Bill popped his head into Jan’s office as he was leaving for the evening. “Jan, do you have a minute? I have to do performance reviews tonight. I was going to drink Scotch and work my way through all of them.” Jan laughed and said, “Sure. Scotch might make you feel good, but it will […]
Sharon poked her head into Heath’s cubicle. “Hey, Heath, are you done yet with that fix?” Heath turned around. “Sharon, you asked me that less than an hour ago. I’m not done yet.” “Well, I need to know when you will be done. Oh, and I need to know if you’re using the design we
Three Tips for Becoming a Servant Leader You and I both know that we’re not supposed to boss people around anymore, that we’re supposed to be servant leaders. Well, a client asked me, “What the heck is servant leadership?” When you’re a traditional manager, you might have thought of accumulating people and power. If you
I had a great conversation last week with someone taking a leadership course. (Not one of my courses. His instructor wouldn’t talk to him!! He’d seen one of my posts and emailed me. Of course I talked with him.) He was confused by the word “Handoff.” He thought it meant that people hadn’t done their
I just read Scott Berkun’s The Year Without Pants: WordPress.com and the Future of Work. For me, it was a mixed read. Yes, you can make a totally distributed team work. What you need to do: Make all of the work visible Keep everyone focused on one project at a time Keep all of the
Do you want to immortalize your agile team? Would you like to contribute to the research about how agile teams collaborate? If so, have I got a deal for you. My friend and colleague, David Socha, a professor at the University of Washington, in the Seattle area is writing a grant for the NSF to
There are two sides of this conversation about telecommuting: the employee side and the management side. I hope you stick around for both sides. You can yell at me at the end. Employees: You Owe the Company a Full Day of Work I’ve been thinking since Marissa Meyer’s announcement what I would say about the
Tom Cagley interviewed me a few weeks ago on his Software Process and Measurement Cast. It’s posted now, as # 180. When Tom interviews me, he makes me think. This is good. I would love to hear your comments about this one. We started with transparency and wove our way around to several topics. I
Vol 8, #8: Three Myths and Three Tips I have been fortunate this year to be working and speaking internationally. And, almost everywhere I go, some manager or project manager takes me aside. “Johanna, can I ask you a crazy question?” I always answer that I’m sure the question is not crazy. The manager shakes
Matthias Bohlen interviewed me as part of the preparation for the OOP conference. We spoke on a wide range of topics, not just my talk which is “Six Behaviors to Consider When Hiring for an Agile Team.” We spoke briefly about program management, which is why I’m leading my influence tutorial. Hear the entire podcast