Events Conference Session
CAAC 10: Virginia Commonwealth Agency Agile Conference #10
This event took place on Friday, June 23, 2023, so registration is closed. See current training or get in touch about booking Michael.
Michael Vizdos co-presented a session at this online conference for agile practitioners and people interested in Implementing Scrum — and other Agile Techniques — within their Virginia Commonwealth Agencies on June 23, 2023.
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Resources from this session
Get tips about Implementing Scrum.
Subscribe to my weekly Saturday morning Scrum Cartoons.
Your Scrum (or Agile) Journey because context matters!
The Scrum Pillars.
The Interactive Scrum Guide (InteractiveScrumGuide.com).
The Scrum Guide Audio Book (scrumguide.mvizdos.com).
Scrum Artifacts (and commitments).
Dark Scrum (anti-patterns and recommended solutions from my mentor and colleague Ron Jeffries).
Team Building / Onboarding New Team Members.
Scrum Outside of Software (www.ScrumInSchool.org).
Commonwealth Agency Agile Conference · CAAC 10
CAAC 10
Michael spoke Co-presented session 1 with Elizabeth Conner · Volunteer planning team
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Welcome and audience polls 0:00:02
Stephen Manley (Virginia State Police)
Opening at the end of the state fiscal year, the host polls the audience. Customer satisfaction is the top reason given for moving to agile, ahead of culture and morale, and attendees rate their executives' view of agile 3.5 out of 5.
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How Agile Can Deliver Value 0:13:32
Elizabeth Conner (Virginia State Police), Michael Vizdos guest
Elizabeth presents why agile can deliver value (its values and Scrum's three pillars) and how (the twelve principles, events, artifacts and tools), with Michael as co-presenter. The discussion turns to why it is hard, and to hiring for agile roles in state government.
- Agile is not easier or faster, and it is not the right fit for every situation.
- Value is what the Product Owner says it is, balancing people, process and technology.
- Scrum's three pillars, transparency, inspection and adaptation, line up with the Agile Manifesto's values.
- It is hard because change feels threatening, and talking about the work can feel like not doing it.
- A certification gets you a check mark, not the job. Write new job requisitions instead of copying old ones.
- VSP added agile practice to every full-time IT employee's work profile.
In the Scrum Guide: Transparency · Inspection · Adaptation · Product Owner
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Metrics to Track Toward Goals and Value 1:13:52
Barbara Phillips (Virginia State Police), September Sickinger (Virginia Department of Transportation)
Barbara covers how to choose metrics, and September shows the reports VDOT actually uses for scrum, Kanban, scaled and portfolio work.
- Too few metrics and you can't tell whether you are improving. Too many crowd out improvement and can hurt psychological safety.
- Tie metrics to goals and the roadmap, report only what someone acts on, and check regularly that each one still earns its place.
- One agency reported 60 metrics. When the reports stopped, four people asked where they were.
- VDOT tracks burndown, committed versus delivered story points, cumulative flow for Kanban, and features completed per program increment.
- VDOT's "Eight Signals" health check rates schedule, cost, scope, benefits, risk, issues, vendor and business as red, yellow or green, with a written guide so ratings are consistent.
In the Scrum Guide: Sprint Goal · Product Goal · Increment
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Conference retrospective 2:19:56
Attendees post kudos and suggestions on an online retrospective board.
- Suggested next: walk through a small project from start to finish in Scrum, and have agencies show how they use their tools, such as Jira and Azure DevOps.
About these pages: curated and reviewed by Michael Vizdos, on the volunteer CAAC planning team since CAAC 4 and a speaker at CAAC 5, 10, 11, 17 and 18. Summaries and takeaways are drafted with AI (Claude) from the recording's captions and reviewed by Michael Vizdos before publishing (how I use AI). This is not the official conference site; the Virginia State Police hosts CAAC (vsp.virginia.gov/caac). Last reviewed October 20, 2026.