Free Scrum eBooks for your Agile learning

The following Scrum/Agile resources are available free to our newsletter subscribers.

Newsletters are sent out roughly every two weeks. You can opt out of anything at any time by simply unsubscribing, or letting us know and we’ll customize your subscription to only what you need.

The Guide to Effective Agile Retrospectives

If you’re tired of having retrospective meetings greeted with groans and heavy, reluctant sighs or feeling like you’re rehashing the same old problems with no signs of improvement, the advice Mark Levison shares in this book will help make your retrospectives more effective.

There’s no need to have retrospectives that people hate and aren’t even useful – with a few tweaks, you can have meetings your team will look forward to, and start seeing real improvements and results. (More details)

Includes follow-up support emails to reinforce what you learned and help you make real changes right away.

A Jargon-Free Introduction to Scrum

This Scrum for beginners e-book is an easy to understand introduction to basic Scrum methodology and how it helps teams and organizations. Using a simple case study, you visualize Scrum at work in a marketing company and how its structure leads to many benefits. Scrum terms are explained simply, so you can get in on the conversation from the beginning. This is Scrum made simple. (More details)

Includes a follow-up email learning series to give you even more confidence and skills.

Agile Engineering Practices and Their Effects

(Technically not a book, but a downloadable PDF Cheat Sheet.)

In Mark’s workshops, he’s often asked, “How can I help my team go faster?”, or “How can we deliver this Product sooner?” His answer is always the same. “You must slow down to go fast.”

In software development, the single best way to improve quality, and eventually speed, is writing less code. Most of the time spent writing code should be to understand the problem and then find the simplest solution to it. The practices used to facilitate this in Agile software development are popularly known as Agile Engineering Practices.

We've helped 8000+ people find success using Scrum

Proud to be the trusted training provider for many of the largest financial, insurance, software, and education organizations, as well as all levels of Canadian government.

Well versed in knowledge and provided great "philosophical" thinking towards solutions to problems at work. Fun and approachable. Encourages solution formulation yourself.
Kang CKitchener-Waterloo
Mark is super knowledgable on the topic and presents it in a fun and educational atmosphere. Really enjoyed the team work and Mark's perspective on a lot of the information.
Shelly MToronto
Energetic, clear, helpful, inspiring, a great teacher.
Nadil POttawa
Enjoyed the course. (Mark) made it interesting/fun. Content presented in digestible format.
Brett MPrivate Client
Excellent course. Complete and comprehensive. Enlightened pedagogy and creative use of online collaboration tools. I do not think that we suffered much for being out of the f2f classroom setting. Mark is a curious, knowledgeable and entertaining instructor, able facilitator and consummate diplomat. Highly recommended. Five stars *****.
Kevin TVirtual
Instructor was well organized and touched each topic in a sequential matter that was logical.
Joe PMontreal
Anyone looking to do this course...do it with Mark! His passion for all things “Scrum and Agile” shines through and excites his students. He’s a “scrum” realist with a fantastic sense of humour! The material is relevant today and Mark gives us a glimpse of what we can expect 5 years from now. The post class support is fantastic and shows how passionate and knowledgeable Mark is about “learning!” A true educator!
Roberta PVirtual
He is very motivated. Mark kept us engaged as the day went fast. He was respectful and was active listener, paid attention to cues when we did not understand.
Lyne LOttawa
Great facilitator. Kept interest with activities and exercises.
Lynn MOttawa
Mark is very engaging and keeps things interesting during the course.
Adam MToronto
Excellent course. Recommend for people that have done some Scrum and read all the readings. Mark is a great instructor. Among best I've had.
David MEdmonton
Very effective and experienced instructor. Well organized.
Sam MOttawa
Mark was fantastic. Possibly the best, most prepared instructor I've seen. He was awesome.
Colin MToronto
After 24+ years of traditional thinking, this was refreshing and new. Can't wait to begin implementing at work. Thanks, Mark!
Kristine NEdmonton
Mark was an excllent instructor, was able to give clear examples to explain theory.
Samanthi SOttawa
Very knowledgeable instructor that kept the course interesting. Course material was awesome! I will recommend to others.
Dave PToronto
Awesome and objective! Careful not to influence how we work by answering other students.
Shawn MMontreal
Mark Levison was very effective in delivering the material for the class. He kept it interesting and interactive even though this was an online course.
Marie LVirtual
Mark has been a great facilitator, instructor, and extremely knowledgeable on teaching Scrum. Great analogies and references cited.
Wilfred MPrivate Client
Mark did an excellent job. I appreciated the hands-on nature of the training wherein we actually tried to do Scrum. He was patient handling all our questions and issues, and managed to keep us engaged despite being on Zoom.
Dan MVirtual
Excellent, expert, engaging, humourous, I would strongly recommend any course offered by Mark!
Tod MVancouver
Mark is a very approachable and friendly instructor and brings some comic relief to his training sessions. He broke down Scrum/Agile so that it was very easy to follow, and always offered opportunities for the class to ask questions. I felt very supported and encouraged while learning about Scrum/Agile and was never scared to ask a question. I am looking forward to another training opportunity to learn from Mark again!
Dana SVirtual
Very informed, prepared, punctual, and entertaining instructor. Took time to answer all questions, fully and with examples. Took lunch time to discuss specific questons. Course was structured well, with plenty of exercises and additional reading.
Hary MToronto
Mark is great. He speaks loud enough to be understood and knows how to handle a room full of people.
André SPrivate Client
Excellent communicator and educator who encourages students to think through questions. Thorough course material to get student "Ready to Rock"
Sue LToronto
Mark is very knowledgable and an excellent communicator. So far my favourite Agile coach.
Fabricio MOttawa
Greatly impressed by the teaching style and format of the course. Much appreciate the sprint style format and the engagment level of the instructor.
Hatem NOttawa
Mark is incredibly knowledgeable. He has learned through pratice and epierences and knows how to leverage SCRUM effectively.
Travis RPrivate Client
Mark is extremely well informed on the subject matter and made it extremely easy to comprehend. I find his ability to articulate his thoughts and teachings very impressive, and it's easy to see how intelligent he is.
Alexandria SOttawa
Good course, lots of excellent content, examples and materials. Would recommend. Mark is a good facilitator who is honest and understanding about the technical and organizational challenges.
Charles MVirtual
Mark did a great job. I appreciated that a) he was coming from a strong development background and b) had an obvious passion about Scrum and the benefits it could bring to development.
Adam MVirtual
All topics were covered and mastered incredibly well. Could confirm his wide knowledge and experience using and explaining scrum.
Lenin QMontreal
Really helpful and inspiring!
Thomas (Tan) PToronto
As always, Mark is both extremely knowledgable and wildy entertaining for all things scrum.
Jennifer MOttawa
The failure-based models used for learning were effective.
Vince RVirtual
My colleagues and I specifically sign up for Mark's courses because we gain immediate value that we can bring back to our organization and teams.
Christopher SVirtual
Instructor was very engaging and helped me learn a lot and I have a lot of actions to take back to hep the team. I think we learned enough to help the team and guide them effectively as a scrum master.
Ian ROttawa
The course itself is a great introduction to the Scrum Master role. It starts with the fundamentals and advances through a successful balance of instruction and interactive exercises. Our instructor - Mark Levison - is obviously an expert in his field and passionate about the subject. He displayed great skill in getting his message across to his students and also in keeping us interested and involved throughout the three day course.
Sean SVirtual
Mark was great at reorganizing our organizational challenges. He was dynamic and kept me interested the entire time.
Jessica PPrivate Client
Of the three coures I have taken on agile training from different organzations, I found this the most effective because the instructor's understanding and incorporation of humor behavor and learning. Instructor came across as very persceptive and intelligent. Because of my positive impression of him as an intellectual I could value his opinions and teaching more than a "generic" instructor going through the motions.
Shaina SPrivate Client
Mark's use and incorporation of the Agile process as part of the training course was an outstanding working demostration in practice real-time. His energy, knowledge, examples, were excellent.
Paul RPrivate Client
Very nice, friendly and knowledgable. Encouraging of questions and participation. Approachable and making you feel comfortable to get something wrong but grow from it.
Dan SVirtual
This is my second set of training with Mark. I must say he knows how to keep everyone engaged and participating in the hands-on workshops. He has an open-mind, is respectful of our opinions and knowledge space. He is extremely knowledgeable and knows how to instruct in a manner people understand and are able retain the learning. I have yet to see an Agile coach as enthusiastic and as good as Mark !
Tasneem SVirtual
Excellent course! I learned a lot although I reliaze there's a lot to cover but now I have a very good understanding of scrum.
Martin ROttawa
A lot of experience and story to share, that helps put learning in context.
Francois TMontreal
Kept participants engaged. Good.
Lyra TVirtual
Whether you have 0 days or 10 years of product owner experience you're guaranted to learn a lot from this course.
Luke NOttawa
Mark is exceptionally knowledgeable and offered many useful tibits I can better my organization with.
James ROttawa
Great instructor. Good pace at class.
Denis TOttawa
Excellent overview of Scrum/Kanban/Agile. The technical material/theoretical material was well balanced/augments with the personal expeirences of the instructor. Highly recommend.
Dino CPrivate Client

Get Certified

Explore what Scrum is and how to make it work for you in our Scrum Certification training. Hands-on learning will guide you to improve teamwork, deliver quick feedback, and achieve better products and results.

About this course

Focuses on the role of the team and the ScrumMaster. Get the skills and practical experience necessary to improve teamwork, take the exam, and advance your career with a certification that is in high demand today. Often the best fit for anyone new to Scrum.

Learning and Benefits

Relatable Scenarios

Learn on-the-job applications of key Scrum concepts, skills, principles, along with practical solutions that you can apply the next day for difficult, real-life situations.

Respected Certification

Everything you need to earn your Scrum Alliance® ScrumMaster certification, including exam fee and membership, and so much more.

Practical Exercises

With focus on the challenges that real teams face, and tools to dig deeper. You don’t need more boring Scrum theory. You need something you can sink your teeth into to see immediate results.

Jargon-Free Learning

This workshop is not just for software development or people with a computer science degree. We’ve helped many non-software teams with Scrum.

Career Advancement

Use Scrum knowledge to standout at work, get paid more, and impress your customer, all without burning out.

GenAI for Systems Thinking

Learn the basics of using Generative AI as a tool to support Systems Thinking in your ScrumMaster role. Explore how to leverage GenAI to help uncover patterns, and think more deeply about the systems your team operates in.

Ongoing Support

Your learning doesn’t stop when the workshop ends. You get lifetime access to all course materials, plus a followup email series designed to reinforce your learning objectives and help you apply what you’ve learned on the job.