Scrum Team Autonomy: Stop Accepting Dependencies, Start Mapping Them

Is having fully autonomous Scrum Teams an illusory goal ? 🎯

Maybe. But it doesn't mean that you should take the current situation as a fait accompli. If Dependencies are a pain in the *ss for your team (and they probably are), a good first start is to identify them and visualize them in a Dependency Mapping exercise :

• First, ask the participants to name the Dependencies that they're currently facing, or the ones identified for a starting Project
• Visualize if it's a mutual Dependency (meaning that both teams need each other) or a single one (meaning that one needs to complete a piece of work before the next one can start) or a collaborative one (meaning that both teams collaborate)
• Club them by category or group of teams if it makes sense
• Discuss which ones are causing the most trouble and taking the most energy
• Propose solutions !

The outcome will vary : from new agreements with the other teams, to a change of accountability to a certain scope, to T-shaping a team member to recruiting a new one... the solutions are as varied as the issues you're facing.

As you can see on the Dependency Mapping my team made this morning, we're not there yet and you know what ? It's OK. The purpose is not to get rid of every Dependency from one day to another, but to constantly move towards more autonomy... bit by bit 😊