Success Is When the Team Gets Closer to the User | Alf Dobbert-Baums

Summary

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Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast

Episode: Success Is When the Team Gets Closer to the User, with Alf Dobbert-Baums
Date: July 23, 2026
Host: Vasco Duarte
Guest: Alf Dobbert-Baums (Agile Coach and Scrum Master)

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Episode Overview

In this Success Thursday episode, host Vasco Duarte sits down with Alf Dobbert-Baums to explore what success means for a Scrum Master. Alf emphasizes that real success is when the team gets closer to the user, fostering direct feedback and a deeper understanding of how their product is actually used. The conversation highlights practical tips to connect Scrum teams with users, the power of “review as working meeting,” and the eye-opening value of user feedback.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Alf’s Favorite Retrospective Format

[01:21 - 03:02]

• Classic Retro Structure: Alf prefers a classic retrospective format including the prime directive, four key questions:
  • What was good?
  • What did we learn?
  • What should we change?
  • What still puzzles us?
• Reason: This structure celebrates success, encourages knowledge sharing, and highlights open questions, which can catalyze further inquiry.
• Crucial Step: Revisiting agreed improvements at the next retro—often neglected, but essential for learning and adaptation.

“Whenever you have agreed improvements, you should revisit them in the next retro...because sometimes the world changes, and maybe that improvement is not relevant anymore.”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [02:18]

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2. Defining Success as a Scrum Master

[04:00 - 06:09]

• Alf’s Definition: Success is when the team gets closer to the user.
• Story of Direct Impact:
  • In a review, a user mentioned a minor issue: after closing a popup, the focus in a list would jump to the top. Resolving this issue within four hours greatly improved the team’s tool for many users.

“We could really help the user because…this small change…helped a lot of users in the customer center to not waste any time.”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [05:23]

• Insight: Even tiny changes, when discovered directly from users, can have a significant user impact.

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3. Making Reviews More Impactful: Working Meetings, Not Demos

[06:32 - 07:35]

• Alf’s Practice: Set clear expectations with users invited to review sessions:
  • Reviews are working meetings, not one-way presentations.
  • Goal: Collaborate on what can be improved, not just show off features.
• Emphasis: Reviews are opportunities for exchange, discussion, and improvement, not just validation.

“It’s not a demo…It’s basically, okay, what can we improve with this one? This is kind of like a version. Do you have some other things?”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [06:39]

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4. Overcoming Reluctance: The Value of Meeting Users

[07:35 - 10:52]

• Host’s Challenge: Many teams see meeting users as difficult or unnecessary.
• Alf’s Response: The Product Owner (PO) represents multiple perspectives, but the actual user provides real-world context that POs typically can't.
• Benefits Cited by Alf:
  • Teams are often surprised by how users employ the product.
  • Direct user interaction reveals:
    • Hidden pain points.
    • The complexity of user workflows (users work with multiple tools at once).
    • How assumptions about users are often false.
• Eye-Opening Examples: Watching real users exposed the need for UI tweaks and highlighted unanticipated pain points.

“Whenever I succeeded in inviting the user, it was always very eye opening also for the developers and changed the building of the product, because suddenly they had a real person behind it.”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [10:30]

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5. Practical Starting Point: Start Small, Then Expand

[10:52 - 11:02]

• Suggestion: Begin by inviting a single user—don’t wait for formal, large-scale feedback sessions.

“You can start with one user and you don’t need to carry in like 15 users, but you can start small and expand on that.”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [10:54]

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6. Recommended Resource: “Shift from Product to People”

[11:02 - 11:36]

• Vasco recommends the book Shift from Product to People by Michael Dougherty and Pete Oliver Kruger.
• Technique Spotlight: Usability Theater – observing users as they interact with the product, just like watching a play, to identify authentic usage patterns and pain points.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Revisit your agreed upon improvements and check, okay, is it still relevant? Did you do it? If not, can we forget about it?”
  — Alf Dobbert-Baums [02:18]

• “Success is when the team gets closer to the user.”
  — Alf Dobbert-Baums [04:06]

• “It’s not a demo, it’s a working meeting…what can we improve with this one?”
  — Alf Dobbert-Baums [06:39]

• “The product owner has more perspective and the user actually uses the product…It’s very valuable and surprising insights, actually.”
  — Alf Dobbert-Baums [08:22 & 09:55]

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Key Episode Timestamps

• 01:21 – Alf’s favorite retrospective format and why
• 03:44 – The importance of revisiting previous retro improvements
• 04:06 – What success means for Alf as a Scrum Master
• 05:20 – The “quick win” story: directly improving a recurring user pain point
• 06:32 – Turning Sprint Reviews into collaborative working meetings
• 07:35 – Helping teams see why user meetings matter
• 08:22 - 10:52 – Insights teams gain from meeting users, with real-world anecdotes
• 11:02 – Starting small with user involvement; resource recommendation

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Summary Takeaways

• Success for a Scrum Master hinges on facilitating closer interactions between teams and users.
• Retrospectives are powerful when improvements are actually tracked and revisited.
• Sprint reviews should be working meetings where users and teams co-create improvements.
• Direct user feedback often shatters assumptions and drives impactful product changes.
• Starting user involvement small (even with just one user) is effective.
• Observational techniques like “usability theater” are recommended to uncover authentic user behavior.

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“Whenever I succeeded in inviting the user, it was always very eye opening for the developers … suddenly they had a real person behind it who is using that.”
— Alf Dobbert-Baums [10:30]

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[For further reading, check out the episode show notes for resources mentioned, including the book “Shift from Product to People.”]

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Hello everybody.

[A]

Welcome to our Success Thursday.

[B]

This week we have with us Alf Dobet Baums. Hey Alf, welcome back.

[C]

Hello.

[B]

So, Alf, Thursday is Success Thursday on the podcast, of course. But before we dive into that, do share with us what's your favorite agile retrospective format and why?

[C]

Well, basically I like the very classical one where you have the prime directive and then what was good, what did we learn, what should we change and what still puzzles us. I think it was basically from, I don't know, I forgot it was one of the very first retro formats. I like that very much because it celebrates the successes, kind of. It shares knowledge with the team. If you say, okay, what did we learn and how can we improve? Of course is in there and what puzzles us? It's a very nice question because sometimes you just have some question marks in your head and you don't know what to do with it. But I think I want to stress one important thing is whenever you have agreed improvements, you should revisit them in the next ret. I think a lot of people don't do that and I think it's a shame basically, because that's at least what I do is that you revisit your agreed upon improvements and check, okay, is it still relevant? Did you do it? Interview, did not do it. Is it relevant or can we forget about it? Because sometimes the world changes or sometimes most of the time the world changes and maybe that improvement is not relevant anymore.

[B]

Absolutely. And reflecting on that is as useful as reflecting or learning that the improvement had an impact. Because when we look at improvements as experiments to be better, right like to become better when they don't work. They give you a lot of information that is going to be useful to what to do next. So when we think about the stuff that didn't work from the improvements we thought about last time, we're also learning, we're not learning that stuff worked, we're learning that stuff didn't work. But then we can ask why, what was missing, what was too much, who didn't we involve but should have, who did we involve but should not, and so on and so forth. And that's very useful information for us to understand our system.

[C]

Yes, definitely. And then we have the system again,

[B]

talking about systems. Of course we work within all of these systems and we want to succeed as Scrum Masters.

[A]

Before we do so, we first must

[B]

define what that means.

[A]

So Alf, share with us, what does

[B]

success mean for you as a Scrum Master?

[C]

Well, for me one thing is basically to come closer to the user. So we had once we had. It's a very nice story. We were in a review with a, basically with a user and she mentioned, okay, I have this very small problem and I don't know how to address it, I don't know how to put it into our system with all the requirements and everything. And we were like, okay, just tell us what is it? We can probably help you somehow. And then she said okay, listen, we have here this big list with all the entries and when you click on an entry in that list a pop up comes up with more details. Details. We were like yeah, okay. And then she said well if you close that pop up the focus on the list jumps to the beginning. Please change it. That we, that the focus stays on the same, on the same level that you just selected. We were like, okay. We talked a little bit in the review and basically after four for hours she had it and I was like this is really great, this is cool. We talk in the review, we talk about it and then we could really help the user because I'm sure that this small change, which really was a very small JavaScript change I assume helped a lot of users in the customer center to don't waste any time because they don't need to scroll through all the list and check okay, where was I before? And yeah, so that is definitely one success story. So getting closer to the user. I think it's always very good to get the feedback from the user.

[B]

So when you think about the teams that you've worked with and if assuming that the goal so success is when we are able to figure out a way to get the teams closer to the user. What are some of the tips you have to share with us? What has worked for you in the past to make that importance of that clear to the teams and then to help them get there?

[C]

Well, for the review, for example, I would always say to the user when they are invited, which is sometimes it's quite hard to do that. It's not a demo, it's a working meeting. So it's not like we demo something and then you can clap your hands and say yay and go away. But it's basically kind of like, okay, what can we improve with this one? This is kind of like a version. Do you have some other things? As I mentioned in the small story, we demonstrated some other feature and she said, well, yeah, this is good, but there's another thing. So this is what the review is about. Basically, the people can discuss things and it's not kind of like, here's a demo and you could also do it in PowerPoint, basically. So, yeah, that's what I would say.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. So when you think about. So one of the difficult things that we have in many organizations, and I've heard this from many clients, is to create this vision of what are the benefits of meeting the user. Now, you started from the perspective in the reviews, invite the users in if possible. Okay, great. But there are many teams out there who still think that it's not possible. It's not easy, it's perhaps not the right thing to do. So when you work with teams, how do you help them understand the importance of meeting the users face to face?

[C]

Well, it's basically that they get feedback,

[B]

but we get feedback from the product owner. Isn't that enough?

[C]

Well, the product owner has more perspective and the user actually uses the. The product. So I, I've never seen really where the product owner uses the software he helps build. So he's kind of like getting all the different stakeholders and maybe the market research and stuff like that. But it is definitely just very valuable if you get the actual user to come in and give some feedback. So, yeah, because what I heard a lot of times from teams, whenever we had that, they were quite surprised. How are the user really using the product? And sometimes they were not aware how difficult it sometimes is for the users because the user always has a different use case. So they not only use our product basically, but our. The usage of our product is embedded into their work goals. So they may have also Excel open and other stuff open where we assume, yeah, only our screen is Open. But no, it's not. And this is something that you hardly ever know. I once did a usability test for a different company and it was really eye opening how the software is used. It was really like, what? Why are you doing that? Click there, click there, click there. Nope, she would not click on there. And I was like, well, we need to make the button bigger basically. So yeah, it's very valuable and surprising insights. Actually. Whenever I succeeded in inviting the user, it was always very eye opening also for the developers and changed the product, the building of the product, because suddenly they had a real person behind it who is using that.

[B]

We don't need to guess how it's used anymore. No, no, absolutely.

[C]

Yeah. And basically you can start with one user and you don't need to carry in like 15 users, but you can start small and expand on that.

[B]

Yeah. So for those of you interested in what Alf just described, there's a great book called Shift from Product to People by Michael Dougherty and Pete Oliver Kruger. And they have a technique they described called usability theater. And it is exactly how it sounds like. You get users to use your product and you observe them just like you would be observing a theater play. So make sure you check that out. The link is in the show notes for those of you who want to know more, Alf, thank you very much for sharing that with us and I'll see you tomorrow.

[C]

All right, bye. Bye.

[A]

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[B]

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