I delivered a webinar called Agile Metrics for Team and Product Progress last week, thanks to the nice folks at Innovation Roots. I had fun and so did many of the participants. One person gave me a new saying about metrics (at the end, during the Q&A): Are you data-driven or data-informed? It’s such a great […]
See Your Agile Delivery Traps Does your team deliver what they want, when they want to? Maybe your team delivers, but depends on another team to deploy. Many teams have trouble delivering the value they so carefully create. Here are three delivery traps I’ve seen in agile teams: The team doesn’t have “done” criteria. The
Sprints, by definition, are a timebox. You’re supposed to say, “Pencils down!” at the end of the sprint, show your work and reflect. One of the big problems with new-to-agile teams is their inability to finish work inside a sprint. Each team is unique. However, I’ve seen these causes most often: Team members multitask, so
See Your Agile Estimation Traps Agile estimation. Nothing seems to bring more fervor to an argument than by pairing the words “agile” and “estimate.” Well, controversy doesn’t bother me. Here are three estimation traps I’ve seen in agile teams: An expert signs up for their own stories, thinking it will help the team’s throughput. Your
Ryan Ripley interviewed me on his podcast, Agile for Humans 83 about Create Your Successful Agile Project. We had a blast. I didn’t stint on my opinions or on my experience with agile teams. One of those opinions was about teambuilding, which I wrote about in Creating an Environment of Teamwork. The other opinion (based on
I had a great time recording with two of the guys from the Agile Uprising Podcast. See Create Your Successful Agile Project with Johanna Rothman. We discussed the book. I had an opportunity to rant and rave about many things: agile project managers (no, the term is not an oxymoron) a little about why the
Tom Cagley interviewed me for his Software Process and Measurement Cast (podcast) a couple of weeks ago and the podcast is live. See SPaMCAST 468 – Johanna Rothman, Create Your Successful Agile Project. We had a blast. I ranted and raved (as I am wont to do) and had a great time discussing some of
See Your Agile Collaboration Traps In honor of the impending Create Your Successful Agile Project book release, I decided to send you a four-part series about agile traps. Yes, one for each piece of the subtitle. This one is the collaboration trap. Here are three common collaboration traps: Your team is a component team. (The
Do you struggle with your agile approach? Sometimes, iterations don’t work for teams. Sometimes, flow doesn’t work. Sometimes, you need both. To celebrate the release of Create Your Successful Agile Project: Collaborate, Measure, Estimate, Deliver, I am writing a series of articles on Infoq. The first article, Customize Your Agile Approach: Select Your Agile Approach That Fits
Yegor Bugayenko asked me to be a guest on his podcast to talk about Hiring Geeks That Fit. I gladly accepted and the podcast is now up: Shift-M/10. We spoke about many issues in hiring: Laundry list/shopping list problem in job descriptions Starting with a “test” or a phone screen (I need to write a post