The Burn Up - Agile Software Delivery

In this episode Michael and I talk about the regulations that protect Chinese networks and information systems. Two closely connected subsystems of China's cybersecurity regime aim directly at maintaining security in these areas: critical information infrastructure (CII) and multi-level protection. - Michael D Frick holds a doctorate in Business Economics and a master's in Modern Sinology. He works as consultant advising businesses on Chinese regulatory aspects. You can find out more about his book “Chinese Industry 4.0” at: https://sinopeerpress.com/ The book is available as ebook and in print format at Apple or Amazon. Michael can be contacted via Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michael-frick-16853a1b or via email mailto:info@sinopeer.com – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast was produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this 5 minute conversation which is part of our ongoing discussion of the Chinese Cyber Security Regime, Dr Michael D Frick I discuss China's attitude towards intellectual property. We discuss that lax IP protection in China is not only a concern for Western companies, that Chinese companies are registering huge amounts of patents, and that while IP protection has found its way into Chinese regulations, enforcement is still very lax. Michale also raises the point that around 80% of blockchain related patents are Chinese (quality notwithstanding) and that within this category many are related to cybersecurity. Ultimately Michael advises that, at least for now, a business model based heavily on IP protection is possibly not the right one for the Chinese market, as opposed to one, say, based on continuous innovation or other forms of differentiation... Michael D Frick holds a doctorate in Business Economics and a master's in Modern Sinology. He works as consultant advising businesses on Chinese regulatory aspects. You can find out more about his book “Chinese Industry 4.0” at: https://sinopeerpress.com/ The book is available as ebook and in print format at Apple or Amazon. Michael can be contacted via Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michael-frick-16853a1b or via email mailto:info@sinopeer.com – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast was produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this podcast episode Dr Michael Frick, author of “Chinese Industry 4.0 Designing high-tech solutions under the cybersecurity regime of the People's Republic of China” and I talk about Online Content Management - censorship - which is the bedrock of the Chinese Cybersecurity Regime. We discuss the Chinese approach to censorship and how it differs from the Western stance on what and how information can be presented and shared online, and why this different approach makes sense from Chinese perspective. We discuss what it means for organisations who want to do business in China, how censorship in China is governed, and the mechanisms through which it is enacted and enforced and what it means when you ‘mess up'. We talk about the fact that only 2% of Chinese internet users use censorship evasion tools and the Chinese netizens' stance to censorship. We conclude by explaining that for the Chinese government all it comes down to is: first preserving and expanding power, second economic development. Also that for organisations who want to operate China there is no half way house, but only the decision between whether to not enter the market at all or fully comply: every organisation will have to make this decision in light of their mission and values. _ Background info The 3 T's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre https://www.amnesty.org.uk/china-1989-tiananmen-square-protests-demonstration-massacre https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeFzeNAHEhU https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan#Political_and_legal_status https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_independence_movement Eye roll incident https://makeagif.com/i/uDC3dz https://www.ifj.org/es/centro-de-medios/noticias/detalle/category/press-releases/article/china-two-journalists-lose-peoples-congress-accreditation-over-eye-roll.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBbv1E2wTt8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUKbt2wKfK8 _ Michael D Frick holds a doctorate in Business Economics and a master's in Modern Sinology. He works as consultant advising businesses on Chinese regulatory aspects. You can find out more about his book “Chinese Industry 4.0” at: https://sinopeerpress.com/ The book is available as ebook and in print format at Apple or Amazon. Michael can be contacted via Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michael-frick-16853a1b or via email mailto:info@sinopeer.com – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast was produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this 5 minute piece Dr Michael D Frick, author of “Chinese Industry 4.0 Designing high-tech solutions under the cybersecurity regime of the People's Republic of China” and I talk about China's difficult relationship with Github: on one hand, the intrinsic nature of open source code shared via Github - let alone the fact that Ghithub allows all sorts of other information to be shared - can easily undermine the Online Content Management (read ‘censorship') policies which are part of China's Cybersecurity regime, while on the other hand, access to standard libraries and the ability to collaborate on software projects is a key enabler - arguably a necessity - for most software development. Github: https://github.com/ _ Michael D Frick holds a doctorate in Business Economics and a master's in Modern Sinology. He works as consultant advising businesses on Chinese regulatory aspects. You can find out more about his book “Chinese Industry 4.0” at: https://sinopeerpress.com/ The book is available as ebook and in print format at Apple or Amazon. Michael can be contacted via Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michael-frick-16853a1b or via email mailto:info@sinopeer.com – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast was produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode software craftsman Luke Elliott and I discuss what makes great software engineering, excellent software engineers and effective teams… We argue that understanding and delivering value is really all good software engineering is about. And that engineers understanding the customer is possibly the biggest difference between organisations who deliver value and those whose don't; and that this is best achieved by combining people who deeply understand the customers like product owners with engineers who deeply care (about value and consequently the customer). We discuss what makes high performing teams, and touch on the challenge of hiring great engineers. We make a detour chatting about the importance of TDD and Pair Programming and whether they are a cult, and why some love and some hate these practices, but why, ultimately XP practices like these ultimately the ability to deliver value at pace, reliably and sustainably. We briefly rant about TLAs and why one should always clarify acronyms (or rather not have them in the first place) and what it means, if a team doesn't feel sufficiently safe to ask questions (and what one can do to build the needed psychological safety). We close by discussing that the art of architecture is knowing what to do now and what to defer, why David Knuth is right in saying that ‘premature performance optimisation is the root of all evil' and what this means for startup who are in bootstrapping mode and must avoid overly early gold-plating and over-engineering while not impeding future scaling. … Luke is a software craftsman with deep experience in lean and agile software development. He believes that great software is crafted by great teams, and that building great teams is challenging and rewarding work. He has lead successful teams across public and private sector, bluechips and startups, in diverse industries including finance, healthcare and energy. He is a keen proponent of lean and agile approaches, XP and believes in CI/CD, fast feedback loops, outcome over output, and product thinking. He avoids big design up front, command-and-control management, and blame cultures. He is currently Director of Engineering at OakNorth Bank. Luke is currently hiring software engineers of all stripes and if you are interested in working like Luke describes, contact him at luke.elliott@oaknorth.co.uk. He can be contacted via revlucio@gmail.com or Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lukeelliott/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode I chat with AlmostAnyHow's Nathan Ardaiz about nurturing micro-moments to improve human interactions and consequently we live and work together. Specifically how micro-moments in our relationships determine the quality of our interactions and how this affects wellbeing, autonomy and resilience of individuals and ultimately teams and organisations. We start a bit ‘dark' by talking about death - and dying well - and what trauma means for the personas we adopt as we go through our daily lives… We discuss anger, anxiety and shame when interacting with colleagues, what it means to truly listen and to understand that it's really ‘about us' not ‘them'. We draw parallels to code- and relationship-debt and how short feedback loops not only make successful products and services but are the basis for good interactions, concluding that “Cultures and teams that reflect and learn - those more trusting, connected, happier, adaptive, understanding and collectively owned - innovate and perform better.” We discuss why nurturing micro-moments can only be grounded in shared values and a collective vision and what individuals, teams and organisations can do to improve their interactions. The people, books and resources we mention in our chat are Frank Ostaseski: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1019512.Frank_Ostaseski Howard Zinn: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Zinn High performing teams at google: https://rework.withgoogle.com/blog/five-keys-to-a-successful-google-team/ Jiddu Krishnamurti: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiddu_Krishnamurti Kim Scott, Radical Candor: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29939161-radical-candor Marshall B. Rosenberg, Non Violent Communication: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71730.Nonviolent_Communication Nathan is founder and director of AlmostAnyHow, a consultancy focused on facilitation and coaching. AlmostAnyHow nurture the tools and the power to truly hear and understand, speak truths, and move forward toward a better collective future. He can be contacted via email: nathanardaiz@gmail.com or via AlmostAnyHow: https://almostanyhow.com/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode I chat with Tom Grogan, CEO of Mishcon de Reya's MdRxTech, a software consultancy and incubator with a legal edge. We discuss why building legal compliance into the product development lifecycle is ever more important in a Web3.0 world and how this can be achieved within lean and agile design and delivery approaches. We will touch on Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain and Smartcontracts and why including legal considerations early and throughout for products or services built on top of such solutions is imperative. We chat about the shift from consumption to creation to ownership that led to Web3.0, and how true realisation of the potential of the ‘Metaverse' - and maybe more drastically quantum technology once it arrives - will change our understanding of ‘property' and ‘ownership' and might ultimately redefine the world. Tom is Chief Executive Officer of MDRxTech. He is a qualified lawyer and has a deep understanding of a wide range of emerging technologies including artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and blockchain (and other DLTs). He has experience advising public and private sector clients on the design, development and delivery of their technology strategies and solutions. He can be contacted here: tom.grogan@mdrx.tech or via MdRxTech: https://mdrx.tech/ Mischcon de Reya: https://www.mishcon.com/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Join Dr. Michael D Frick and I to the first episode of our series about China's Cybersecurity Regime, following the recent publication of Michael's book “Chinese Industry 4.0 Designing high-tech solutions under the cybersecurity regime of the People's Republic of China'. In this first episode we'll touch on what China's cybersecurity regime is, what it means for anyone doing business in or with China, and how to navigate it. In future episodes we'll get into some of its components in more detail… Michael D Frick holds a doctorate in Business Economics and a master's in Modern Sinology. He works as consultant advising businesses on Chinese regulatory aspects. You can find out more about his book “Chinese Industry 4.0” at: https://sinopeerpress.com/ The book is available as ebook and in print format at Apple or Amazon. Michael can be contacted via Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michael-frick-16853a1b or via email mailto:info@sinopeer.com – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast was produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Lyndsay Prewer and I talk about how Chaos Engineering can help improve an organisation's resilience. We'll talk about why deliberately messing up a system from time to time is a good thing… We'll discuss what Chaos Days are, their benefits and how to run them… Lyndsay Prewer has an excellent talk about Chaos Days https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLRkCAqftb4 and has co-written a freely available playbook about Chaos Engineering with colleagues from Equal Experts: https://www.equalexperts.com/playbooks/ Lyndsay can be contacted here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lyndsp/ —------------ Subscribe to the podcast at: http://theburnup.com/ Read Marcel's Blog at www.thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk or at www.beautifulabstraction.com Email us: podcasts@burnupmedia.com This podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

This episode is a follow-on from our previous episode about the Apollo space program. Marcel and Todd talk about the failures surrounding the Challenger Disaster as a cautionary tail for today's leaders to consider to avoid the same pitfalls. Please listen to “The Challenger Disaster: You're wrong about - The Challenger Disaster” - 3rd Jan 2019 by Sarah Marshall and Michael Hobbes for full context: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-challenger-disaster/id1380008439?i=1000465289942 Please also listen to our previous podcast about the Apollo program as this is a follow-on discussion: https://burnupmedia.com/2020/04/13/ep23-learnings-from-the-space-industry-part-1of2-apollo-11/ The following topics are covered: - The impact the challenger disaster had on NASA and our recollection of events - The findings of the rogers commission - Importance of listening to expertise - Preventing a silo effect, where the procedures put in place box in taking logical action - Designing for safety and understanding safe parameters, risk and probability - The importance of communication unfiltered by middle managers - Findings of the house of representatives committee report - Dian Vaughn's (sociologist) 1996 analysis of the disaster - Government contracting and its role in the disaster - High turnover at NASA and its role in the disaster - A discussion about SpaceX and how they are approaching spaceship development is a more Agile way We hope you enjoy this episode. As always please feel free to give us feedback and share. Show Notes The Challenger Disaster: You're wrong about - The Challenger Disaster - 3rd Jan 2019 by Sarah Marshall and Michael Hobbes https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-challenger-disaster/id1380008439?i=1000465289942 Challenger Disaster footage with radio loop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hqOdAi_t2c Radio communication transcript: https://history.nasa.gov/transcript.html Rogers Commission report https://history.nasa.gov/rogersrep/genindex.htm https://spaceflight.nasa.gov/outreach/SignificantIncidents/assets/rogers_commission_report.pdf Richard Feynman at commission hearing demonstrates the o-ring issues: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raMmRKGkGD4 House of representatives report https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-CRPT-99hrpt1016/pdf/GPO-CRPT-99hrpt1016.pdf Controversial Edward Tuft diagram analysis https://www.researchgate.net/publication/11520001_Representation_and_Misrepresentation_Tufte_and_the_Morton_Thiokol_Engineers_on_the_Challenger Dian Vaughn's (sociologist) 1996 analysis of all 200k documents (by then the incident is a full fledged field of research, most based only on the exec summaries) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diane_Vaughan – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode Marcel and Todd talk about management lessons learned during the Apollo era space program and how they can still apply in today's management environment. Please listen to “Management Lessons of the Moon” by Andrew Chaikin YouTube video for full context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaskWhy5pYE The following topics are covered: - The legacy of the Apollo era management - The importance of a clear goal from the top - Having sufficient resources to achieve your goals - Using a Systems thinking approach - Configuration management - Ensuring optimum solutions can win - Designing for simplicity and redundancy - Testing under realistic conditions - The importance of what-if thinking and mentality - Team accountability and trust - Luck We hope you enjoyed this episode. As always please feel free to give us feedback and share. Show Notes Discussion on Apollo 11: Management Lessons of the Moon by Andrew Chaikin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaskWhy5pYE The Challenger Disaster: You're wrong about - The Challenger Disaster - 3rd Jan 2019 by Sarah Marshall and Michael Hobbes https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-challenger-disaster/id1380008439?i=1000465289942 Other, material of interest Apollo 1 fire radio transmission (be warned, it's not a comfortable file to listen to): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=274lQSbpkRg Highly Recommended! Epic Apollo 11 documentary made solely of original material on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/81078076 – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

We strongly believe that organisations with a successful future are those that embrace remote working practices. Not only does this address some of the challenges posed by the current Covid-19 crisis, but overall, allows organisations tap into a wider talent pool, work with a wider client base and most importantly make for better work life balance. In this episode we discuss remote interviewing with 5 super interesting guests…. We have recently co-written a blog-post on remote interviewing and my business partners at Equal Experts have extensively discussed remote working practices in their free remote working playbook. But writing about it, is one thing, hearing it from the horse's mouth is different altogether. In this Burn Up Episode, we chat with 5 guests, all with extensive experience in remote interviewing. We talk about whether remote interviewing works, whether it's a stop-gap measure or there to stay, and how to be successful at it, as interviewer and candidate alike. Our Guests We've got an excellent cast of guests on this episode. Please feel free to get in touch with any of them if you are looking for an engagement, want to know more about remote working, work with an organisation that is interested in improving their remote working practices or simply want to say hello… In this episode you'll meet; Becky Smith (https://www.linkedin.com/in/beckysmith2/) recruiter and people manager, and Neha Datt who works as product consultant, has co-written the remote working playbook (https://remote-working.playbook.ee/) and runs a webinar on remote working best practices. She can best be reached via her company Mercurial Phoenix (https://mercp.com/) or via twitter @oliphantism. You will also hear from Nuno Sillva Peirera (https://www.linkedin.com/in/nunosilvapereira/) who works as a Delivery Lead in Portugal and with whom we have remote interviewed many times. Nuno blogs, tweets @nunoaspereira, xxx and has recently released a Metal Album (https://open.spotify.com/artist/5VmHEyh21vclFmhysESorO?si=QXEkfIfARWW34_sObmMVwg) which we highly recommend you check out. Nuno also has a most excellent youtube video on remote working (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q5PpYdpxzc). We also speak with Werner Smit (https://www.linkedin.com/in/werner-smit-16203533/) who is a Delivery Lead in South Africa and has extensive experience working across country boundaries, Rajesh Kumar Thiagaran (https://www.linkedin.com/in/rajeshthiagarajan/) who is a Product Consultant in Pune, India, with experience in the recruitment industry and with whom we have recently run a major multi-day remote training session across London, Bangalore and Pune. And of course, there is also Dave Hewett (https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-hewett-b97609/) whom you'll have met in Episode 8. Dave has a keen interest in team working practices (remote or other) and has been instrumental in making the remote (and other) playbooks happen.  If you want to work with Equal Experts you can get in touch with them via their website (https://www.equalexperts.com/join-us/) or any of us via linkedin or any other channel. Things you may want to check out: https://www.equalexperts.com/blog/our-thinking/new-to-running-interviews-remotely-this-is-how-we-are-doing-it/ https://remote-working.playbook.ee/ Interested in more Agile thinking, want to get in touch, share thoughts, collaborate with us in an episode or work with us? – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode Swathi Poddar - who you'll know from last season — and I catch up on Lean Inceptions. As you know we have written the Inception Playbook which is a quite chunky piece, providing in-depth guidance on how to kick off projects well and set initiatives up for success. While this is still very helpful, we found that the more experienced teams are looking for something a bit more light-weight, to incept not major initiatives, but smaller projects, feature delivery or additional workstreams. In fact, these days we are running more and more super short, highly focused Inceptions that may be as short as 2–3 days, or only 3–4 hours, even… In this episode we discuss when such Lean Inceptions are valuable and feasible and talk through the mechanics of running them. You may want to view this diagram https://miro.medium.com/max/5000/1*NIAb5Xkd-8woskn0DHv4DA.png while listening to this podcast. Show Notes You can find Swathi here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-poddar/ More information on Lean Inceptions: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/lightweight-inceptions-82bb8bd8932b Free Inception Playbook Download: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/inception-playbook-1-0-e1e7e12512db Free Core Tools Playbook Download: https://burnupmedia.com/playbooks/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode we introduce our new Core Tools Playbook and how these tools can help a team work more effectively and achieve better outcomes easier. TheThe Core Tools Playbook is a collection of the tools a team can use during kick-off of an initiative or at any point initiative delivery. In fact, some tools are so versatile they can be used outside of initiative or even IT context. This playbook introduces 18 tools, explains their benefit and when to use them, and provides step by step instructions on how to use them as well as supporting templates and examples. The Core Tools Playbook covers tools such as Affinity Mapping, Story mapping, Context Modelling, Wardley Maps, and many others… The Core Tools Inception Playbook (free download): https://burnupmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/InceptionPlaybook-InteractivePages-v2.1.pdf – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode Todd talks about the practicalities of Risk/Issue Management, including what risks and issues are, how to gather them, how to log them and how to review them. The following topics are covered: What's a Risk/Issue? How are Assumptions and dependencies different? What's different in Agile risk management vs. other methodologies? Risk data gather and S.W.O.T analysis Risk register breakdown ALWAYS HAVE AN OWNER FOR EVERY RISK!!! Risk review sessions AddING items into the development backlog to address risks and prioritise appropriately USING metrics to understand when to act on risks, such as performance testing, etc. An example risk register can be found here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1QLTb8NwePp2tkejIW-N9GJ7eseK2FfuMA5-S8A5zWko/edit?usp=sharing – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Dependency management, despite its importance, does not get the attention it deserves and is often a bit haphazard and less structured than it could be. In this playbook, we suggest a lightweight way to identify and manage dependencies. We explain why to do it, how to do it, what good looks like, and the most important dos and don'ts. Detailed discussion here: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/how-to-manage-dependencies-1551355b9025. Show Notes Example and Template here: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/how-to-manage-dependencies-1551355b9025 Expanded show notes and leave questions or comments for this episode at: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/06/26/ep16-tldr-dependency-management/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this Team Roles episode, Marcel and Todd talk about the role of the Delivery Manager and Scrum Master. We talk about the difference between delivery roles and give practical advice on how to help teams reduce risks, remove blockers and… Deliver! We touch on the importance of 1-on-1 relationships with team members, the importance of servant leadership, project awareness, project management tooling, risk management, good project hygiene and how to become a delivery manager. In this episode we talk in more detail about the following topics: - What is a Delivery Manager anyway? - The difference between Delivery Lead, Delivery Manager, Programme Manager and Scrum Master. Have we got you confused yet? Don't worry, we'll explain.... - Delivery mindset within the team - Balance between shielding the team and exposure to clients - The importance of 1-on-1 relationships with team members - Avoiding being a 'box ticker' Delivery Manager - The importance of servant leadership - Being aware of what you DO know, not what you THINK you know - Being organised and prioritising time - Documenting everything - Project management tools - The importance of building good teams - Todd's number 1 tip: scheduling 1-on-1s and the importance of listening - Risk and blocker management - Good project hygiene and project ceremonies - How to get into project management - Project management certifications and continuous learning Show Notes Getting Things Done® by David Allen https://gettingthingsdone.com/ Inbox Zero https://www.fastcompany.com/40507663/the-7-step-guide-to-achieving-inbox-zero-and-staying-there-in-2018 – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode Swathi Poddar and I are talking about a thing we used to fight about: Should we or Shouldn't we allow frontend and backend specific user stories? Surely, stories should describe features, something that delivers value? But what, if there was a public API? And if it turns out that API also fed a GUI frontend? And what if your team simply demanded it as it made their lives easier? Show Notes Link to illustration which provides context for this episode: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/05/15/ep15-assigning-teams-to-features-or-services/ Sam Newman's book Building Microservices we mention (again) in this epiode: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22512931-building-microservices Expanded show notes and leave questions or comments for this episode at: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/05/28/ep15-should-we-allow-fe-and-be-stories/ Our guest in this episode is Swathi Poddar, Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She can be ‘found' and contacted here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-poddar/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this episode Swathi Poddar and I are talking about a topic very close to our heart: how do we best assign work to our teams? Do we have clear ownership of features or services, and if so, what do we do with the ‘shared' service we'll invariably encounter? Are such services commonly owned, can anyone mess with them, or are we keeping them under tight guard, and we ask: ‘Who owns the frontend?' Expect an interesting, possibly controversial discussion... For context please view these charts and illustrations while listening to this episode: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/05/13/ep14-assigning-teams-to-features-or-services/ Books we touch on in this episode, and which are highly recommended to ready are Sam Newman's Building Microservices https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22512931-building-microservices Eric Evan's Domain Driven Design https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/179143.Domain_Driven_Design Expanded show notes and leave questions or comments for this episode at: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/05/13/ep14-assigning-teams-to-features-or-services/ Our guest in this episode is Swathi Poddar, Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She can be ‘found' and contacted here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-poddar/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In our continued exploration into Team Roles, in this episode we talk to Erica Kucharczyk about the role of User Research. This is a role that is frequently overlooked, but can pay off huge dividends in the long run if quality research is incorporated into your development cycle. We discuss how research helps teams validate their value proposition, the value of user research, the process of designing, running and analyzing tests, Qualitative vs Quantitative, how to get into user research and what good looks like. So, get out there and do some research! We start by talking about how User Research validates value propositions; needs, gains and pains. Next, we talk about how the User Research role differs from, and overlaps with, the Design and UX roles. We discuss why you should pay for User Research and what good looks like when user research is incorporated fully into the development cycle. We briefly touch on some tools for remote testing and talk about different testing environments, such as a more formal lab setting vs. more natural settings. We talk about the importance of researcher demeanor and attitude, especially the mindset of not leading the user and not helping the user too much. We touch on low-fi testing methods for low budget situations or to simply get started doing user research with your team. We revisit the Qualitative vs Quantitative discussion and talk about how they compliment each other and how different insights can be gained by both approaches. We go through the process of designing tests, running the tests, analysing the results and playing back the findings. We talk about recording users and privacy concerns, including GDPR. Erica talks about her interest in this area and the article she co-wrote on this subject (see link in the show notes below). We discuss how people can get into research and what good looks like. Good researchers must be good communicators, they should like people, be persuasive, and be able to think on their feet. Finally, we talk about how to get started with research on your project and to ensure you don't forget about the User Research role when planning teams. Erica Kucharczyk has been working as a researcher for about 12 years and started off in academia running research on projects in sleep technology and brain training games for older people with dementia. More recently she's been working as a user experience researcher with Government clients and she's interested in research ethics and research operations. Show Notes Erica Kucharczyk is a Brighton/London based User Researcher and can best be found here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erica-kucharczyk/ Erica's article on GDPR and data protection with regard to User Research can be found here: https://medium.com/design-research-matters/general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr-and-user-research-e00a5b29338e Erica recommends the following book: Think Like a UX Researcher by David Travis https://www.amazon.co.uk/Think-Like-Researcher-David-Travis/dp/1138365297/ Erica mentioned the following tools in this episode: Appear.in - https://appear.in/ Morae - https://www.techsmith.com/morae.html Loopback - https://lookback.io/ Windows Game Bar - https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/p/game-bar/9nzkpstsnw4p Expanded show notes and leave questions or comments for this episode at: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/05/13/ep13-team-roles-user-research/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In our “If WE were the Client” series we engage in some wishful thinking, turning the situation on its head and talk about all the things we would do and change if we were looking for or working with software suppliers. – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Status reports… all Delivery Managers need to do them. Love them or hate them, this short TL;DR episode will give you practical tips on getting the most out of your status reports and turn the chore into a great communication tool if you focus on your audience and quality, concise content. – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Most software delivery use a story backlog to manage delivery: effectively a list of things to delivery. But often the backlog is at best a mess, at worst confusing and misleading. A good backlog provides structure and facilitates delivery, a bad one adds confusion and inefficiencies. Here is our 5 minute fix to help you optimise your backlog. Find detailed show notes on this episode page: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/04/01/ep10-tldr-backlogs/ Related reading: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/keep-your-backlog-lean-and-clean-4f66652b2cc2 https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/is-backlog-a-dirty-word-cdcb89570b2f https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/epics-stories-themes-and-features-4637712cff5c https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/we-should-really-visualise-requirements-8d38280cf58d – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Story mapping is maybe the easiest tool to quickly and reliably elicit requirements. It's my default that always delivers reliable results, not matter the situation. Here is our 5 minute how-to. Find detailed show notes on this episode page: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/03/06/ep09-tldr-story-mapping/ Related reading: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/storymapping-3a3f0d67d681 https://www.adaptivepath.org/ideas/the-anatomy-of-an-experience-map/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Event_storming – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

For this episode we have invited our colleague Dave Hewett to discuss all things Engagement Management, Client Service and Account Handling. We will touch on what good ‘client servicing' means and where the balance lies between saying ‘yes' and saying ‘no'. Ultimately engagement management is all about ensuring delivery in a way that both the client and the delivery team are happy. Remember, only happy teams deliver good outcomes. Client services is a role of many ‘hats' and switching context is possibly the most important skill in this role, be this to dive into granular detail within a domain or to switch domain completely across different clients. Dave also explains that a thick skin certainly helps with the role, where you often end up as the go-to for everyone from the client to your team offloading stress, anger, frustrations and worries. That said, it is also important for an engagement manager to detect what is important and what isn't: things you can let go and ignore as ‘noise' and those things that really need attention. Dave Hewett is UK based Engagement manager for Equal Experts. Contact him if you are interested to hear how Equal Experts can help your organisation in delivering software or affecting change. Equal Experts: https://www.equalexperts.com/ Contact: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-hewett-b97609/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Everyone has heard of User Stories, most delivery teams use them, most business analysts or product owners write them, but often we are not writing them well. Here is our 5 minute fix to help you write great stories. Find detailed show notes on this episode page: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/03/03/ep07-tl;dr:-user-story-writing/ Related reading: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/what-makes-good-user-stories-451c56b5756f https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/clean-user-stories-and-backlogs-bf203b6e1257 – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

For this episode we have invited our colleagues Isabell Britsch and Tarik Johnston to discuss all things Digital Design with us. We will touch on the importance of placing the user at the centre of things and in this context will explain the differences between service design (the overall end to end including the organisational view), user experience design (how user interact at the various touchpoints), user interface design (the design of an interface provided at a specific touchpoint). We chat about the difference between experience design (how things work) and visual design (how things look). And also why both are important in the design of products and services satisfy user needs and business goals. More so, user experience design is a vital factor in requirements analysis and iterative, collaborative solution design. In this context we will specifically argue that all software applications, even the most internal operational system, will benefit from, in fact require, user experience and visual design. As usual, in our episodes on roles we will touch on ‘what makes a good practitioner' in these disciplines, how their day to day work looks like, and how one can get into these roles… Maybe the most important takeaway is that all software teams must adjust their thinking and start including user experience and visual design into their solution design and implementation process. Isabell Britsch is a London based Design Consultant and Art Director and has a 20 year work portfolio with clients across a wide range of industries and projects in digital, print and TV. When she does not design, she teaches Yoga and Meditation. Tarik Johnston is a London based User Experience Designer with a 15 year work portfolio in designing user-centered digital applications in the public and private sector across ecommerce, banking, government, travel and property. Show Notes Isabell Britsch is a London based Design Consultant and Art Director and renowned yoga and meditation teacher. Portfolio: https://www.behance.net/isabellbritsch Contact: https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabell-britsch/ Yoga and meditation here: https://www.yogawithisabell.com/landing Tarik Johnston is a London based User Experience Designer and can best be found here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarik-johnston-625ba96/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this Episode we have invited our colleague Swathi Poddar to discuss why the Business Analyst and Product Owner are such important roles for every successful delivery team. Successful projects are based on a clear understanding of the domain, specifically goals and needs, and how to best satisfy these with a solution within the given constraints (time, money, regulatory, etc). With the Product Owner hat on, we take care of the up-front bit, i.e. the focusing on strategic fit, while with the business analyst hat on, we focus more on the nitty gritty details of the solutions. But really, both roles are just a different focus the same spectrum. In practice they can be taken on by the same or different individuals. Ultimately both roles are about ‘making sense' of a problem domain, enabling teams to articulate complexity, explore items under discussion and converge towards a clear and valuable outcome. As with most roles in the ‘21st century', knowledge of tools and techniques (how to do things) are being downgraded to hygiene factors, while approach and mindset (how to go about things, specifically communication and collaboration) become factors of excellence. Consequently the business analyst and product owner are key roles for any well run project. Swathi Poddar is a Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She has worked and studied in the UK, US and currently works out of Pune and Banglore, India. Show Notes Further thoughts on the topic can be found at our blog: The Business Analyst Role ‘analysed': https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/how-to-become-a-business-analyst-1-mindset-vs-skills-435ef3bf1c5a Successfully interviewing as Business Analyst or Product Owner: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/product-owner-interview-guide-d504ad1de1e2 BA Career survey: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/business-analysts-how-did-you-get-into-your-role-cea4b64b8017 Our guest in this episode is Swathi Poddar, Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She can be ‘found' and contacted here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-poddar/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

This Episode, the start a series on our Team Roles Series, we will set the scene on which roles are generally required for a well set-up software delivery team. In this Episodes we will be introducing each role and set the scene for subsequent episodes in which we will invite craftswomen and men skilled in the various roles to discuss raison d'être, what good looks like, value that role adds and, in fact, what that roes ‘does'. Expected insightful discussions with some of the industry's top talent from all over the world. We will be quite flexible with rolling out the episodes in this series, so stay tuned, and let this unfold organically over the next couple of months… – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

We've all been in situations where suppliers and clients alike were extolling the benefits of nearshoring, offshoring or other forms of cross-location working. And indeed there are very good reasons on why we may want to consider such resourcing strategies, but more often than not we find that making this work in practice and realising the benefits without introducing too much pain is harder than anticipated. Today, we are in Bangalore and have invited our colleague Swathi Poddar to talk offshoring and distributed teams with us. Swathi Poddar is a Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She has worked and studied in the UK, US and currently works out of Pune and Banglore, India. Show Notes All three of us agree: colocated teams are easiest. But not always feasible. Globalisation and distributed teams are here to stay. Be this for cost efficiencies, scale or multi-region support. So get used to it. Here is how to make them work: Hire skilled talent  Put conscious effort into forming and supporting distributed teams Align all stakeholders Over communicate To make this really work, you need to put the effort in. And be under no illusion, distributed teams come at a cost. If you get it wrong, you will suffer all sorts of problems from inefficiencies to quality issues. If you get it right, it will make your delivery faster and better. Further thoughts on the topic of Distributed teams can be found at our blog: https://thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk/on-working-with-distributed-teams-475b12be4d3 Our guest in this episode is Swathi Poddar, Business Analyst, Product Owner and Software Consultant. She can be ‘found' and contacted here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swathi-poddar/ – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this Episode with chat about Values. Values that we as individuals, as supplier and client hold, and why it is important that we are mindful of such values. We discuss what happens when values are misaligned and propose ways on how to align them. Because we both know from experience: When values are misaligned, bad things will happen! Show Notes Interesting reading on topics mentioned in this podcast are the Agile Manifesto, and the less authoritative, but nevertheless highly relevant Declaration of Interdependence. Expanded show notes and leave questions or comments for this episode at: https://burnupmedia.com/2019/01/27/ep02-values-alignment/ Subscribe at: http://theburnup.com/ Follow The Burn Up on Twitter: @burnupmedia Connect with us on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/burnupmedia Email us: podcasts@burnupmedia.com Read Marcel's Blog at www.thedigitalbusinessanalyst.co.uk More interesting stuff on our reading list: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/4905904-m?shelf=software-consulting This podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

In this Episode with provide a high level view on what Agile is. We touch mindset, process and techniques. We dispel the myth of Agile being a silver bullet to solve all software delivery problems, discuss whether Agile is always right, and provide some early insight into how to apply Agile successfully. Expect more detailed discussion on each topic as the podcast evolves. Show Notes Interesting reading on topics mentioned in this podcast are the Agile Manifesto, and the less authoritative, but nevertheless highly relevant Declaration of Interdependence. Also, a quick overview of Scrum and XP, as we mentioned them. If you are up for a related Novel check out The Phoenix Project, if you are interested in agile concepts, do read the introductions to DSMD and SAFe (where the latter is concerned, do read this critique before jumping onto implementation.) – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Introducing The Burn Up: a podcast about all things Agile and Software Delivery. In this very first podcast we set the scene, talk about what The Burn Up is all about, who it is for, and what listeners can expect. In The Burn Up we will share our experiences, introduce interesting concepts and techniques, dispel myth and challenge common assumptions. This is our way of providing inspiration and guidance to practitioners – clients and suppliers – involved in software design and delivery and ultimately make software delivery more enjoyable and successful. – More information at https://www.theburnup.com This podcast produced by Burn Up Media Ltd under under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Further Information at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/