Johanna Rothman, Management Consultant
Expert in Managing Product Development
Secrets to Catch Yourself Mind-Reading The more remote we are, the easier it is for us to assume we know what other people think. I call that mind-reading. I am not clairvoyant—not even with my husband. (We both would like a little clairvoyance, at times!) The more mind-reading we do, the more likely we will …
Three Predictions About the Future of Remote Work We’re now several months into our dispersed work “routines.” (I suspect that anyone with a child at home would love to have a real routine.) And, as I work with my clients, I’ve learned several fascinating details: Many teams are much more effective now. Teams that can’t …
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How to Manage by “Walking Around” When You’re Remote If you’re like me, you learned a lot by walking around and listening when you were in the office. I saw and heard the state of the various teams. I could see in-progress work. I could see and hear how the team members treated each other. …
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Three Tips to Move from Agile in Name Only to Real Agility Several of you have written to me, asking about the problems you see. Your managers focus on certifications, practices, and vanity metrics—not real agility. The managers don’t understand how agility can help them. You see cargo cult agile. You worry that agility is …
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What Happened to the Beautiful Plans? (They Became Experiments) Tim, a senior manager, loved seeing plans for work and roadmaps. Then, the organization decided to Embrace, Not Manage Change. Tim wasn’t sure how to track the work. This image helps me frame the need for an agile approach. (See the blog series: Where I Think “Agile” is …
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Lead Your Team’s Transparency and Pervasive Communication Kelly, a manager who served two geographically distributed teams, was concerned. Both teams worked on the Data and Reports module for the product. While the first team worked as fast as they could, the organization wanted features faster. Kelly had advocated for another team to join the first team. The organization assigned another …
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Want a Successful Agile Transformation? Invite Managers Many people start their agile transformation with teams. That’s great, and it’s not enough to build and maintain an agile transformation—to change the culture. Too often, your agile approaches stall or create dysfunctions for the people and teams. If you want a successful agile transformation, invite the managers. …
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The Manager’s Role in Creating Effective Teams, Part 3 Is it a manager’s job to search through haystacks to find people who can become part of a jelled team? Not really. If you know you have an unjeller, the manager’s job is to prevent that person from being on a team you hope will jell. …
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Productive Vs. Busy I received some fascinating responses to Do You Want More Productivity? One correspondent told me that managers need to move people—especially testers—from one project where they are not busy to another project where they could help. His experience matches mine—many projects do not have enough testers. However, we do not share the …
Do You Want More Productivity? A senior manager asked me, “How do I get more productivity out of my people? We have cross-functional teams. Each team has their expertise. I just feel as if the teams could do more.” I asked, “What kind of expertise? Is it expertise as a team or are people experts …