Is it possible to balance the product innovation and feedback we need, with the commitment our management wants? Maybe. I tried to show my thinking for these questions in this series: When does it make sense to ask for or offer estimation and commitments? When does it make sense to ask for more feedback instead?
What if you don’t need to experiment to reduce risks? You may have technical risks in terms of getting it “all” done. Especially for a given release date. In that case, you have a low need for product innovation. Your planning feedback loops can be longer. I’ve seen this occur in some of these circumstances: A
What if you can plan for a few weeks or even a month-plus at a time? You don’t need the extremely short feedback cycles (hours to a day) because you’re not doing high innovation. You don’t need to change what the team does every few days. You can estimate and commit to maybe a month’s
I’ve met a number of agile coaches recently. They tell me they’re hired as Scrum coaches or as Scrum Masters. They see their job as “better Scrum.” It would be lovely if that was their one and only job. However, many of these coaches work in organizations just starting a cultural transformation. Even though the
Cliff, an IT Director, was concerned. One of the projects was a mess. It didn’t seem to matter how much or how little the team had for requirements. The team never seemed to release enough on time. Cliff had only been with the organization for four weeks. Yet, that team seemed to have more trouble
A couple of weeks ago, I delivered the first version of my Free Your Agile Team talk at Agile New England. Here’s a direct link to the video. I spoke about the problem of a framework-first approach to transforming to an agile culture. I also spoke about the plethora of team-based coaches and the insufficiency of management coaching. (I
One of the big problems I see with a product orientation (as opposed to a project) is in preparing for ongoing work. You might not start the next project for this product after you complete this project. You might have to round-robin projects for various products because you don’t have enough people to do all
I recorded a Being Human podcast with Richard Atherton. It’s wide-ranging from thinking about agile approaches as a way to improve organizational flow and what that means for us as humans. I had a blast. I think Richard did, too. He’s a think-before-he-speaks person, and if you watch the video, you can see him thinking.
When I teach any sort of product/project/portfolio management, I ask, “Who believes multitasking works?” Always, at least several managers raise their hands. They believe multitasking works because they multitask all the time. Why? Because the managers have short work-time and long decision-wait time. If you are a manager, your time for any given decision looks
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.