Podcast Summary: Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast

Episode Title: The Agile Team That Committed to Failure for 18 Sprints Straight
Guest: Darryl Wright
Host: Vasco Duarte
Date: October 28, 2025

Overview

In this episode, Vasco Duarte speaks with Agile Coach and Scrum Master Darryl Wright about an all-too-common phenomenon in Agile: teams repeatedly overcommitting and underdelivering. The discussion dives into the roots of "learned helplessness" within teams, why such destructive cycles persist, and what Scrum Masters can do to break the pattern and restore morale and effectiveness.

Key Discussion Points

1. The Most Influential Book for Darryl (01:19–05:00)

• Book Recommendation:
  Darryl singles out Better Value Sooner, Safer, Happier by Jon Smart et al. as the book that most inspired his career.
• Why This Book?
  • It's packed with “real life experience” and authentic “war stories.”

    “It’s four or five decades or more of experience from people that have had their sleeves rolled up in the trenches...It’s so authentic, just the way they write it. You can tell they’ve got all the war stories, all the scars firsthand.” — Darryl (01:47)

  • The authors candidly share what failed in major Agile transformations as well as what works, creating a sense of relatability and learning.
• Illustrative Story:
  • At Barclays, Jon Smart’s team combated resistance to change (“laggards”) by publicizing "most improved teams" lists. Slowly, even the most resistant began asking how to get better.
  • “They started getting phone calls from people who were quite dedicated laggards who would say, ‘Hey, why am I on the bottom of this list?’...And then there’d be this moment, this little pause, this silence, and then the person would say, ‘Well, how do I get these improvements?’” — Darryl (03:41)

Key Insight: Social systems and subtle peer pressure can be more effective than direct mandates.

2. The Case of the Team That Failed for 18 Sprints (05:35–09:16)

• The Situation:
  Darryl was invited to help a low-performing Agile team at a large energy retailer. The team’s morale and output were dire.
• Symptoms of Trouble:
  • The team was delivering far less than committed ("110 points committed, 30 delivered").
  • This pattern persisted for 18 sprints.
  • Team size and story estimation did not explain the discrepancy.
• The Core Discovery:
  • The team kept overcommitting because “the business needs that much.”
  • Despite the business never receiving the requested output, neither the morale nor the standing with the business improved; instead, both worsened.
  • “Why would the team say they can deliver 110 points when they’ve been delivering 30 points for 18 sprints?” — Darryl (06:58)
• The Vicious Cycle:
  • Unrealistic targets → Repeated failure → Loss of trust and morale → Even less delivery → Cycle repeats
  • Business distrust and team stress were at all-time highs.
  • “Every time the team gets pushed to commit to an unrealistic target, they then experience failure. That makes them more despondent, it makes them more hesitant…” — Darryl (08:15)
• Proposed Solution:
  Darryl suggested changing the next Sprint goal to 30 points (the team’s actual capacity):
  • “The good news is I know what the problem is and I can help... The bad news is that the Sprint goal for the next sprint is going to be 30 points.” — Darryl (07:21)
  • This suggestion was rejected because “the business needs 110 points.”

Key Insight: Ignoring empirical evidence for the sake of perceived business need only escalates dysfunction.

3. Sources and Effects of Learned Helplessness (09:16–12:36)

• Who Perpetuates the Vicious Cycle?
  • Dysfunction had set in so deeply that even the team itself clung to impossible commitments.
  • The team’s attitude: “We just have to try…we know we can’t do it, we’ll never do it, but we just have to try.” — Darryl (10:02)
  • Vasco relates a similar experience where teams committed to unattainable goals “because we thought you wanted us to.” (10:37)
• The Puzzle of Adult Behavior:
  Vasco: “How can adult people…when they go to work, they have this kind of attitude?... It’s still a puzzle for me how this is possible.” (10:46)
• Reference to Maverick (Ricardo Semler):
  • Vasco recounts that Semler was similarly puzzled by how capable adults stifled their initiative at work.
  • The lesson: Changing the system, not just the people, is essential to breaking this dynamic.
• Deming’s Wisdom:
  • Darryl reminds us: “A bad system will beat a good person every time.” (12:32)

Key Insight: Organizational culture and systemic forces—not individual capabilities—often dictate team outcomes.

Memorable Quotes

• Darryl Wright (01:47):
  “It’s so authentic, just the way they write it. You can tell they’ve got all the war stories, all the scars firsthand.”
• Darryl Wright (03:41):
  “They started getting phone calls from people who were quite dedicated laggards who would say, ‘Hey, why am I on the bottom of this list?’…Well, how do I get these improvements?”
• Darryl Wright (08:15):
  “Every time the team gets pushed to commit to an unrealistic target, they then experience failure. That makes them more despondent…”
• Vasco Duarte (10:46):
  “The mystery is how can adult people, who go out and have their own lives…when they go to work, they have this kind of attitude...and it’s still a puzzle for me.”
• Darryl Wright (12:32):
  “As Deming said, a bad system will beat a good person every time.”

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Book that Inspired Darryl: 01:19–05:00
• Barclays & “Most Improved Teams” Story: 03:07–04:54
• Setting the Scene: The Failing Team: 05:35–08:37
• Analyzing the Vicious Cycle: 08:15–09:16
• Who Maintains Dysfunction? 09:27–10:09
• Learned Helplessness Examples: 10:09–11:30
• Semler, Maverick, and Adult Initiative: 11:30–12:32
• Deming’s Maxims: 12:32–12:45

Final Thoughts and Takeaways

• The commitment to failure is often a systemic, not personal, issue rooted in mismatched expectations and repeated negative cycles.
• Changing team behavior means addressing the surrounding context and systems, not just “motivation.”
• Scrum Masters can best help by exposing local realities (actual team velocity), advocating for sustainable commitments, and pushing for system-level change.
• Recognize learned helplessness early and act to break the downward spiral before it becomes entrenched.

For more actionable Agile advice and stories from the trenches, visit scrummastertoolbox.org.