Several of my clients are trying to do the impossible right now—plan their portfolio for an entire year. Or plan their product backlogs for eighteen months or longer. When I ask them how well that’s worked for them in the past, they often say, “Our planning works great. Our execution? Not so well.” That’s my […]
Ever since I was on the Troubleshooting Agile podcast, I’ve followed Squirrel and Jeffrey. (I highly recommend their podcast.) Recently, Squirrel posted something fascinating on LinkedIn: Aim for a “single source of lies” about your business. That’s quite a provocative idea, especially when many of us persist in looking for a “single source of truth.”
If you read this blog or my newsletter, you know I enjoy both nonfiction and fiction writing. I have another short story as part of the 2023 Holiday Spectacular: Underdog Party. The week is over. Please see the WMG Holiday Spectacular 2023 project for all the other stories and to buy the books when they
My 60 seconds of WIP. Yes, I fully expect to cycle on this opening. Or, it will be in a different part of the story. I often realize where this chunk goes after I start to write. (Fiction or nonfiction.) The transcript: I’m Johanna Rothman, and this is 60 Seconds of Johanna’s WIP for December
A French writer bought Free Your Inner Nonfiction Writer and wasn’t sure what I meant by a “fieldstone.” He couldn’t find a translation that made sense to him. In Weinberg on Writing, Jerry explained fieldstones as a way to build a piece of writing, just like masons used blocks to build stone walls. The more
If you read this blog or my newsletter, you know I enjoy both nonfiction and fiction writing. I have a short story as part of the 2023 Holiday Spectacular: A Dreidel Ball Miracle. Copyright © 2023 by Johanna Rothman The week is over, so the only way to see this story now is to participate
This week’s WIP is a holiday romance short story. (With any luck.) The transcript: I’m Johanna Rothman, and this is 60 Seconds of Johanna’s WIP for December 7, 2023, where I read an excerpt of just a minute of some writing in progress. This excerpt is from a feel-good holiday short story. The late November
In How Centralization Decisions Create Friction, Increase Cycle Time, and Cost Money, Part 1, I discussed how removing support staff for departments and managers created longer cycle times. (And sometimes, increased friction so much that people could not easily do their jobs.) Removing those support staff was one indication the companies fell into the Economies
In the first post, How Centralization Decisions Create Friction, Increase Cycle Time, and Cost Money, Part 1, I explained how centralizing even relatively small decisions to centralize has high costs. Why do organizations centralize? To supposedly capitalize on “economies of scale.” That’s the problem of understanding the cost of work—but not the value of that
Yes, you might remember this character from a previous week. I don’t just cycle on my nonfiction. I also cycle on my fiction. The transcript: I’m Johanna Rothman, and this is 60 Seconds of Johanna’s WIP for November 30, 2023, where I read an excerpt of just a minute of some writing in progress.