There is no escaping Agile if you are involved in product development within the IT industry. It has become the new go-to methodology for many businesses. As there is such a huge demand for it, you may wonder what Agile certifications you should be interested in working towards. To give you a little help in finding the right for you, we will look at some of the most popular Agile certifications.
CSPO (Certified Scrum Product Owner)
The PO or Product Owner is an important stakeholder on Scrum teams. They are the individual in a Scrum team that takes responsibility for owning the idea and delivering it to the specific audience that the Product Owner chooses. There is some flexibility with the rule too, though, as it can be adjusted and tweaked to suit the specific needs of an organization and the product they are developing.
Whatever the situation, CSPOs are trained to fully understand the five main pillars of Scrum product ownership and can demonstrate their knowledge of them. These include:
- Working along with the Product Backlog
- Testing out product assumptions
- Understanding the users and customers
- Describing the strategy and purpose
- Understanding their role as the product owner
CSM/Certified ScrumMaster
The next course we want to highlight is the Certified ScrumMaster course. This is a very intensive and deep delve into Scrum. This is a very immersive educational experience that involves practical hands-on participation with a mix of roleplays, games, team activities, group discussions and interactive seminars.
The focus of this course is to understand the framework provided by Scrum and offers some starting points to perform in the ScrumMaster role.
What do you learn?
- The principles, values and overarching philosophy that will help you to be more Agile
- The ins and outs of important principles like Self-organization, timeboxing, iteration and Empirical process control as an effective model that will help when you are working in a complicated environment.
- All the roles involved in Scrum and how they all work together to fulfil the product development
- Establishing the right environment to enable the delivery of high-performance agile such as ensuring that the Product Backlog is in a well-maintained condition and the Definition of Done.
- Techniques and skills for enabling and taking part in agile meetings that are highly effective with every iteration and day.
- Leveraging reviews and retrospective activities so you can produce solutions that fit better and improve the company’s ability to deliver Scrum.
If you are serious about taking the next step, check the online and onsite training schedule for dates and courses coming up soon.
A-CSM/Advanced Certified ScrumMaster
Following on nicely from the above we want to discuss another popular Agile/Scrum certification that is next for anyone who wants to expand beyond their Certified ScrumMaster certification. This is the Advanced Certified ScrumMaster certification course and is perfect for anyone fulfilling the role of Agile Coach or ScrumMaster. The focus of this course is on the practical techniques that Scrum Masters need to be effective when working with either just one or multiple teams.
As you work through the course, you will learn important skills in areas such as elaboration techniques, backlog item splitting, coaching, analyzing, and diagnosing Scrum violations, Teaching all stakeholders regarding Agile and group facilitation.
CAL-E+O/Certified Agile Leadership Credential
Another great Scrum and Agile credential and course worth checking out are the CAL E+O. As part of this, you can learn various crucial and potent skills and techniques important to leadership in Agile, such as:
- Executing step-by-step playbooks to help leaders to be more engaging
- Overcoming notable challenges in Agile and Scrum
- Creating the environment and context to develop an even more high performing organization
- Connecting leadership behaviors to the organizational culture
- Developing and maintaining an organization that uses Agile with a fully developed Agile Mindset
- Working effectively as managers and with other managers
- Redefining executive leadership that is effective
- Engaging individuals so they create an organizational culture that is of a very high performance
- Evolving an Agile culture at every level of the company
- Using key practices to lead lasting growth for the organization
- See the causes of resistance and then mitigate them
- Having key discussions that fully clarify what is properly desired
- Enhancing your personal leadership skills
This is especially ideal as a course for organizational coaches and leaders. The organizational leaders include program leads, managers, directors, vice presidents and other executives. The organizational coaches include internal change leaders, HR professionals, Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches.
SCP-SM/Certified Scrum Professional ScrumMaster
One of the most popular and potent certifications in Agile is undoubtedly the Certified Scrum Professional ScrumMaster, which is aimed at Scrum Masters, as the title suggests. It helps provides all participants with practical techniques and thinking tools to help them to become more impactful out with the Scrum Teams across the wider organisation.
With this course, the most complex and complicated team challenges are addressed, looking at team launch.
The powerful principles of Agile are made even more practical, with participants learning how to fully unleash the Lean Thinking power using Value Stream Mapping and the Systems Thinking power using Causal Loop Diagrams.
Obviously, the right course for you as an individual or team is the one that allows you to fulfil your role and responsibilities within Scrum and Agile. The courses we have outlined are some of the popular options, that are popular with good reason.
Story by Steve Turnbull
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