Toptal Projects Blog

The Toptal Projects Blog is a focal point for learning about the current best practices, tricks of the trade, and state of knowledge in Project Management and Agile leadership. These publications are brought to you by the professional project managers and agile professionals in the Toptal network.

authors are vetted experts in their fields and write on topics in which they have demonstrated experience. All of our content is peer reviewed and validated by Toptal experts in the same field.

World-class articles, delivered weekly.

authors are vetted experts in their fields and write on topics in which they have demonstrated experience. All of our content is peer reviewed and validated by Toptal experts in the same field.

What Is a Product Owner? A Project Manager’s Guide

It’s not uncommon for project managers to be assigned duties that should belong to a product owner. Find out how you can use this role confusion to your advantage, and increase your skills in both arenas.

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Elizabeth A. Anderson

Elizabeth is a Certified Scrum Master and Certified Product Owner with more than a decade of experience in Agile project management. She has built and supported a variety of software products, including a complex IoT yacht security monitoring system with hardware, mobile, and web apps, and a mobile e-commerce platform for industrial metals company O’Neal Steel.

You’ve Landed Your Next Scrum Master Job. Now What?

The first days in a new position can be confusing and lead to avoidable mistakes. These Scrum master best practices will help you become the servant-leader your team needs.

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Anna Zakoyan

Anna is an Agile coach, senior Scrum master, trainer, and consultant with 16 years of experience in project and team management. She has helped more than 50 companies, including SGS Digicomply, Krisp, Ucraft, HSBC, Ameriabank, and Joomag, transform how teams collaborate and how work gets done.

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SAFe Case Studies: Transformation Notes From the Field

In the final installment of Toptal’s Agile scaling series, the creator of SAFe, Dean Leffingwell, shares his expertise alongside three case studies from Toptal project managers who discuss the challenges and rewards of implementing an Agile scaling framework.

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Daniel Carroll

Daniel is a Senior Editor for the Toptal Projects and Product Blogs. He has more than 20 years of experience at publications of the University of Chicago Press, Cambridge University Press, and Elsevier.

Agile Scaling: SAFe Best Practices for Scrum Masters

This article is part of Toptal’s Agile scaling series, designed to guide project managers in their team expansion efforts. In this second installment, Toptal Scrum expert Ammar Raafat discusses how Scrum masters moving into the role of release train engineer can help their teams thrive.

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Ammar Raafat Mohamed Bashandy

Ammar is a SAFe release train engineer and Agile program manager at Vodafone Group, where he leads a multidisciplinary agile release train team of 43 engineers, designers, and product managers. He holds 10 current project management certifications—including Advanced Scrum Master, Scrum Product Owner, and SAFe Agilist—and has an MBA from ESLSCA Business School Paris.

5 Agile Scaling Frameworks Compared: Which One Should You Use?

Toptal’s Agile scaling series is designed to guide project managers in their team expansion efforts. In this first installment, project manager Kamil Imański breaks down popular scaling frameworks to help you make the best choice.

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Kamil Imański

Kamil is an Agile project manager and Scrum master with a background in business analysis and change management. He has extensive experience leading teams and implementing Agile scaling practices at international companies, including BAE Systems, which is an FTSE100 company and the largest defense contractor in Europe. He is a certified Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, PMP, and PMI-ACP.

Using Agile Spreadsheets for Discovery Estimation

Estimation tools abound but none is as flexible and accessible as the humble Agile spreadsheet. Here’s why you should consider customizing your own to calculate discovery estimates.

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Mauricio Silva

Mauricio is a seasoned project manager who specializes in software and infrastructure projects. During his 30-year career, he has led complex IT projects at multinational companies including IBM and Kyndryl.

What Is Agile? A Philosophy That Develops Through Practice

Agile’s flexibility is attractive, but its lack of specificity leads teams to misinterpret its applications. Agile expert Umar Ali explains how he helps teams prioritize values over practices.

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Umar Ali

Umar is a project manager, Agile coach, and Scrum master who specializes in leading Agile transformations for organizations and teams. He leverages Agile ways of working to improve software quality and push for process and cultural improvements that allow self-organizing teams—remote, on-site, and offshore—to flourish.

Streamline Jira Workflows With These Best Practices

Jira’s flexibility can make managing projects complicated if your setup isn’t optimized for success. Use these Jira workflow best practices to strengthen the efficiency and clarity of your projects.

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Kelly Provost

Kelly Provost is a business analyst and project manager with more than 20 years of experience leading Agile teams. Her former clients include JPMorgan Chase and IBM, as well as startups and organizations such as BMW Financial Services and the Ohio Department of Commerce.

Is the Citizen Developer the New Face of Agility?

In an era of talent shortages and fast delivery, the low-code market is taking off. Citizen development on a low-code platform may be the solution your organization needs.

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Bryan Bates

Bryan has more than 20 years of experience managing projects in Agile, Waterfall, and hybrid environments. He holds a PMP certification and the Microsoft Power Platform Functional Consultant credential. Bryan uses his low-code expertise to assist new users in the Microsoft Power Apps Community forum.

Tracking the Scrum Master Growth Path

Whether you’re exploring the fundamentals or refining your leadership skills, these recommendations will help you chart a path toward becoming a true transformation expert.

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Anna Zakoyan

Tips for Effective Agile Budgeting and Forecasting

Adaptability is a core pillar of Agile. As such, Agile budget planning needs to be approached with a flexible mindset. These tips can help you deliver projects on budget without sacrificing quality.

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Katie Shevlin

Katie has more than a decade of experience reporting on innovations in business and technology. She has worked on content for brands including McDonald’s, Telstra, and Hewlett Packard, and is Senior Editor of the Toptal Projects and Product Blogs.

Remote Solutions for Effective Agile Retrospectives

Leading effective remote retrospectives can be challenging. These videoconferencing best practices will help you run successful retros whether your teams are remote or in-house.

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Jim Stewart

Jim Stewart is a project expert and certified Agile coach with more than 25 years of experience consulting on and managing projects for companies, including JPMorgan Chase and Fidelity Investments. He has been a PMP and CAPM instructor for more than 12 years.

Stay on Track With These Proven Agile Project Estimation Techniques

Estimation is an important part of Agile project delivery, and there are many ways to weigh and rank the items in a backlog. This comprehensive guide can help you decide which method is best suited to your team and project.

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Jonathan Donado

With more than 15 years of experience as a project leader, Jonathan has led projects for Fortune 100 clients as well as FEMA, the US Army, and the US Department of State. As an Agile professional, he has worked across many industries, including technology, IoT, and BPO.

Agile Transformations: Why Leaders Resist and How to Bring Them on Board

Agile transformations require significant organizational change, which can be unsettling for the C-suite. These tips can help Agile coaches address leaders’ uncertainty and create sustainable agility.

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Andy Deighton

Andy is an Agile expert and Professional Scrum Master who has introduced and implemented Agile practices at Lloyds Bank, National Grid, and others. A former Java web developer for BMW, Andy brings his deep understanding of software development teams to his work as a coach for both startups and multinational companies.

Automate Your Way to Better Project Management

Software automation tools can help project managers streamline tasks that distract from more crucial responsibilities. We took a deep dive into Jira’s automation capabilities and asked Toptal project managers for their thoughts on how to best automate workflow.

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Monica Zaleski

Monica is Lead Editor, Product and Projects, at Toptal and a former editor at the Project Management Institute. She worked in academic and business publishing for more than 15 years on book projects for the University of California Press, as well as on marketing communications projects for Microsoft, SAP, and Synnex. Monica also holds a doctorate in English.

Scrum Master vs. Agile Coach: Why Successful Transformations Need Both

During an Agile transformation, leaders often assume that the Agile coach role can be undertaken by a Scrum master. While they share similar traits, these roles have scopes that differ greatly.

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Tony Amos

Tony is a software engineer turned Agile professional who uses his development experience to guide organizations and teams to success.

Toptal Project Management Expert

Marco De Stefano

Marco started out as a software developer but moved on to more suitable roles—scrum master and Agile project manager—which he’s been successfully occupying for over the past decade. His technical background and business-oriented mindset facilitate effective communication with development teams and with different business stakeholders. Recently in his latest projects, he also works as an Agile coach to foster scrum adoption.