Free Scrum eBooks for your Agile learning

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

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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.

Five Steps for Creating High-Performance Teams

Scrum is a tool for building high-performance teams. Some Scrum Teams achieve this goal almost by magic, while others struggle to get there. So is it magic? Or luck? Or is it far more attainable than that? There is a science to it that makes it possible.

Mark Levison offers insight into the neuroscience of teams with five proven Agile methods to create teams that sizzle, not fizzle.

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.

Beyond Scrum: Why Scrum Alone is Not Enough

To be successful with Scrum in the long term you need more than the basic framework. This is intentional. Scrum provides the structure as a starting point, but it’s designed to work well when applied with other effective patterns.

Mark Levison’s first book discusses topics including why organizations become Agile, the limits of Scrum, common mistakes made and how to avoid resulting failure, and the benefit of exploring other Agile practices.

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.

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Tons of material to get through, Mark did well with the contextual questions from our organization.
Brendan BPrivate Client
This course is valuable to anyone who would like to be introduced to Scrum. It was a well spended 2 day course and was very helpful. Mark is very knowledgeable and a very good coach.
Ronald HOttawa
Great job! You did a great job or engaging us and encouraging participation. I feel inspired to better my team and organization using the knowledge I gained.
Michael DToronto
Mark clearly presents the scrum process and principles. He provides background information and stories to reinforce these techniques.
Richard COttawa
I was impressed. The most valuable thing was not the principles (already knew most intellectually) but the instructor's zen master answers to challnges/questions. This aided in more intutive knowledge.
David AEdmonton
Instructor was very engaging, but also shared valuable insight that will help me succeed.
Morgan TPrivate Client
A good introduction about scrum, roles of PO, SM and team. Opened up my thoughts on how it could be applied/practiced effectively and efficiently to build a good team.
Rajesh MOttawa
Thumbs up! Easy to follow. Engaging and thought provoking.
Neil OPrivate Client
Excellent. Taught and gave a great understanding of Scrum.
Cameron MEdmonton
Excellent instructor provided engaging activites to help roleplay learning and provoke meaningful discussions.
Alice PEdmonton
Came into the course with basic practice and limited knowledge of theory. Mark has deep knowledge and experience of the material that is easily shared, conveyed, and put into practical settings /analogies. I appreciated the effort of setting a team working agreement during the course, how we communicated /voted throughout the course, and the respected timeframe granted to teach us the material. Many thanks Mark for sharing your time, knowledge, and humour with us. It was very interesting, albeit an intense 2 days of information. Not an easy feat in a virtual setting. Also, many thanks for the many links provided to learn further on our own time. The course material is large and wide. This was perfect to learn basic theory in practice. Further knowledge, training and experience is required to fully capture and understand the depth of SCRUM and Agile.
Chantal MVirtual
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
Instructor was engaging, kept the interest of the class. Nice material, I really like how we got into Scrum framework right away by using the backlog analogy for the course topics.
Cecilia OOttawa
Mark is a great instructor! He is knowledgeable and has experience, so he knows what he is talking about! Highly suggest his course!
Anthony MVirtual
Mark was excellent - one of the best instructors I have had. Well prepared, knowledgable, and he obviously cares.
David OEdmonton
Lively, hands on, enlightening. Would recommend.
Allen NEdmonton
Mark was great! He kept the room energized and very engaged. His passion and pexereince were very evident. Class materials were very helpful! Great focus on how to drive results.
Aaron MPrivate Client
Very engaging instructor. Used many real-life examples.
Laura OPrivate Client
It is very well organized and timed. The teacher has a really deep, hands-on knowledge about the subject.
Alberto MPrivate Client
I enjoyed having Mark as an instructor, he is knowledgeable on the topic, provided easy to follow examples, and has a good sense of humour. I liked how he took notes on questions people had, provided a brief answer and then provided links after the workshop so that we could follow up on the topics that interest us. The 10 min sanity breaks that he gave every hour were great as it allowed my brain to relax and then come back and focus. I really enjoyed the course, I learned lots over the 2 day workshop. I feel like 2 days might be a bit short for the course as I would have enjoyed another day of the course to learn more and refine my skills. I would recommend this course to anyone new to the scrum master role or interested in learning about scrum as it gives you a great base that you can expand.
Christopher MVirtual
Mark was intensely knowledgeable, humorous, and a bit off-beat. Initially I was skeptical of his abilites to engage the totality of the group but as the course progressed he appeared to fully succeed.
David OEdmonton
The course is great and Mark is amazing. I really impressed with his high level of knoweledge, his personal skills. I enjoyed the level how he conducted the training. The level structured and time-planned sessions. I enjoyed the way how and what Mark answered unpredictable questions. He is great facilitator. Thanks a lot for opportunity to expand my knoweledge.
Anna MVirtual
I have appreciated using the scrum to the training course itself.
Ionut MMontreal
Well presented - effective - open to discussion - provides information that shows us better methods and resources for self learning.
Bedros NMontreal
Mark is terrific at carrying a dialog on agile and his humor and humility make the class fun.
David MVirtual
Great instructor. Lots of good feedack throughout the session that was meaningful.
Petula NToronto
Mark thanks for sharing your knowledge. I truly enjoyed your course. You have a great teaching ability.
Anaya MOttawa
Very knowledgeable and great communication skills to explain complex concepts in simple ways.
Ricard MToronto
Mark was great! He's very knowledgeable and his understand of SCRUM is deep and polished. I enjoyed the product owner course.
Joe OEdmonton
Great job Mark! Training was excellent. I now know what REAL scrum is and feel equipped to continue learning and practicing true scrum principles.
Cornelus MVirtual
Mark presented very well. Class well organized. Liked the zoo activity and actually applying the scrum guidleines to a sprint.
Laurel PEdmonton
Mark was awesome, very enthusiastic about the subject and more importantly was very knowledgeableabout Scrum Master role and Scrum.
David OPrivate Client
I found Mark to be engaged, upbeat, and very knowledgeable.
Peter LPrivate Client
Mark was great. I appreciated his directness.
James POttawa
Excellent instructor providing clear explanations. The course structure is flawless.
Benoit NMontreal
Mark inspires you to make yourself better in the roles which makes your workplace better. I wish he could come to my place of employ to get us setup to succeed. Might have to look into that.
Jackie MEdmonton
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 was a great commincator of the concepts. He practiced what he preached by using SCRUM to team.
Darren MMontreal
Excellent. Well worth money and time.
David MOttawa
Awesome and objective! Careful not to influence how we work by answering other students.
Shawn MMontreal
Fantastic overview of everything PO, Agile, Scrum. Learning how to manage and maintain a collaborative product backlog will be so valuable.
Elizabeth MPrivate Client
Mark did a great job of keeping the class engaged and deployed many useful techniques to get the course material across.
Tharaneesan NPrivate Client
The course material is great and the way Mark presents it is very clear. Mark augments the material with real-world scrum experience across many components/orgs.
Scott NOttawa
The teach went further to clarify question and add valuable information from other Agile methodology.
Marco SMontreal
Mark was great at reorganizing our organizational challenges. He was dynamic and kept me interested the entire time.
Jessica PPrivate Client
Great agenda, engaging instructor, relevant examples and exercises. 10/10 rating
Ed AVancouver
This is one of the best courses I took. I liked the 'hands on' scrum technique. I liked the open discussions and how the instructor motivated people and kept them engaged.
Magda SOttawa
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'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
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

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.

Registration is now open for workshops:

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.