Some words about stand-ups .... Again...

Today I have introduced a new member to my scrum team. This individual came from another team, which followed some elements of agile but not to it's fullest extent. Some will say 'Who is', but it is not to my standards. This new individual was involved in stand-ups, but again it was more of a weekly status meeting. In my book, this is NOT a stand up.

Lets examine a weekly meeting vs a stand ups.

- Group meeting sitting down vs standing up: 
This Topic, when brought up, is one that I always get weird looks from. Stand ups are for individuals to be standing up in. Not Sitting down. The objective of having people stand up is that each person will get to the point right away. 2 ~ 3 min tops. It is the subconscious acting in such a way to say: I'm here for a quick FYI and help out if needed then I'm out.  When you have a weekly meeting with a team of 5 people, each talking for 10 mins. This is 50 min.... and 10 minutes is liberal.

Summary: 

• Sitting down = lazy and talking about the work day in a relaxed manner;  
• Standing up = ready to go and take on the day's work

- Talking about a week's worth of work in one meeting:

In a weekly meeting, each individual will start talking about what they have achieved in the past week. So this is a summary of what was done last week. It is not discussing the "nitty-gritty" details brought up in a stand up. Because it's a week, if there was an issue encountered by any individual, then this person may have been stuck for much more than needed and the solution applied might not be the most ideal. In a stand up, because of the details and short span of a day, everyone would be aware of the issue and one or more individual may have a solution at hand and ready to help out.

Summary: 

• Talking about a week work = general and unproductive for the team except PM; 
• Talking about yesterday = specific, right to the point, and productive for the team and PM