Getting the team talking through The Daily Scrum

Communication is key to a Service Desk - team members need to feel comfortable exchanging ideas about how to solve problems. However, working in a flexitime working environment, one by one the members of the team crawl into work. Some start studiously looking through their email. Others put on their headphones as they get on with their work for the day. In an apathetic environment like this, the practise of having a Daily Scrum meeting becomes the heartbeat to kicking off talking and chatter among the team for the rest of the day.

The Daily Scrum is a concept taken from Agile Scrum project management method used most frequently for software development. There are plenty of articles on the Internet that describe how it works, like here and here, as well as articles on how it does not work. In essence it is a daily round circle, stand-up meeting where each member of the team goes around in a circle and tells the team what they have been working on since the previous daily scrum, what they plan on working until the next one and any blockages they have to completing any work.

Unlike long running projects, a Service Desk environment is based on incidents so it is often difficult to predict what team members are going to be working on. However, the meeting acts as a useful way for members to synchronise with the rest of the team, giving everyone greater visibility of each others' work and providing an opportunity for them to help each other. Particularly when there are major incidents, the meeting keeps everyone focused and aware of progress.