple of Udemy courses
- Read and view all the materials on the Scrum.org Scrum Master Learning Path
- My ongoing reading list and blogroll
On completion of the assessment, a score report is returned with percentage achievement by focus area (e.g. Product Value) with corresponding links to specific resources if improvement is needed in those areas.
So, for me Job Done now to learn by doing!
PSM I
Awarded: Dec 13, 2019
Concluding, the study and practice assessments were all valuable experience and leave me more determined than ever to work in an Agile, preferably Scrum environment going forwards.