Arline Sutherland

Scrum in Church: Saving the World One Team at a Time, Agile 2009, Chicago.

Abstract—From 2005-2009 the author led Scrum teams in churches in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Florida, and Delaware. Scrum was designed to increase productivity and improve quality through teamwork. This experience report shows how Scrum was implemented in non-profit organizations to break down silos of knowledge and activity, encourage communication and collaboration, improve the working environment and personal relationships, and drive higher velocity and quality throughout the organization. Nonprofits have impediments that are difficult to overcome – parttime and volunteer workers, narrow specialization, little to no experience with project teams, and political problems whose roots can go back as far as 1692. Scrum as an institutional change agent is invaluable to a church.