Podcasts about lean agile

Xmas Special: From Project-Driven to Flow-Driven Software Development in 2025 with Vasco Duarte In the kickoff episode of the “5 Wishes for 2025” series, Vasco Duarte dives into a topic close to his heart: why managing software like construction projects leads to failure. Drawing on his experience in the Agile community and sharing compelling real-world examples, Vasco introduces a new perspective on how software development should flow, adapt, and continuously deliver value. Software Development: Stop Building Houses, Start Growing Gardens “Software is more like a garden than a construction site—continuous care and attention are key to thriving.” Vasco begins by debunking the myth that software development can be meticulously planned like a construction project. Sharing a story about a failed 18-month software endeavor, he highlights how rigid plans crumble in the face of changing markets. Instead, he advocates for an adaptive, flow-based approach to software development, comparing it to the continuous nurturing required in a garden. Why Projects Fall Short in Software Development “You can't plan your year's meals in January—why would you try that with software?” Vasco identifies three critical flaws of project-driven software development: 1. Assumption of Stability: Markets and requirements shift too fast for static plans. 2. Front-loaded Decisions: Early decisions often fail to hold up over time. 3. Artificial Boundaries: Restrictive scopes kill innovation and flexibility. The Three-Step Framework for Flow-Based Software Development 1. Continuous Delivery “Software is like a shark—it has to keep moving or it dies.” Vasco explains how companies can succeed by continuously delivering updates to users. He shares insights from a mobile startup using experiments and feedback loops to keep evolving and delivering measurable value. 2. Incremental Funding “Fund software like a business, not like a construction project.” Drawing on ideas from Lean-Agile financial planning, Vasco introduces incremental funding as a smarter way to manage development. He points listeners to a previous episode with experts Maarit Laanti and Rami Sirkia for deeper insights. 3. Goal-Oriented Teams “Teams need goals, not just backlogs.” Vasco stresses the importance of giving teams end-to-end ownership of the value they create. The backlog is a tool, but the real focus should be on clear goals that align with business impact. He mentions his OTOG - One-Team-One-Goal blog post.  Raising Agility to the Portfolio Level “Flow-based software development lets us make quick, strategic decisions at the portfolio level.” By embracing continuous delivery, incremental funding, and goal-driven teams, organizations can elevate agility from individual teams to the entire portfolio. Vasco highlights this as a game-changer for modern businesses, enabling quicker, smarter product decisions. Global Agile Summit 2025 – Don't Miss Out! “Join us in Tallinn to see flow-based software delivery in action.” Vasco invites listeners to the Global Agile Summit 2025, where real-world examples of flow-based development will take center stage. For those listening during the holiday season, there's a Super Early Bird ticket available with a 75% discount. Visit GlobalAgileSummit.com for details. About Vasco Duarte Vasco Duarte is a thought leader in the Agile space, co-founder of Agile Finland, and host of the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast, which has over 10 million downloads. Author of NoEstimates: How To Measure Project Progress Without Estimating, Vasco is a sought-after speaker and consultant helping organizations embrace Agile practices to achieve business success. You can link with Vasco Duarte on LinkedIn.

What does it take to be an effective Scrum Master? In this episode, Brian Milner and Gary K. Evans, author of The Effective Scrum Master, explore the nuanced role of Scrum Masters, the importance of people skills, and the shift from efficiency to effectiveness. Overview Join Brian Milner as he chats with Agile coach and author Gary K. Evans about the essential qualities of an effective Scrum Master. From fostering self-organizing teams to balancing proactive leadership with people-centered strategies, this conversation unpacks the skills and mindsets needed to thrive in the role. Whether you’re new to Scrum or a seasoned pro, this episode offers fresh perspectives and practical advice for taking your Agile expertise to the next level. References and resources mentioned in the show: Gary K. Evans The Effective Scrum Master: Advancing Your Craft by Gary K Evans Join the Agile Mentors Community Mountain Goat Software Certified Scrum and Agile Training Schedule Certified ScrumMaster® Training and Scrum Certification Advanced Certified ScrumMaster® Subscribe to the Agile Mentors Podcast Want to get involved? This show is designed for you, and we’d love your input. Enjoyed what you heard today? Please leave a rating and a review. It really helps, and we read every single one. Got an Agile subject you’d like us to discuss or a question that needs an answer? Share your thoughts with us at podcast@mountaingoatsoftware.com This episode’s presenters are: Brian Milner is SVP of coaching and training at Mountain Goat Software. He's passionate about making a difference in people's day-to-day work, influenced by his own experience of transitioning to Scrum and seeing improvements in work/life balance, honesty, respect, and the quality of work. Gary K. Evans is a seasoned Agile Coach and author of The Effective Scrum Master, with over 30 years of experience transforming Fortune 100 and 500 companies through Lean-Agile practices. Known for his expertise in building high-performing teams and training over 15,000 professionals, Gary brings a unique focus on people-centered solutions to complex organizational challenges. Auto-generated Transcript: Brian (00:00) Welcome in Agile Mentors. We are back and it's another episode of the Agile Mentors podcast. We're getting towards the end of the year. I am here with you, as always, Brian Milner. And today I have a very special guest with me, Mr. Gary K. Evans is with us. Welcome in, Gary. Gary (00:17) Thank you, Brian. It's great to be here. Brian (00:19) Very glad to have Gary with us. Gary is an agile coach. He's a lean consultant. He owns his own company called Evanetics, but he is also the author of a newly published book that came out this summer. It's called The Effective Scrum Master. And it really is a comprehensive guide. It's a really interesting read. So I thought we'd have him on to talk to us about. what that means, an effective scrum master. So scrum master is this episode, I think it's gonna be really a special one for you. So Gary, let's start with that question. When you say an effective scrum master, what is an effective scrum master? Gary (00:56) In my experience, I've worked with a lot of Scrum Masters who go through the motions, they understand the events, they focus on how to run these Scrum events. But the teams flounder and they struggle with what should I do next? How do I anticipate things? And the Scrum Masters themselves often get very frustrated. One of the complaints that I hear, especially from early to mid-career Scrum Masters is I have this anxiety. How do I know that my team is operating as efficient, as efficiently and effectively as they can because they focus so much on efficiency. So this idea of effectiveness really is much more important. In fact, John Kern, one of the co-authors of the Agile Manifesto, who wrote the foreword for my book, he focused in on that word effective because we spend so much of our energies trying to be efficient. that we aren't accomplishing what we need to do, which is to build self-organizing, mature teams. And that's really the focus of my book. Brian (02:01) That's an awesome distinction, I think, because I like that a lot. There's a conversation that I will have sometimes in class about how that drive or search for trying to be not effective, sorry, what was the other word that you used? Efficient, sorry, sorry, just slipped my mind, ADHD. But the efficient kind of quotient there I think is... Gary (02:18) Efficient. Brian (02:27) something that in business in the business world today is a highly visible term. It's something that everyone seems to think is needed. But, you know, that really dates back to sort of the assembly line and efficiency experts that would stand behind you with a stop clock and try to get you to do something, you know, point two seconds faster so that it would total up to, you know, more productivity over the course of the day. But that's not the kind of work we do. Gary (02:56) I love the fact that you've mentioned that that was really the Frederick Winslow Taylor scientific management approach. And it was very much based on this idea of efficiency. But I have seen so many teams and as an agile coach, I've had multiple experiences of teams that are very, very efficient at going in the wrong direction entirely. They've lost their focus on true north. They don't understand what it is they're actually supposed to do. They think that the Scrum Guide, 14 pages in the Scrum Guide, is their Bible. And that's all that they need to know. And nothing could be further from the truth. Brian (03:37) Yeah. Yeah. And to me that, you're talking about efficiency versus effectiveness. You know, if we were a company that was trying to create a new drug to cure some disease, you know, I want effective. I don't want efficient. I don't want someone, I don't want to produce a million pills that don't work. I want to produce, you I'd rather produce one that works, you know. Gary (03:59) Exactly. Brian (04:05) And that seems to be kind of something that I think a lot of teams are missing today. Gary (04:09) It does indeed. Brian (04:10) Well, good. I like that distinction. I think that's a good distinction and that's a good place for us to start to think about this role as being kind of more effective. I think that they're sort of, I don't know, I'm kind of curious what your take is on this. Is it a marketing problem? Is it an education problem? Why is there so much confusion, I think, about what a scrum master, what a good scrum master is? Gary (04:41) That's a really deep and broad question. Part of it is that in the beginning, when Scrum was introduced into the community and was just beginning to become known, there were two attributes of Scrum Masters that were repeated again and again and again. That was you became a servant leader for the team and you removed impediments. Brian (04:44) Just a light casual one here. Gary (05:09) Unfortunately, most people stopped at that point. And they didn't realize that this, the Scrum Master role, and I'll admit, I take a very expansive view of the Scrum Master role because I've been doing this since 1993, basically, 1994. And I've learned through making lots and lots of mistakes. And the idea that All we have to do is be a servant. Well, what does that mean to be a servant leader? Nobody ever really defined it. I actually wrote an essay a number of years ago on what it meant to not be a servant leader so that I could understand by contradiction what it was that I should be doing. I called it the top 10 scrum master crimes. And really, a lot of them really had to do with crimes because it's very easy for a scrum master to start to merge into making decisions for the team that the scrum master should not be making. Now, there are times when a scrum master should direct the team, should make decisions for the team if the team is not qualified to make certain decisions because they're just too new. But this idea of being a certain leader There's so much more to that. In my expansive view of the Scrum Master role, it is not a process role first. It's a people role. And to be an effective Scrum Master, you have to be an effective people person. I've worked with so many teams and coached Scrum Masters. Scrum Masters just did not like people. They weren't people persons. And the teams responded accordingly. So. A lot of the coaching that I do with my Scrum Masters is you've got to reach deep. You've got to be able to get into people's lives rather than hold them off, you know. And so a lot of it has to do with that. Brian (07:10) I love that. I wholeheartedly concur with that. I've talked on this podcast a little bit about how it seems like we've lost the focus of that first line of the Agile Manifesto, individuals and interactions over process and tools. And I mentioned when I go to Agile conferences sometimes, I feel like the majority of the talks that I see and hear are process and tools talks rather than know, individuals and interactions talks. And I can't agree more. I think that's really a focus for us as Scrum Masters is the individuals and interactions portion, the people portion. You know, our teams are made up of people and if we're not good with helping understand how people work together, we're kind of really missing the value of what it is we deliver to the teams, I think. Gary (08:04) And Brian, the people are all different. And to have a one size fits all because the scrum guy says do X, and Z. Well, that'll work for some people, but it will not work for others. And it may even build resentment within the team because they feel that they're being treated unfairly. The focus, the theme of my book and the reason I wrote the book. Brian (08:06) Right, exactly. Gary (08:30) is that I had seen so many teams that were floundering under Scrum Masters who really didn't understand their own role. And I came up from my experience, I defined four different categories that helped to elaborate what the Scrum Master should be if they want to be effective. And I labeled those as Sherpa, Shepherd, Sheepdog, and Diagnostician. I couldn't really think of a word. I started with an S for diagnosticians. But I have a strong medical background, so diagnostician really helped because the sherpa is the expert. And to be an effective scrum master, you have to be an expert, not at scrum, but at agile. We really want, I want my scrum masters to be agile masters. And as a coach, I'm constantly pushing them. How are you improving your craft? And what is involved in that craft? So you've got to be an expert. Brian (08:58) Hahaha. Gary (09:26) Now for a new scrum master, that's a contradiction in terms. You can't be an expert if you are just at the beginning of the journey. But there are things that you can do. And I discussed this. In order to from exposure, you can gain experience. And from experience, you can generate expertise. And so that's the first one. If ultimately you need to be a master of Agile. Secondly, a Sherpa and then a... a Sherpa and then a Shepherd, you have to be able to guide the team. And you can't guide somebody if you haven't been through that path before. So this is where the issue of longevity, education, and just exposure and experience with different teams on different projects. This is where the maturity comes and you start to develop a depth of understanding. But then there's the hardest part, the hardest persona of the scrum master is the sheepdog. This is where you are the protector of the team. And so many scrum masters fold in this area because a threat will come either from management or from within the team or somebody outside the team like a product owner. And the scrum master doesn't understand how to protect his or her own team. I'll share a little war story with you that is in the book. I had a product owner who one morning came in and just started ripping through several of my team members. I don't know what happened at that point. I stepped between him and the team and I said, do not take another step forward. I was ready to defend my team physically. It didn't come to that. And later I learned the reason for why he was so upset. But if you're going to be a sheepdog and protect your team, it may require personal sacrifice. It may require professional sacrifice. And this is the area where so many scrum masters, they can't deal with that part because they don't have that confidence. So you've got the Sherpa who's the expert, the shepherd who is the guide. The sheepdog who's the protector and finally the diagnostician who is the healer. Things are going to go awry and you have to have a way of diagnosing what the root cause of the problem is. And this is where the issue of metrics and understanding your team members, building a rapport with your team members that quite often is extremely intimate. I have had team members, I have a series of questions I ask all my team members so that I understand their background and such and also things that I need to be aware of. And I will ask them, do you have any medical issues or other accommodations that we might need to consider for you? This is an issue of respect so that we don't put somebody in an uncomfortable situation. It's a strictly private conversation. I've had people share with me that they have a drug problem. that they're caring for an ailing parent, that they're going through a divorce, all kinds of different issues that come out. And we work out special signals so that if they're having an episode someday, they just give me that signal. And I know that I need to either give them space or give them some special consideration. This is what I mean by the people issue. You've got to get to the point where you allow people's lives to splash onto you and you get wet with their issues. And yet you still have to maintain your autonomy and separation in order to work with the whole team together. The Scrum Master role is extremely complex from my perspective because it involves people, as you say, individuals and their interactions. That's where we have to start. Brian (13:33) I agree. And that's a great call out to say, to talk about there, just the idea that, you these are, these are individuals, not, they're not robots, you know, like they're not AIs yet. These are human beings and they have lives outside of work. They have things that affect them. And if they're going through a divorce, like you said, then you think that might affect their work life? Well, of course it will. Cause they're a human, right? And that's gonna... Gary (13:43) Right. Yes. Brian (13:57) that's going to affect their, their mood that day. That's going to affect, you know, how productive they are. It's going to affect lots of things. And, and, you know, we, we've talked here on the podcast a little bit about making accommodations for people with different, neurodivergent traits like ADHD or, autism or other things like that. And, know, I've always loved the idea of, know, putting people in the best position to be successful, you know, trying to understand what is. unique about them, strengths and weaknesses, so that you can help them to be put in a position that they can shine, right? They can really contribute in their own unique way. And we have to allow for both those strengths and weaknesses. We have to help them with the weaknesses. We have to put them in a position to share their strengths. Gary (14:49) And this leads to a slightly different topic if I can move up a little bit. The scrum master role is an endangered species right now. And there's a reason for that. There's several reasons for that. One of which is what we've been talking about. So many scrum masters are not people persons. And as a result, the teams are not accomplishing what the organization needs. And therefore the scrum master is regarded as overhead. Brian (14:52) Yeah, please, please, please. Hmm, yeah. Gary (15:19) as ineffective. And frankly, that's correct. There are currently, if you look at the Scrum Alliance and Scrum.org, I got the figures from these companies as of the beginning of this year, there are about two million Scrum Masters in the world right They're not all equally effective, Many of them are PSN1s from Scrum.org and there are like 625,000 of those, that type of thing. And then you get 39,000 PSN2s and then you get a thousand or so PSN3s. You can see the drop off there, just huge drop off. And the certification issues lead people to think that they're a Scrum master. Scrum two days or? An online examination doesn't prepare you. It simply doesn't. We've not done a good job of helping people understand through these major certification roles. that this is a starting point, but it's not going to make you effective. And part of it is it's become commoditized. And so we have this issue of lots and lots of scrummasters, most of whom really are not people persons and most of whom don't understand how to deal with a team and build a team rather than just an assembly of individuals. I've taken over teams that have been floundering. I've done this multiple times. And on day one, it's a series of isolated individuals. That's the best that they could have. Because there was no cohesion that could be found. And that always takes me a lot of effort and a lot of time to figure out how can I find cohesion within the team. So it's exhausting. The Scrum Master rule is really exhausting at times. And if someone's not tired at the end of the day, they're not doing it right. Brian (17:22) Yeah, I really am in alignment with what you're saying here. And I've thought about this issue a lot as well, and just the idea that we seem to find ourselves in a situation where, as you said, there's a lot of people who have that certification. And as someone who gives people certifications, I have to take my own part in that. I have to accept my own role and what that plays in it. But I think that you're right to... The training is necessary, right? You have to understand the basics. You have to understand these things before you can do anything else. However, I think that the disservice that the industry has done is to make this proclamation that if someone is certified, that they are ready to lead. And that really is what a Scrum Master is, is a leader in the organization. They're a leader for the Scrum process in the organization. And that's just... Gary (17:55) Yes. Yes. Brian (18:23) not true, right? It just takes more ongoing mentoring and coaching for that person to get to a place where they are really a, you know, what we would call a change agent, right? They are there to, you I always like to use the term infect the organization. They're there to spread and infect this mindset, this philosophy. And if we don't understand it ourselves, if we're not really living that philosophy, If we want our team to be experimentation based and we don't experiment ourself and we don't kind of demonstrate to them what it looks like to experiment, to try things, to fail, to figure out why that didn't work and then apply a new change and say, let's try something different. If we don't demonstrate that, not just tell them, but demonstrate it, they're never going to get that. They're going to stay, as you said, a collection of individuals. And I think that's, to me, that seems to be one of the big issues today with Scrum Masters and with Scrum in general is just that we have, you know, in opposition to your book, ineffective Scrum Masters that aren't really helping people see what Scrum should be. Gary (19:41) Exactly. And you've touched on what I call the four E's, which are exposure, experience, expertise, all built through experimentation. And you use that word to experiment. We need to experiment. But experimentation takes courage. Now that is one of the Scrum values. But when you get a young person or a new Scrum master who's in a role in an organization that may have certain, let's say, unsafe environment and cultural factors. It's very difficult for most people to build that courage to say, we've got to change this and become agents of change. Now, obviously they can, they should be diplomatic. They should be respectful, but they should also be persistent. But being able to see that requires a vision. You have to be able to be able to look around and see where are the big problems that we have? Why should I rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic if the ship is sinking? Brian (20:41) you Gary (20:45) And so having that vision, again, comes from maturity. And the Scrum Masters that I work with, I push them pretty hard because I want them to grow. And every one of them has thanked me. But they didn't thank me during while it was happening. Brian (21:06) Ha Yeah. Yeah, I can understand that. mean, we, you know, one of the analogies I'll use there is like, we, a lot of us that have gone through the process and become a trainer will say it was hell while we went through it, but we look back on it and think that was necessary. We needed to go through that. now that we've gone through it we're on the other side, that was a necessary component of becoming an effective trainer was really seeing it up close and personal and seeing how other people do it. So I completely get that. Gary (21:31) Exactly. Brian (21:36) I want to ask you a question here that I know this is a loaded question. I get this question all the time. But I thought it might be interesting to hear your perspective on this from the effective Scrum Master perspective. People constantly ask, well, what does a Scrum Master do all day? Because when you look at the Scrum Guide and you look at the things that we have as responsibilities, You know, the two main responsibilities we have that are ongoing is to make sure events happen and make sure that the time boxes are kept according to the Scrum Guide. But I try to tell people there's a lot that goes on between those events. It's not just about the events, right? There's a lot that we do. just help our audience. For those people who are listening and don't really have a clear picture of what a Scrum Master does, just give us some samples of what you see as activity that effective Scrum Masters would take on a regular basis. Gary (22:30) What an interesting qualitative question. Brian (22:33) Ha ha ha. Gary (22:34) And I say qualitative on purpose. What does a scrum master do? What a scrum master should do is listen, listen a lot, observe, even if you're remote and virtual. You should be monitoring the Slack channel. You should be having video sessions. You should be attending team discussions whenever you can, but not only to listen, but to be the last one to speak. This is a big issue. So a scrum master often is considered to be doing nothing. But what the scrum master is doing is listening, watching, being the last to speak so that he or she does not taint the conversation among the team members. And it's very easy for that to happen. They should be compiling. team metrics. And I have a very lengthy section in the book on metrics, not only velocity and burn down charts and that type of thing, but a number of other other metrics that I've developed over the years for my own teams. So that the Scrum Master and the team can understand their own performance. They should be training, obviously, as a Sherpa, as an expert. They should be conveying knowledge to the team and they should be teaching every time they're talking to somebody, they should be teaching someone. So it's not a prescribed set of activities in my estimation of what a scrum master does. And I'm going to I'm going to use an analogy here. And it's going to it's going to offend some people because they're going to say, that's a terrible analogy. Well, it's actually a good analogy if you take it as that. The scrum master is like a parent. and needs to nurture the family. How does a parent, what does a parent do? They listen, they observe, they teach, they guide. Sometimes they have to protect, sometimes they have to discipline. And these are all skills that make for a good effective scrum master. So as I say, it's a qualitative issue. But a person who cannot parent well, I'm not saying the team are children, I'm saying they're your family. You need to parent your family. And you need to, as an experienced person who hopefully has a bit more experience and exposure and wisdom. and has better insight into how the world works, even the world of the organization, the Scrum Master has to be able to convey that on a day-to-day, hour-to-hour basis. It is not a part-time job. It is a full-time, exhausting, boots-on-the-ground position that many people just cannot fill. It's sad, but not everybody can do everything. Coming back to the certifications again, job ads always want to know you need to have a CSM or a PSM. You need to have an ACSM, type of thing, advanced certified Scrum Master. These are proxies that companies use because they don't know what a Scrum Master does. They don't know how to qualify it. So they try to quantify it through a certification. And what they have are two million Scrum Masters. who are certified in the world. How many of those are really good? Not all of Brian (26:06) Right. Gary (26:07) So the reason that I dwell on this a little bit, Brian, is my book is there to help people understand. not only the limits, but the expanse of what they should do. And there are limits to what a scrum master should do, but there's also an expansive view of they need to do more than just be a servant leader and remove impediments. Those are important. That's not the end of it. Brian (26:33) I agree. It's kind of interesting because it's a delicate balance, right? Because it's sort of like, you know, there's not a recipe. There's not a clear, hey, here's the 10 things that you do every day. And just when you come in the morning, check this list off and do these things, right? There's not that. But I think that the other mistake that I see some Scrum Masters make sometimes is that they treat it as being a purely reactive kind of position where I'm going to sit back and wait for things. And then when something happens, then I'll, then I'll jump in and I'll do something based on what someone else has done, which I think is a mistake as well. We we're proactive. We were very proactive to, to make an impact and make a difference. And when we recognize something's needed, we, got to jump in there. We got to get in there and do something about it when it's needed. you wouldn't want to have a coach of a team who set back and just, you know, Gary (27:26) It is. Brian (27:30) waited for someone to come to them and ask them for questions. There's no strategy. There's no paying attention to fundamentals. All those things would kind of go out the window if that coach isn't more proactive with his approach towards his or her approach toward the team. Gary (27:45) Exactly. That's a wonderful analogy because I was a soccer coach as well. I'm a soccer player as well. And when I'm coaching youth or that type of thing, I have to teach them how to use this sideline, the touch line in order as a virtual defender. need to have been on the field to know how to teach them how to operate on the field. And if I can't get involved with them, if I just wait until they make a mistake, they're going to make a lot of mistakes. Brian (27:48) Hmm. Gary (28:14) And you've touched on this idea of the passive scrum master. Scrum master is not a passive role. I had a product owner, one of the best that I've ever worked with in my career. We were having a very heated conversation one day, as we often did. And he said, Evans, you're an activist scrum master. And I had never heard that before. And I reflected on it a little bit and I said, Chuck, you're right, I am. But not everybody has that kind of personality. So each scrimmaster has to identify where they may need to improve, maybe some of their assertiveness, some others need to learn how to hold back. It's a learning curve. It's a learning 24-hour-a-day learning session. We're all different. teams are different, the Scrum Masters are different. And as we get more experience and develop more expertise, we handle things differently as a result of that growth. And my role as a coach is to grow the Scrum Masters, to grow the teams. And I've loved it because I love working with people. So you get to work with people, you get to solve problems and you get to see tangible results in people's careers. What more could you ask? Brian (29:36) Right, right. I'm with you. I'm right there with you. I can't agree more. Well, this has been a great discussion. just want to, you know, we mentioned already your book is called The Effective Scrum Master. We're to put links in our show notes to that if people want to go and find that and just, but you can find it on Amazon. Gary K. Evans, The Effective Scrum Master. Gary, how can people find out if they want to get in touch with you or find out more about your work, how can they get in touch with Gary (29:37) Thank Well, appreciate that. I am currently putting up, there is a, we have a website. It's called effectivescrummaster.com. I'll repeat that. Effectivescrummaster.com. There's a sign up link there. It's the page is just under construction at this point. It's live, but people can go up and they can enter an email to be notified when we start to make changes. There'll be some free information there, some resources that they can download. We've got a plan on how we're going to roll this out, but that's just beginning. And so I hope that people will go and visit that and hopefully we'll be able to develop a relationship and they'll be able to reach out to me through that website. Again, effectivescrummaster.com. Brian (30:51) Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Gary, for making the time. It's been a really great conversation and I really appreciate you making the time to come on the show. Gary (30:59) Brian, this has been my privilege and I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.

BONUS: Rediscovering Agile's Roots, What We Can Learn From Lean Manufacturing with Doug Rabow In this BONUS episode, we reconnect with Doug Rabow, a previous guest and an expert in Lean-Agile strategic management known for his dedication to fostering empowered teams and enhancing processes through Lean principles. This discussion dives into the foundations of Lean, its evolution from manufacturing, and how software development can benefit from these time-tested methodologies. Join us as we uncover how adopting Lean can transform software practices and culture to align more closely with the true spirit of Agile. Introduction to Lean and the Toyota Production System (TPS) "Lean isn't just a methodology; it's an ongoing journey of learning and problem-solving." Doug begins by mapping out the origins of Lean and its cornerstone, the Toyota Production System (TPS) (Wikipedia article on TPS). Initially crafted to solve operational challenges in manufacturing, TPS introduced principles aimed at efficiency and continual improvement. Doug underscores that while Agile has gained broader recognition, Lean provides an essential, often overlooked foundation that extends beyond frameworks like Lean Six Sigma or isolated process improvements. "Lean isn't a set-and-forget solution; it's about cultivating an evolving culture of problem-solving." Cultural Foundations of Lean: Adapting for Software Teams "Respect for people and a culture of continuous improvement form the heartbeat of Lean." Transitioning to software development, Doug highlights the core cultural tenets that empower teams to excel. He points out that scaling these principles—such as fostering a culture where problem-solving is embedded in daily practices—is vital due to the complexities of software as a people-driven process. Referencing Conway's Law, Doug illustrates how the structure of teams directly impacts code and workflow. "Developing software is as much about building teams as it is about building products. Lean teaches us that these are inseparable." The Toyota Way: A Blueprint for Excellence "Applying Lean is about chasing excellence, not just managing tasks." Jeffrey Liker's The Toyota Way introduces 14 principles that Doug relates to software environments, emphasizing the value of discipline and respect for people. He discusses the importance of aligning processes with long-term strategies and ensuring that these processes are designed to foster continuous learning. Doug reiterates that truly understanding and integrating Lean requires more than surface-level adoption. "Respect for people isn't an add-on in Lean; it's the root of a thriving, innovative team culture." Waste in Software Development: Insights from the Poppendiecks "Work in progress is not an asset; it's a liability." Doug shares insights from Mary and Tom Poppendieck's (Mary and Tom have been on our podcast here) pioneering work on Lean Software Development, particularly their adaptation of waste types from manufacturing to software. These include partially done work, extra features, relearning, handoffs, and task switching. Doug points out that waste reduction strategies—such as Kanban and pull systems—help teams minimize bottlenecks and optimize flow. "Software development, like manufacturing, benefits from visualizing value streams and focusing on reducing waste." Metrics and Measurement in Lean "The right process will create the right results—focus on process metrics, not individual metrics." In Lean, metrics are crucial for assessing and refining processes. Doug advocates for using metrics like cycle time and throughput to provide teams with insights into system efficiency. He explains how focusing on process metrics rather than individual productivity helps sustain a culture that prioritizes team learning and growth. "When we measure what truly matters—the process—we empower teams to solve problems collectively and improve outcomes." About Doug Rabow Doug Rabow is a dedicated practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with an emphasis on building empowered teams and optimizing processes through Lean methodologies. His extensive experience in applying Lean principles in software development has made him a trusted voice in the Agile and Lean community. You can link with https://www.linkedin.com/in/dougrabow.

If an Agile Release Train (ART) is a team of Agile teams, how do you make sure your teams are collaborating effectively? In this episode, Mohamed Zouaghi, Lean-Agile coach and transformation architect, shares his tips. Like what you hear? Connect with Mohamed on LinkedIn. Explore SAFe courses here.

“In all the SAFe transformations I've been involved in, there have been struggles for managers. I often meet people who suddenly have their staff moving into teams and ARTs, and those people get a lot of guidance, training, and support from coaches. And they're well-equipped to take on that mindset shift. But for managers ... they are left to somehow figure it out themselves.” In this episode, Adam talks to Mikael Broomé, Lean-Agile coach and SPCT candidate at Think Flow in Sweden, and Dr. Steve Mayner, VP Framework, Methodologist, and SAFe Fellow at Scaled Agile, Inc., about new guidance that offers managers much-needed support throughout this transition. The trio discusses topics including the challenges managers face, why investing in training and development for managers is crucial, and why organizations should create parallel career paths for managers. Like what you hear? Connect with Mikael and Steve on LinkedIn. Read the new guidance article, The Role of People Managers in SAFe. Explore SAFe courses here.

-Acerca de la ponente, Karen Caramelo- Apasionada por el “aprendizaje permanente”, trabajo para mejorar las organizaciones a través del desarrollo de personas y equipos. Mi experiencia en Educación No Formal y Lean Manufacturing en contextos cambiantes me permite utilizar un enfoque Lean-Agile para facilitar la creación de entornos colaborativos y seguros para que las organizaciones puedan explorar todo su potencial para generar valor duradero.

In this episode of our Agile Amped podcast, we introduce the exciting program planned as a part of the Enterprise Agility Roundtable. Our esteemed speakers, Alexander Birke, Enterprise Agility Coach at Accenture, and Silke Eggert, Head of Lean Portfolio Management & Transformation at Vodafone, along with guests from several prominent German corporate organizations, are here to kick things off. The program begins with an opening keynote from John Smart, founder of Sooner, Safer, and Happier, discussing ‘Optimizing for Outcomes'. The second keynote, part of the Atlassian-Vodafone collaboration, explores how GenAI will enhance workforce efficiency. Tune in to hear how synergies were created through the exchange of best practices, ideas, and stories with other Lean Agile leaders.

In the latest episode of Agile Amped, recorded at the SAFe Summit 2024, Peter Palmér, Senior Transformation Strategist at Scania, and Helena Westman, Lean-Agile Coach, discuss their lean-agile transformation journey within the TRATON group. This group includes four strong brands: MAN, Navistar, Scania, and VW Truck & Bus, each with its unique identity and culture. Peter Palmér, with extensive experience in production, engineering, and quality, and a prominent speaker on lean product development (LPD) and leadership, shares his insights. Helena Westman, a dedicated lean-agile coach with a rich background in IT operations and contract management, brings her expertise in motivating and leading teams. Tune in to hear their insights on the complexities of driving lean-agile transformation across diverse and successful brands.

Welcome to the Mob Mentality Show! In this episode, "Mobbing in the Midst of Waterfalls," we explore how mobbing can survive and even thrive when surrounded by traditional waterfall teams. Full of practical insights, this episode is especially helpful for those navigating diverse workflows. ### Topics Covered: **1. Mobbing in Lean/Agile vs. Waterfall** Learn the key differences and challenges, and how mobbing can bridge the gap between these methodologies. **2. Collective Automation** Discover how mob teams collaborate on automation and pipelines with waterfall teams to aid tech integration. Understand how mob teams can drive automation initiatives that benefit the entire organization.  **3. WIP and Scope Negotiation** Master the art of negotiating WIP and thin slice scopes with waterfall teams. **4. Scheduling Mob Time** Find practical strategies to mob with waterfall team members, overcoming scheduling conflicts. **.5 Avoiding Bottlenecks** Learn how to support others and ensure smooth progress that prevent workflow congestion. **6. Rogue Lean Story** Hear a concrete story about maintaining lean principles within a waterfall framework. Discover strategies to fight for optimal cycle times. **7. Creative Solutions** Unlock innovative solutions by thinking of third alternatives to achieve business goals. Gain a clear understanding of business problems, ensuring flexibility and adaptability in tech solutions. ### Why Listen? This episode offers practical advice, real-world stories, and insights on maintaining mobbing techniques within waterfall environments. Tune in to balance agility and structure, foster continuous improvement, and drive successful automation across your organization. Don't miss this enlightening episode of the Mob Mentality Show – "Mobbing in the Midst of Waterfalls." Subscribe now! **Subscribe to the Mob Mentality Show on YouTube and your favorite podcast platforms for more insightful discussions and advice.** Video and show notes: https://youtu.be/t9v0T6saH10 

Doug Rabow: Continuous Feedback As A Forcing Function For Focus, and Productivity in Agile Teams Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. The Great Product Owner: Continuous Feedback As A Forcing Function For Focus, and Productivity in Agile Teams Highlighting the characteristics of an extraordinary Product Owner, Doug shows the importance of questioning, transparency, and customer collaboration in that role. This episode also shows how great Product Owners manage to maintain clarity and progress amidst project uncertainty, and offers insights into practices that promote continuous feedback and adaptive project management. The Bad Product Owner: The Perils of Isolation, A Product Owner Anti-Pattern That Derails Agile Teams Doug shares what can happen when the  Product Owner works in isolation. Doug also explains how this approach can derail team progress. Learn about the crucial role of collaboration and problem definition in the Product Owner's responsibilities.   [IMAGE HERE] Are you having trouble helping the team work well with their Product Owner? We've put together a course to help you work on the collaboration team-product owner. You can find it at bit.ly/coachyourpo. 18 modules, 8+ hours of modules with tools and techniques that you can use to help teams and PO's collaborate.   About Doug Rabow Doug is a passionate practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with a focus on developing empowered teams and Lean process improvement.   You can link with Doug Rabow on LinkedIn.

Doug Rabow: Daily Standups as a Success Barometer in Agile, And Other Lessons For Scrum Masters Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. In this segment, Doug discusses the dual aspects of success for Scrum Masters: defining it and demonstrating it to others. We also talk about how the quality of daily standups reflects the overall health of the Agile practices in the team. We also explore how fostering an environment of good-faith feedback and continuous improvement can lead to success for Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches. Featured Retrospective Format for the Week: Asking Questions In this segment about Agile Retrospectives, Doug highlights the importance of asking pointed, empathetic questions during retrospectives to uncover deep insights about team dynamics and challenges. We learn about the role that well-crafted questions play in driving continuous improvement. And learn how Doug's approach of integrating impactful questions into conversations, helps teams to navigate and overcome obstacles more effectively.   [IMAGE HERE] Retrospectives, planning sessions, vision workshops, we are continuously helping teams learn about how to collaborate in practice! In this Actionable Agile Tools book, Jeff Campbell shares some of the tools he's learned over a decade of coaching Agile Teams. The pragmatic coaching book you need, right now! Buy Actionable Agile Tools on Amazon, or directly from the author, and supercharge your facilitation toolbox!    About Doug Rabow Doug is a passionate practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with a focus on developing empowered teams and Lean process improvement.   You can link with Doug Rabow on LinkedIn.  

Doug Rabow: Agile Governance, Creating Transparency and Overhauling Project Management to Fit Agile Product Development Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. In this episode, Doug shares his strategies for improving visibility and governance in project management through tools like JIRA. He explains how creating transparency enhances governance and accountability in agile teams. This episode also offers a practical look at setting up light governance frameworks that enable real-time, pull-based reporting to facilitate better decision-making and project management.   [IMAGE HERE] As Scrum Master we work with change continuously! Do you have your own change framework that provides the guidance, and queues you need when working with change? The Lean Change Management framework is a fully defined, lean-startup inspired change framework that can be used as the backbone of any change process! You can buy Lean Change Management the book at Amazon. Also available in French, Spanish, German and Portuguese.   About Doug Rabow Doug is a passionate practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with a focus on developing empowered teams and Lean process improvement.   You can link with Doug Rabow on LinkedIn.  

Doug Rabow: Prioritize, Visualize, Execute, A Lean Approach to Work Management in Agile Teams Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. Doug explores some of the critical aspects of team management that ensure efficiency and clarity. Doug also shares how visual management is essential for maintaining focus on top priorities within teams. We learn about the Five S from Lean, and how simplifying and visually organizing work can prevent priority confusion and, in the end, improve productivity. Featured Book of the Week: The Toyota Way by Jeffrey Liker In this episode, we explore lessons from The Toyota Way by Jeffrey Liker beyond manufacturing. Doug describes how The Toyota Way applies to strategic management and software development, focusing on high-quality, small batches. Discover how continuous feedback drives continuous improvement, and what Agile learned from Lean Manufacturing.   [IMAGE HERE] Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches - Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM's that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!     About Doug Rabow Doug is a passionate practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with a focus on developing empowered teams and Lean process improvement.   You can link with Doug Rabow on LinkedIn.

Doug Rabow: The Delicate Dance of Driving Change, Learning How To Time Change Input in Agile Teams Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. When facilitating change, jumping in too quickly can be problematic. Doug shares a story of his experience stepping into a less competitive industry, eager to implement numerous improvements. However, the existing team was content with their workflow, which created resistance to Doug's ideas. In this episode, we explore how Scrum Masters can help drive change without overwhelming their teams. And how facilitators can balance improvement enthusiasm with team readiness, and why involving the team in the change process is crucial.   [IMAGE HERE] Recovering from failure, or difficult moments is a critical skill for Scrum Masters. Not only because of us, but also because the teams, and stakeholders we work with will also face these moments! We need inspiring stories to help them, and ourselves! The Bungsu Story, is an inspiring story by Marcus Hammarberg which shows how a Coach can help organizations recover even from the most disastrous situations! Learn how Marcus helped The Bungsu, a hospital in Indonesia, recover from near-bankruptcy, twice! Using Lean and Agile methods to rebuild an organization and a team! An inspiring story you need to know about! Buy the book on Amazon: The Bungsu Story - How Lean and Kanban Saved a Small Hospital in Indonesia. Twice. and Can Help You Reshape Work in Your Company.   About Doug Rabow Doug is a passionate practitioner of Lean-Agile strategic management with a focus on developing empowered teams and Lean process improvement.   You can link with Doug Rabow on LinkedIn.

Bio  Fabiola is a pioneer and thought leader in Agile HR and Co-Founder of Just Leading Solutions, a global transformation consultancy for HR and Business Agility. As a seasoned Management Consultant and Executive Advisor, she works with key players around the globe and across the private, corporate, and social sectors. She helps them become more adaptive and innovative by maximizing the potential of their people function. Fabiola is a Switzerland native living in New York. She is an avid New York Rangers fan.   Interview Highlights 03:20 Business Agility 04:35 The Impact of Technology 07:45 How HR Fits into Business Agility 10:35 Making the Change 13:50 Sustainable Initiatives 16:25 Agile HR vs Agility in HR 18:35 Workforce Planning Sessions 30:15 The Agile HR Course   Links ·         JLS Website: www.justleadingsolutions.com ·         Training Overview: Agile HR Training ·         Agile HR Explorer: Agile HR Explorer Training ·         LinkedIn Fabiola Eyholzer   Books & Resources ·         The Connected Company, Dave Gray ·         Thinking in Systems, Donella Meadows ·         The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and Growth, Amy Edmondson   ·         The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups, Daniel Coyle   Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I'm Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku So I have with me here Fabiola Eyholzer, she is the Co-Founder and CEO of Just Leading Solutions, a New York based consultancy for Lean Agile People Operations. Fabiola, it's a massive honour and pleasure to have you on this show. Thank you for being my guest on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. Fabiola Eyholzer Thank you, Ula, the pleasure is all mine. Ula Ojiaku So how did you get into this, you know, Lean Agile space? Fabiola Eyholzer So it's actually quite an interesting story. It's now 13 years ago when I was running the Swiss market for a European HR consultancy, and we were looking for a new leadership model for our career starters. And I met some Agile coaches and they're like, oh, you have to do Scrum, and I'm like, well, did you hear me say that we are an HR consultancy, we're not a software developer. She's like, trust me, it's the right thing to do, so we did a test run. So we introduced Scrum, which is the predominant Agile practice with our career starters, and it was such an eye opener to see what actually happens when we work in this new way that I knew this is the future, and I decided there and then to quit my job and dedicate the next phase of my career to Agile HR. Ula Ojiaku Wow. And since then, what sorts of organisations or projects or initiatives have you worked on? Fabiola Eyholzer So we've worked on so many different initiatives and with so many different companies and I actually had to look it up, I was in over 21 countries with the topic of HR Agility, and in that time I worked with companies across all industries, across all sectors, from profit, to non-profit, to education. And something that is really interesting is that at the end of the day, it doesn't matter that much what your corporate culture is, what your social culture is, when it comes to the people function, we want to make sure how do we maximise the people function, how do we leverage what we are doing in HR in a way that is highly beneficial for our employees, and with that, highly beneficial for our organisations. And of course, right now we are in that situation that the world of work around us is changing massively, you know, it's just being turned upside down. And this is, on the one hand, really scary, on the other hand, it's a massive chance to really reinvent HR, and really do things differently. Ula Ojiaku Something that stands out to me is you're saying it's an opportunity to reinvent HR and we will get back to that, but before we do, what does business agility mean to you? Fabiola Eyholzer So for me, business agility is really ensuring that our companies are engaging and adaptive and innovative so that they can thrive in that fast paced and constantly changing, highly dynamic environment. And at the core, what it means is that organisations and institutions are shifting away from being well oiled machines to being thriving ecosystems, because adaptability means exploring change, enabling change and being able to be change ready and to manage change to flex their muscles, to explore opportunities very quickly, to act on opportunities and not be scared, not be afraid to pivot and to course correct. And that's what we are seeing right now, that companies have to shift away from a model that served us really well for 150 years to a new system that is always at the edge of chaos, but that's the only way to continue to thrive and be adaptive in that fast paced, highly dynamic environment. Ula Ojiaku And would you say, I've, this is the first time I'm hearing that phrase, edge of chaos, but I do agree, and would you say that in this day and age, because the nature of the work we do, compared to 150 years ago, or even some years ago, it's for the most part getting to be knowledge-based, especially in technology. Is that one of the considerations for the change we need in the way we organise and run our companies or groups or teams? Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, technology is definitely a massive game changer for us, but it's not just about changing the way we work or changing the way our processes work. And quite often when we talk about technology in the HR space, people think about, you know, putting our HR process onto new, fancier digital process, but that's not just what it's about. It's more about understanding how much is technology and everything else that goes hand in hand with that, how is it changing the way that we work, and it leaves us with that very fundamental question, what type of work is left for us humans? If everything around us is being automated, and you know when we think about automation, a lot of people think about assembly line work going away, you know, routine work going away. And that was true 20 years ago. But today, work is being automated in every single field imaginable. And it's not just routine work that is being automated, and that leaves us with that question, what type of work is left for us? The answer is, it's the type of work that requires our passion and our potential for collaboration, ideation, our social and emotional intelligence. And of course, we are solving problems we never had to solve before, so there is no script, and that means we need to organise our companies in a different way. We need to organise work in a different way so that we can manage that ongoing fast paced change and that we can continue to solve problems we haven't solved before. And that's why we need to shift away from being a well oiled machine that has everything already figured out and written into job descriptions and competency models and objectives and KPIs to a company that can create and respond to change very quickly. Ula Ojiaku So given your definition of what business agility means to you and the case you've made for change, in the sense that we're at the edge of chaos and the sorts of work we need to do right now because technology, almost everything can be and will be automated in one way or the other, so where does HR fit in into this, in the light of business agility? Fabiola Eyholzer I can give you a very straightforward, simple answer. The role of HR in business agility is that HR is the secret to business agility, because if we don't align our people approach, and if we don't align our HR practices to the new realities and new demands, we're not going to be successful. So if we don't engage in talent scouting and talent enablement and performance acceleration in a way that is aligned with the new way of working, we cannot achieve business agility. Ula Ojiaku And how ready would you say the HR function is for this sort of transformation? Fabiola Eyholzer So the companies that we work with, or that I have the pleasure of working with, they are ready, or at least they're not scared to try. So they're courageous enough to try. As an industry in human resources, I think we have a long way to go. On the one hand, we see that things are changing and we're trying super hard to change with the times, but quite often we don't have that fundamental understanding that the entire mindset, the entire DNA of the organisation is going to change, and unless we understand that new mindset, that new DNA, we will not be able to change or maximise the people function in a way that is most beneficial for Agile enterprise. So we have a long way to go. Ula Ojiaku How would you know if an organisation's HR function is ready? Are there some indicators that they're ready to go on this journey if they haven't started already? Fabiola Eyholzer One of the indicators is if they have more questions than answers, they're probably there. So, because the companies are just saying, oh, we've done this, we've done that, tick, tick, tick. They're probably not the ones with that growth mindset that Agile organisations need. Okay, so that's one indicator. The other indicator is that they're not satisfied with the status quo and at the same time they are willing to do something about it. So I sometimes say, we have a gut feeling that tells us there must be a better way out there to engage with people, to create a learning organisation, to inspire people. And if we listen to that gut feeling, then we need to be gutsy about it, to change it, to do something about it. And these are some of the things that we see in organisations that we work with, they are not afraid to challenge the status quo. They realise we need to change and we need to change now. Ula Ojiaku And okay, when they have identified, yes, we need to change, we need to change now, what's your typical direction or steer or guidance to these organisations and their leaders in terms of where to start? Would you say, let's take a big bang approach and overhaul everything? Or would it be small iterative steps towards the change? What's your typical approach? How would you advise them? Fabiola Eyholzer So I'm going to give you the consultant answer, it depends. So it depends on the change readiness and change willingness of the company. We have a lot of companies where we have amazing success, when we took one part of the organisation, typically around 500 to 2500 people, where we changed the entire HR approach. We had some companies where we have had amazing success with a big bang where we really transformed the entire HR organisation, but it really depends on how ready are you to explore and also how willing are you, how much do you want to put in, how much energy and passion and resources are you willing to put into that transformation? But one thing that we always do is, we start with training and inspiring people, because we talk about a new world of work. And while this is easy to say, you know, people initially envisioned this is about virtual work, or working from home. Well that's a tiny part of what we're talking about when it comes to this new world of work, and because this new world of work is rooted in such a fundamentally different mindset, we first need to understand that mindset, and we need to speak the same language, because quite often we're using words that have a very different meaning in the Agile space versus the traditional corporate environment. And I can give you an example, for instance, if we talk about hiring for potential, you know, what are we looking for? In the traditional way of looking at potential, it's, does someone have the potential to thrive in that particular role, and does someone have the potential to take the next step in a predefined career trajectory? But that's not what we're talking about when we talk about hiring for potential in the agile space. We are talking about hiring for potential to thrive in an uncertain, complex, ambiguous, volatile world. Does someone feel comfortable with uncertainty, not knowing what their job is going to look like 12 months from now? Does someone feel comfortable with flexing their muscles, with learning and unlearning new things? So it's a very different understanding of a simple work word ‘hiring for potential'. So that's what we're doing, is speaking that new language, understanding why and how this new world is so fundamentally different. Ula Ojiaku Well, that's very, very thought provoking and some of the things in my little experience that I would expect leaders of such organisations to say like, yes, well and good, you know, you inspire us, there's a case for change, but how can we make sure this isn't one of those multiple failed large change initiatives with engagement? How would we know we will make this sustainable? Fabiola Eyholzer So you will never have a guarantee, but what is a massive game changer, and what's crucial to the success of any transformation is your commitment, okay? So you have to stick with it, even, or especially, when the going gets tough. And since we are working in such a different way, it's super easy to fall back into old patterns of behaviour when there are problems that come up, when we need to reprioritise, when something unforeseen happens, it's super easy to fall back, and that's when you have to keep going. And I think that dedication is one of the key aspects. And also what's interesting about agility is when you learn about Agile and how it works, and what the values are, it resonates with us. Of course it does, because it was created for the human economy, so it taps into what we bring to the table. So it sounds super easy and straightforward, let's talk about empowering people, who doesn't want to feel empowered, but then it's, we have to figure out what does that mean for us in an organisation, what does empowerment mean? How do we share that empowerment? How do we allow the teams to explore, to learn, to stumble, to fail, to course correct? It's not always that easy to then actually follow through. And I always say the devil is in the detail when it comes to Agile. You know, it sounds super easy on the surface, but when you dig in deeper, it gets more challenging. Ula Ojiaku It's almost like learning to play a game of chess. Yes, you might know how the different pieces move on the board, but actually the getting into it, it's a lifelong pursuit to become a grandmaster, almost anyway. I really enjoyed going through your course, the Agile HR Explorer course that's on the Scaled Agile platform open to SBCs, but there was something that you mentioned in that course, Agile HR versus Agility in HR. Can you explain for the benefit of the audience, you know, what these two terms mean and how they differ? Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, so the word HR has two meanings. So when people talk about HR, they can either mean the HR department, your compensation specialist, your learning expert, your grading instructor. So all these HR professions, so the entire HR department and that. Or they can mean HR as a discipline, as a function, where we talk about talent acquisition and performance management and learning and development, workforce planning and so on. And because there is that duality to it, we also have a different approach to agility. And that's when you hear those words, Agile for HR, so meaning what can Agile do for the HR department or HR for Agile, meaning what does HR do for the Agile teams, for the Agile organisation, and the approach is slightly different. So when we bring Agile to the HR department, it's all about how do we work in a different way? How do we organise around value? How do we deliver value faster, in a better way? So it's implementing all these Agile practices, the natural practices and ceremonies and artifacts within the HR department. Whereas the other side is really, how do we align all our HR practices to this new way of working, and that's really where the magic happens. So if we shift from recruiting to talent scouting, if we shift from learning and development to talent enablement, if we shift from performance management to performance acceleration, that's when we help the organisation become and stay Agile, that's when we bring business, or enable business agility across the organisation. Ula Ojiaku And there's something you said about workforce planning, you know, so in terms of the function, if I may just go slightly off tangent, it's a question that's been on my mind in the sense that, is there a way that one could approach workforce planning that would undermine the agility of the organisation? So I'm going to give a hypothetical example. So there are some organisations who might be saying, do you know what, in this economy, we need to balance out our talent mix, and we want new, fresh talent who, maybe fresh graduates who are, they will cost cheaper, they probably are up to date with new technologies versus, you know, existing talent who might be more expensive. So is there a way that one might approach workforce planning that could be detrimental, because there are pros and cons to every approach potentially, but in your experience, in the multiple organisations you've supported and continue to support, could there be things we could watch out for that might undermine our agility in that space? Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, so the way that we look at it is when we look at talent and what talent brings to the table, we don't look at it from, is this talent expensive or cheap? It's about how much value does this talent add to the organisation? Okay, so it's a value based way of looking at it, rather than a cost based, right. So that's the first part. The other part is that we, what we want to do with adaptive workforce planning is that we can explore opportunities very quickly, so it has to be a way where it's easy for us to say, hey, we have new initiatives come up that require new skills that we are very proactive about it, that, let's say we need more AI experience or Blockchain experience or whatever it is in the future, if we know that today that there is a high chance that we need it, let's look at the organisation. Do we already have people who have experience or skills in that particular field? Can they train others? Do we have to start building, putting up a training program ourselves? Do we have to get external talent in that can give us a leg up? Can we work with exploratory assignments to get people that experience? So there's so many things that we can do, and the focus with anything that we do in agility is always about now and the future, whereas in the traditional workforce planning, it's more about the past and today. And if you think about it, workforce planners, they don't have a full overview of what are the initiatives the teams are going to be working on six months from now, but we think it's going to be 12 months from now. And that's what we do with the active workforce planning in the Agile space. We have that forward looking approach. We look at our talent pool and say, what's the strength of our talent pool, not just compared to the initiatives that we're doing today, but to the initiatives that we think are coming up. And the beauty about this is, and here you see that we're really applying systems thinking, is that this is then opening up growth opportunities for our employees, because if we want to be an Agile organisation, we need to be a learning organisation first. Ula Ojiaku I do like what you're saying about the adaptive workforce planning and it does align with that, you know, responding to change over just sticking to a plan. How often would you recommend or how often in your view would it be practical to be having these sorts of workforce planning sessions? Fabiola Eyholzer We do it once a quarter with our clients, because that allows you to then also collaborate, because this is about talent management, you know, where do we see things that people need to learn, what they want to focus on, do we need to open up exploratory assignments, do we need to assign people to different teams, all of these things we need to know before we go into our quarterly planning. So if we talk in SAFe terminologies, you want that to happen before your PI planning so that you can make sure that those people topics are part of the backlog. So we work with capacity allocation, all of that, to make sure that we have people topics on that, so that's why we do it once a quarter. Ula Ojiaku Okay. And I would assume, you know, once a quarter, those people topics, because there's also the respect for the individual or the people involved, there would be some factoring in that there will be conversations with the individuals to say, hey, this is what we think is going to happen, what's your opinion? Do you want to go instead of just shifting them into positions and maybe them learning on the day of the PI Planning your team has changed. Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, and, you know, in the Agile space, we talk a good game about empowerment and we know how it works when it comes to work, but of course, empowerment also means empowering people when it comes to their learning and growth journey. So, hey, the people manager, people developer and HR are there to open up opportunities for them, but at the end of the day, they have to be on that journey by themselves, they have to make those steps, they have to go through that door, they have to go out and learn and explore and bring themselves into play. So it's, what's empowerment when it comes to their own growth and learning. Ula Ojiaku Thanks for that Fabiola. Would you say that when you do this adaptive workforce planning, does it make sense for one area or team or division or department to be compared with another? And I'll tie it back, I'll just give you some context, because I've heard of organisations, you know, doing it based on, oh, we want to make sure our cost base is, you know, our overheads, we're cutting it, I know everyone is doing a good job but we want to cut it, can we start measuring this department with that department in terms of workforce planning. I do resonate with that value base, instead of looking at how much they cost, what's the value these people, these talents are bringing? What's your view on, in the process of doing this, comparing one unit or department with another in their workforce planning approach? Fabiola Eyholzer So there are two aspects to it. One is, what data do we measure? And the second part is what do we do with the data? So for instance, when it comes to adaptive workforce planning, for instance, one of the important KPIs that we have is looking at the talent pool strength. So how strong is the talent pool compared to what we're working on right now? What we're going to work on in the next one or two quarters and three to four quarters out. But we're measuring that just so that we have a data point to get us talking. So this is not about comparing my team to your team and my team is better than your team, that's not what this is about. It's more about having a data point that allows us to have a conversation, that allows us to see, are we moving into the right direction? So, and I think that's important to all the KPIs. Why are we measuring them? And what are we doing with the data? And also the question, are we measuring the right things? And something that we often see is that people don't differentiate between leading and lagging indicators. So, for instance, a simple example in HR, we often look at retention rates, which is a great measure to have. But here's the thing, a retention rate is a lagging indicator, a lot of stuff has already happened, you know, and people did that quiet quitting probably long before they actually handed in their notice. So while we want to have that data point, there are other data points that are probably going to be better for us to be proactive, to do things about it. So always think about why are we measuring something? Are we measuring the right things? Are we measuring the things that are easy to measure? And for instance, cost is a data point that is easy to measure, but it doesn't say anything about the value. If someone used a hundred percent of their budget, well, did they do well? We don't know. Maybe they could have done the same thing with 70% of the budget, or maybe they should have gone to 120 and created something amazing for the future. So, really think about why are we measuring things and what are we doing with the data? Ula Ojiaku It just reminds me of a conversation I had and I said, what if we don't look at the cost and what if we also asked, are they meeting the targets that you set for them, the objectives that you set for them, and could they be setting up your organisation to make, you know, quantum leaps of progress by the work they're doing right now. So, and some of these things we can't see into the future, it's only retrospective, and that's where the leading indicators you talked about, although you talked about it differently from, you know, measuring attrition and people leaving and retention and all that, but there are ways of knowing in advance whether our guess is most likely to be correct, and sometimes measuring money or the cost isn't always the best metric, so I really like what you said about that. Thank you. Fabiola Eyholzer And also when you think about it, so many organisations, they want to be innovative and adaptive. At the same time, they focus so much on efficiency and, you know, following a script, following a plan, you know, hitting certain numbers that are set in stone, that they actually lose agility and adaptability and innovation, but they don't see the connection between the two, they don't see the connection between their leadership approach and their HR and finance and legal processes and how that is impacting one way or another how innovative they are, how creative they are. Ula Ojiaku I do recognise we're kind of teetering whenever we talk about the cost, we're teetering between, you know, finance, but they are all intertwined, like you just pointed out, it's all intertwined and it's a delicate ecosystem where you're always going to have to be doing something to stay in balance. What you did yesterday might not necessarily work today, so it's all about sensing and responding and I do appreciate what you've said so far. So what led to your developing the Agile HR course, which is now on the Scaled Agile platform? Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, I co-created or co-founded JLS, I think, nine years ago, and we very early on realised that we need to have a training to sort of do that level setting, get people that foundation, foundational knowledge to succeed in their transformation efforts. And that's when we created a series of different courses, and one of them is the Explore course that you mentioned. It's a one day course, it's great for anyone who's new or fairly new to Agile, Agile HR, you know, someone who wants to know more about it, and this is really an important first step to a longer learning and growth journey. But if you're new to Agile and you're in HR, this is definitely a great training. It's a one day training that gives you, starts out with the new world of work, you know, why is it so different? Why do we have so much pressure on performance management and career models and so on and so forth? Then what is Agile? And we explain Agile, not using technology based examples, but HR examples, you know, what does good design mean in the HR space? So we really explain the Agile manifesto and Agile values and principles from a HR perspective, and then we bring these worlds together and we talk about what is Agile HR and how do we apply that to different HR practices? So it's going to give you a well-rounded introduction to the field of HR Agility. Ula Ojiaku And is this available on the JLS website? Fabiola Eyholzer Yes, so all our trainings are available on our website and also our partner companies offer Agile HR training, you can go to an open enrolment class or you can bring it to your own organisation to train either an entire department or a team. And it's especially valuable when you start out on a new initiative, you know, it doesn't matter whether your company is already Agile or planning to become more Agile, if you're tasked with reinventing performance management or, you know, doing a new initiative, a new project, this is always a good way to get into it and say, okay, how can we make Agile work for us before we then help the organisation be more Agile? Ula Ojiaku We'll definitely have the link to your website in the show notes with your episode. So what I'm hearing is it's available, there are some partners as well that offer this training, which you and your team have curated. But if someone says, no, I want you, Fabiola, to come to do this for us, is that possible as well? Fabiola Eyholzer Absolutely. You can go to our website and contact me or you can hunt me down on LinkedIn, I'm the only one with my name, so you should be able to find me and just send me a message and we can definitely collaborate. Ula Ojiaku Okay. Well, what excites you about what you do currently? Fabiola Eyholzer Oh, I tell people I have the best job in the world because I get to work with amazing people, amazing companies, you know, people and companies who are not afraid to push the status quo, you know, who are courageous to do things differently and who are not afraid to push boundaries, because we're getting into uncharted territory. When you think about human resources, the term HR was first used in 1893 by J. R. Commons. So HR is this year, 120 years old, and of course we've evolved, you know, we changed from personnel management to modern HR and everything, but we're at the cusp of a new era that is going to be fundamentally different from anything else that we've done in the past. And if you think about it, it's never been this exciting to be in HR. We get to reinvent and shape the future of HR, or the people function, whether you call it talent and culture, or employee success or people and culture, whatever term you're using, we are reinventing it, and I'm in the middle of it, so I get to help organisations do this. Ula Ojiaku That's exciting. I can sense the passion and the enthusiasm there. Would you be writing a book on this topic anytime soon? Fabiola Eyholzer Maybe one day. Ula Ojiaku Maybe, okay. Whilst we will be eagerly waiting for your book, what books would you recommend to people who might be wondering, okay, what else could I read to, to get abreast on this, or generally any books that you would recommend that have made an impact or impression on you? Fabiola Eyholzer So one book that had a really big impact on me was The Connected Company. So it talks about the company being more like a city, rather than an engine, and even though it doesn't talk about agility, it doesn't talk about human resources, there is so much food for thought in there, you just have to put that thought in to make that translation into HR, but I thought that was a fantastic book. Then obviously Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows. I'm a systems thinker myself, so that definitely resonated a lot. And of course there are other books like The Culture Code, Fearless Organization, books like that, that can, you know, really give you a lot of food for thought. Ula Ojiaku Thank you very much. These would be in the show notes. And would there be any ask before we round up that you would have for the audience? Fabiola Eyholzer So don't be afraid to push boundaries and to challenge the status quo. As I said earlier, every time you have that gut feeling there is a better way out there, well, chance is that there actually is. So don't be afraid to push boundaries. Don't be afraid to try. And I know everyone sometimes feels that they're in that hamster wheel, that they have so many things to do already that they can't take on something else, but I tell you from personal experience and from my experience working in that field for, for 10 years, it is a game changer. And if you're willing to put in the work, the results are going to be amazing. Yes, actually it's hard work, but it really delivers what it promises. Don't be scared, be courageous, do it. Ula Ojiaku Thank you very much Fabiola for those words of wisdom. It's been a pleasure. I've thoroughly enjoyed this conversation and I hope, you know, we would have some follow up sometime in future. Many thanks Fabiola. Fabiola Eyholzer Anytime. Thank you so much. Pleasure was all mine. Ula Ojiaku That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com or your favourite podcast provider. Also share with friends and do leave a review on iTunes. This would help others find this show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com Take care and God bless!   

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. We explore a real-life project that Marcus was part of, and how the #NoEstimates methods he used helped him make predictions, even if did not estimate the work to be done. About Dan Vacanti and Marcus Hammarberg Daniel Vacanti is a 20+ year software industry veteran who has spent most of the last years focusing on Lean and Agile practices. In 2007, he helped to develop the Kanban Method for knowledge work. He also co-founded ActionableAgile which provides industry leading predictive analytics tools and services to any Lean-Agile process. Dan co-founded ProKanban.org a community focused initiative to help people learn about Kanban. You can link with Dan Vacanti on LinkedIn and connect with Dan Vacanti on Twitter.  Marcus Hammarberg is the author of Salvation: The Bungsu Story (available on Amazon), an inspiring and actionable story about how simple tools can help transform the productivity and impact of an organization. The real-life stories in The Bungsu can help you transform the productivity of your team. Marcus is also a renowned author in the Kanban community, he authored the book Kanban in Action with Joakim Sundén. Head of Curriculum School of applied technology.  You can link with Marcus Hammarberg on LinkedIn and connect with Marcus Hammarberg on Twitter.

Today I'm thrilled to be joined by two guests as part of our Founders & Friends series! For these shows, we encourage a member of our network to extend the invitation to a new friend to hop on the mic to talk about their founder stories and get their take on building a successful startup in today's market!Joining us first is our friend Alina Guidu, CEO of Muze, a platform that enables Independent artists to release music and connect directly with their fans, bypassing the traditional gatekeepers in the music industry and ensuring artists get access to up to 90% of their work's revenue. She's an experienced entrepreneur with a demonstrated history of driving success in the media and Web3 industries, and I'm excited to learn how she's putting these skills to use disrupting the way music is shared in the twenty-first century.Joining Alina and me is Saleha Jaweid, who is a Toronto-based IT Operations Rockstar with a wealth of experience driving innovation across Canada, where she's focused on creating highly productive technology teams. She currently leads IT Ops at Topl, the world's first blockchain built for tracking, tokenizing, and monetizing positive impact. She has worked with many different companies and startups as both a tactical team member and funder, helping them become operationally savvy and inculcate a Lean-Agile mindset.For both Alina and Saleha, there is a lot of R&D and innovative tech involved in their current missions, and I can't wait to learn about what they're working on today, how they got into the startup space in the first place, and their goals for the future!Boast AI accelerates the success of innovative businesses globally with software that integrates financial, payroll, and engineering data into a single platform of R&D intelligence. Visit Boast.ai, sign up for our Blog newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn for weekly #InnovatorsLive sessions and the latest news to fuel your growth. Intro and Outro music provided by Dennis Ma whose mixes you can find on Soundcloud at DJ DennyDex.

Implementar un marco de trabajo Ágil puede parecer sencillo. Normalmente las “reglas de juego” de cada marco están claras, pero no es suficiente con seguirlas de manera mecánica para conseguir una transformación organizacional profunda. En esta sesión, veremos algunos de los principales retos a superar si realmente queremos lograr un cambio cultural en las organizaciones. – Acerca de la ponente, Karen Caramelo – Apasionada por el concepto “lifelong learning”, trabajo para mejorar organizaciones a través del desarrollo de personas y proyectos. Mi experiencia en Educación No Formal y Lean Manufacturing en contextos cambiantes me permite utilizar un enfoque Lean-Agile para ayudar a construir entornos seguros y de colaboración donde generar valor en las organizaciones. Soy ingeniera industrial, con master en organización de la producción y gestión industrial. Actúo como formadora, facilitadora y agente de cambio organizacional. Dedico mi tiempo libre a desarrollar programas de liderazgo y desarrollo personal en ONGs, para que estudiantes y jóvenes trabajadores puedan poner su granito de arena en generar un impacto social que contribuya a la creación de un mundo mucho mejor.

Welcome to Episode 14 of "Clean at Work," where we delve into the fusion of clean language with strategic thinking. Our esteemed guest this week is Mike Burrows, founder of AgendaShift, renowned for his innovative approach to integrating clean language into strategic conversations. In this episode, Mike shares his insights on how clean language can revolutionize strategy-related discussions in technology organizations and beyond. He emphasizes the importance of focusing on outcomes before rushing to solutions, highlighting how this approach saves time and fosters more inclusive, effective conversations. Mike walks us through his "ideal obstacles outcomes" principle, which aligns with systemic modelling techniques. This method encourages exploring the ideal scenario first, then addressing multiple obstacles, creating a more holistic view of the challenges and opportunities. Mike's approach underscores the value of rich, outcome-oriented conversations with diverse voices and perspectives. The discussion also touches upon the practical application of clean language in Mike's facilitated work, including his famous "Fifteen-Minute FOTO" game. This game is a brilliant example of how clean language can be used in a structured yet flexible way to generate meaningful outcomes and strategies. Mike's insights extend beyond mere technique, delving into the nuances of leadership, organizational discourse, and the transformational impact of clean language on workplace communication. He shares his experiences with coaching, the challenges of integrating new tools into established practices, and the importance of respecting the client's mental model. As the conversation unfolds, Mike and our hosts explore the dynamic relationship between problems, obstacles, outcomes, and the broader context of strategic thinking. This episode offers a wealth of knowledge for anyone interested in enhancing their strategic conversations with clean language, from agile coaches to business leaders. Join us for this enlightening discussion with Mike Burrows, where we uncover the synergies between clean language and strategic thought, providing listeners with actionable insights to implement in their workplaces. The game discussed in the podcast can be found here: https://www.agendashift.com/resources/15-minute-foto About the Speaker Mike Burrows is the author of Agendashift: Outcome-oriented Change and continuous transformation (2nd edition March 2021), Right to Left: The digital leader's guide to Lean and Agile (2019, audiobook 2020), and the Lean-Agile classic Kanban from the Inside (2014). Mike is recognized for his pioneering work in Lean, Agile, and Kanban and for his advocacy for participatory and outcome-oriented approaches to change, transformation, and strategy.  Prior to his consulting career, he was global development manager and Executive Director at a top tier investment bank, CTO for an energy risk management startup, and interim delivery manager for two of the UK government's digital 'exemplar' projects. Through Agendashift and the Agendashift Academy, his focus now is on wholehearted, deliberately adaptive organizations and the transformational leadership that enables them. About the Hosts: John Barratt (https://www.agileaffinity.com/) loves seeing individuals, teams, and organizations become the best they can be. He does this using a mixture of coaching approaches embedded with the agile mindset. John spends most of his time supporting organizations to descale and self-organize, relying heavily on the systemic modelling skills he learned through his ongoing training from Caitlin Walker. Sarah Baca (http://www.nerdyknights.com/) is a coach, therapist, facilitator, and teacher who has a passion for using clean language to help others discover what makes them feel vibrantly alive. She has been working with organizations as an agile coach for over a decade, specializing in enterprise and leadership coaching. 

Is your funding rationale the best match for your organization's MVPs and development value stream? In today's episode, Joe Vallone, SPCT and SAFe® Fellow, describes the Real Options financial framework and why it's attractive for funding Lean-Agile development. Read the article Joe mentions in the podcast. Like what you hear? Connect with Joe on LinkedIn. Explore SAFe courses here.

In the first part of the finale of the Complexity series, hosts Kristof Van Tomme (CEO and co-founder at Pronovix) and Marc Burgauer (Principal Consultant and Co-founder at Contextualise) interview Lean Agile coach and Contextualise co-founder, Chris McDermott who explains how he helps leaders navigate uncertainty through honest conversations, how a social science lens can benefit software development teams, and why context matters when we're adapting practices.

Description: In this insightful episode, we welcome Gene Lee, the transformation strategist and the mind behind the groundbreaking LA5C Framework. With 15 years of rich experience, Gene unveils the essence of successful business transformation, laying down the foundation of his unique Blue Ocean LA5C Framework which has been pivotal in enabling organizations to skyrocket their revenues, all while achieving high Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) scores. As the Founder of Radar Consulting LLC, Gene has been on a mission to propagate this hybrid approach that meticulously blends Lean and Agile methodologies, making a real difference in organizational agility and customer-centricity. Through our engaging conversation, we delve into the core elements of the LA5C's - Customer-Centricity, Collaboration, Coordination, Communication, and Continuous Improvement. Gene expounds on how embedding these 5C's into an organization's culture breeds a Culture of Continuous Improvement, which in turn fosters Innovation. We also explore why the LA5C framework emerges as a remarkable Blue Ocean strategy and the compelling reasons behind its lack of widespread recognition until now. Gene sheds light on the transformational journey from lean and agile as standalone methodologies to an integrated Lean Agile approach that has proven to be a game-changer for numerous organizations globally. Gene generously shares eye-opening real-world outcomes attributed to the LA5C framework, providing a persuasive narrative on why businesses should seriously consider this path towards achieving remarkable customer satisfaction and exponential revenue growth. Moreover, we discuss the significant role of process optimization and cultural shift in ensuring the success of lean agile transformations. Whether you are a business leader, a transformation enthusiast, or someone intrigued by innovative frameworks, this episode is a treasure trove of wisdom and practical insights. Don't miss the chance to learn from the expert himself and discover how the LA5C framework could be the blueprint for your organization's journey towards a thriving Culture of Continuous Improvement and unmatched success. To connect with Gene, visit his website: https://radarconsultingllc.com/ Disclaimer: Not advice. Educational purposes only. Not an endorsement for or against. Results not vetted. Views of the guests do not represent those of the host or show. Do your due diligence. Click here to join PodMatch (the "AirBNB" of Podcasting): https://www.joinpodmatch.com/drchrisloomdphd We couldn't do it without the support of our listeners. To help support the show: CashApp- https://cash.app/$drchrisloomdphd Venmo- https://account.venmo.com/u/Chris-Loo-4 Buy Me a Coffee- https://www.buymeacoffee.com/chrisJx Thank you to our sponsor, CityVest: https://bit.ly/37AOgkp Click here to schedule a 1-on-1 private coaching call: https://www.drchrisloomdphd.com/book-online Click here to purchase my books on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2PaQn4p Follow our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/chL1357 Follow us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/drchrisloomdphd Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thereal_drchrisloo Follow us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@drchrisloomddphd Follow the podcast on Spotify: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/christopher-loo Thank you to our advertisers on Spotify. Financial Freedom for Physicians, Copyright 2023

This is the fourth series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the THIRD series happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia stomping toes for Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Page "Paginator" Watson knocks heads for team FAST Agile This technical coach works for Industrial Logic. Page worked with Ron Quartel at Premier Blue Cross that used FAST Agile. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-is-xp/ Richard Hundhauson is Scrum Hausen vilifying the opponent for team Nexus Richard works is a Scrum devops trainer and is a co-creator of Nexus. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhundhausen/ Barry Smith, aka Barry the Blizzard wrestles for team SAFE Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating a lucha libre lifestyle “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night Bouts You can listen to the first, second, and third Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/ Interested in learning Agile? Kartar Petal starts a new job as a project manager of a waterfall project that's failing. But the biggest problem is that his LIFE is on the line if he doesn't deliver on time. His best chance of survival is to listen to a hindu godman who has decided to coach Kartar in becoming Agile. But will it be enough to save Kartar from being killed? Agile Noir teaches the following through dramatic story telling: Agile Manifesto and it's meaningUser StoriesPoker Planningservant leadershipScrum roles: Scrum Master, PO, and team.negotiating a win-win with stakeholdersScrum of Scrums Available in India, USA, and China from the following sellers: ACM (Association of Computing Machines): ACM BookstoreUSA: Amazon.comIndia: Pothi.comChina (Mandarin edition): WeChat store

This is the fourth series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the THIRD series happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia stomping toes for Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Page "Paginator" Watson knocks heads for team FAST Agile This technical coach works for Industrial Logic. Page worked with Ron Quartel at Premier Blue Cross that used FAST Agile. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-is-xp/ Richard Hundhauson is Scrum Hausen vilifying the opponent for team Nexus Richard works is a Scrum devops trainer and is a co-creator of Nexus. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhundhausen/ Barry Smith, aka Barry the Blizzard wrestles for team SAFE Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating a lucha libre lifestyle “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night Bouts You can listen to the first, second, and third Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/ Interested in learning Agile? Kartar Petal starts a new job as a project manager of a waterfall project that's failing. But the biggest problem is that his LIFE is on the line if he doesn't deliver on time. His best chance of survival is to listen to a hindu godman who has decided to coach Kartar in becoming Agile. But will it be enough to save Kartar from being killed? Agile Noir teaches the following through dramatic story telling: Agile Manifesto and it's meaningUser StoriesPoker Planningservant leadershipScrum roles: Scrum Master, PO, and team.negotiating a win-win with stakeholdersScrum of Scrums Available in India, USA, and China from the following sellers: ACM (Association of Computing Machines): ACM BookstoreUSA: Amazon.comIndia: Pothi.comChina (Mandarin edition): WeChat store

This is the fourth series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the THIRD series happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia stomping toes for Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Page "Paginator" Watson knocks heads for team FAST Agile This technical coach works for Industrial Logic. Page worked with Ron Quartel at Premier Blue Cross that used FAST Agile. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-is-xp/ Richard Hundhauson is Scrum Hausen vilifying the opponent for team Nexus Richard works is a Scrum devops trainer and is a co-creator of Nexus. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhundhausen/ Barry Smith, aka Barry the Blizzard wrestles for team SAFE Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating a lucha libre lifestyle “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night Bouts You can listen to the first, second, and third Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/

In this episode, Tim Schipper and I navigate the realms of Lean and Agile practices. Uncover the captivating aspects of Lean in action, explore the core intersections between Lean and Agile, and learn how these strategies can enhance development. What You'll Learn: 1. What do you appreciate about Lean the more it is practiced?.  2. What are the important similarities between Lean and Agile?  3. What is the central common element between Lean and Agile?  4. Can you apply Lean / Agile to development?  5. What is an important metric when applying Lean/Agile to development? About the Guest:  Timothy Schipper is a graduate of Calvin College and the University of Michigan (Bachelors of Mechanical Engineering and Masters of Science). His career has spanned 40 years and includes time as a tool designer, engineering educator, engineer, IT manager, Lean expert, author, and Agile Transformation leader. He has led Lean transformations since 2003 in the areas of manufacturing, office processes, IT development, global product development, new business initiatives, government agencies, and non-profits. He is currently works for Steelcase Inc. of Grand Rapids MI. Timothy has written two books on the topic of Lean: Innovative Lean Development: How to Create, Implement, and Maintain a Learning Culture, and The Highly Effective Office: Creating a Successful Lean Culture in any Workplace  Links: Click here to connect with Tim Schipper Click here for more information on Tim's Books ⁠Click here for The Lean Solutions Summit  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/leansolutions/support

This week, Luca Minudel joins the Xagility podcast to discuss his book "Living Complexity Practical applications of Human Complexity in software and digital products development" as well as dot voting and assessing complexity. On the agenda: Luca's journey with complexity Luca's experience with F1 & making changes during the race Lessons learned from working with great teams  Human complexity: what is it? Identity, intentionality, intelligence, and diversity Non-human complexity Control knobs: turning complexity up and down? Flow Model: the challenge level and the skill level When does a team lose the ability to change and renew itself? How can we assess the complexity that is in front of us? Sensing complexity and delivery initiative complexity assessment Sharing experiences with dot voting Practices for dealing with complexity: C2 approach Luca's twist on the cone of uncertainty Red teaming: what must we do to create psychological safety? Co-creation and co-evolution No scaling and organic growth Luca's Book: https://leanpub.com/livingcomplexity/ About Luca Minudel Luca is a great fit for clients looking for a very experienced Agile professional with a strong track record, pragmatic and framework-agnostic.Luca contributed to the adoption of lean and agile in Ferrari F1 Racing Team while winning three World Championship titles. For the Agile pioneer ThoughtWorks, he delivered training, coaching, assessments and organisational transformations in top-tier organisations in Europe and the United States. He has also worked as Head of Agility, Lean-Agile practice lead and as Transformation Lead. Enjoyed this episode? Let's connect: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://linktr.ee/johncolemanxagility ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠- social and podcast links  ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://linkpop.com/orderlydisruption⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ - order training from right here If you are interested in helping your team or organization achieve greater agility and want to explore agile training options, visit our training page on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x-agility.com/executive-agility-leadership-training/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. If you value coaching and would like to work with a deeply experienced agile and executive coaching specialist, visit our coaching page on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x-agility.com/executive-agility-coaching/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ If you are looking for an agile consultant that can help your leadership team identify an appropriate roadmap to organizational agility and take the most effective course of action in your agile transformation, visit our consulting page on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x-agility.com/executive-agility-consulting/⁠⁠⁠⁠ #scrum #agile #complexity #management # #lucaminudel --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/xagility/message

This is the fourth series of Agile Framework Fight night.  This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile.  Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE.  Agile Framework Fight Night, the THIRD series happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle.  You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia stomping toes for Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Page "Paginator" Watson knocks heads for team FAST Agile This technical coach works for Industrial Logic. Page worked with Ron Quartel at Premier Blue Cross that used FAST Agile. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-is-xp/ Richard Hundhauson is Scrum Hausen vilifying the opponent for team Nexus Richard works is a Scrum devops trainer and is a co-creator of Nexus. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhundhausen/ Barry Smith, aka Barry the Blizzard wrestles for team SAFE Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating a lucha libre lifestyle “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night Bouts You can listen to the first, second, and third Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/

This is the fourth series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the THIRD series happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia stomping toes for Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Page "Paginator" Watson knocks heads for team FAST Agile This technical coach works for Industrial Logic. Page worked with Ron Quartel at Premier Blue Cross that used FAST Agile. https://www.linkedin.com/in/paige-is-xp/ Richard Hundhauson is Scrum Hausen vilifying the opponent for team Nexus Richard works is a Scrum devops trainer and is a co-creator of Nexus. https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhundhausen/ Barry Smith, aka Barry the Blizzard wrestles for team SAFE Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating a lucha libre lifestyle “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night Bouts You can listen to the first, second, and third Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/

In today's episode, SPCT and SAFe® Fellow, Charlene Cuenca, has some tips about building a well-balanced, cross-functional Lean-Agile center of excellence (LACE). And she explains why you should consider inviting the COO and HR to be a part of your guiding coalition.

In the second part of the podcast episode, Gayatri Kalyanaraman is in conversation with Karl Scotland, Agile Transformation Services Practice Manager at TEKsystems Global Services and a master facilitator, shares his career journeyKarl shares his journey of how he became a master facilitator and that started when  he was experiencing tremendous resistance with Scrum. (Karl moved to using Kanban and lean concepts :) )Later when he was designing for larger change, Karl came across using  X-matrix - with an agile transformation flavor embeddedKarl talks about his realisation that one should not think about just to implement scrum/kanban Agility needs to be baked is created my own sense of self discovery - Achieving flow And the next step was to start looking for evidence to look for and think about strategy as always about tough choicesSomething similar to Agile manifesto - A even over BKarl shares his views on Tool selection and it should not define process. Usage of tool should stay at the tactical side Choice of tool should always be to help us capture flow data and understand blockers on Interesting story on the balancing the speaking and consulting engagement Shares the passion on building community events Karl can be reached at https://www.linkedin.com/in/kjscotland/ Karl helps businesses become Learning Organisations. Karl has held several engineering and management positions in Neural technologies, BBC, Cisco, Yahoo and Rally software. Over the last 20 years Karl has been an advocate of Lean and Agile approaches to achieve this, working with companies including the BBC, Yahoo!, EMC Consulting, Rally Software, Cisco, SDL, Legal & General and Alegis. During this time, he has been a pioneer of using Kanban Systems and Strategy Deployment for product development, a founding member of both the Lean Systems Society and Limited WIP Society, as well as being active in the community and a regular conference speaker. Karl is a co-founder of the Lean Agile in Brighton.

In the first part of the podcast episode, Gayatri Kalyanaraman is in conversation with Karl Scotland, Agile Transformation Services Practice Manager at TEKsystems Global Services and a master facilitator, shares his career journeyStarted his education with a passion with music and quickly found that he was enjoying the software part of the music over creative musicKarl has held several engineering and management positions in Neural technologies, BBC, Cisco, Yahoo and Rally softwareLater on he moved to become a consultant in helping organizations transform themselves to writing clean code, good practices and happier peopleKarl shares his thesis on why technology roles have become extremely complex - while we started writing C++ code, there were relatively less requirements and hence the need to change became less relevant. But as software and technology become ubiquitous, the roles also needed to be wider and deeperKarl talks about curiosity and learning and how he has built it within himself. He talks about the story where the subject matter experts  Approach from the perspective of what does organizations need to do to become change initiators themselvesKarl shares his model of Agenda Shift hypothesisKarl loves the perspective of ‘Cynics will become your biggest supporters' - as they want to share the obstacles that's preventing them from making it happenHypothesis driven change creates a sense of ownership on their obstacleKarl can be reached at https://www.linkedin.com/in/kjscotland/ Karl helps businesses become Learning Organisations. Karl has held several engineering and management positions in Neural technologies, BBC, Cisco, Yahoo and Rally software. Over the last 20 years Karl has been an advocate of Lean and Agile approaches to achieve this, working with companies including the BBC, Yahoo!, EMC Consulting, Rally Software, Cisco, SDL, Legal & General and Alegis. During this time, he has been a pioneer of using Kanban Systems and Strategy Deployment for product development, a founding member of both the Lean Systems Society and Limited WIP Society, as well as being active in the community and a regular conference speaker. Karl is a co-founder of the Lean Agile in Brighton. 

This is the third series of Agile Framework Fight night.  This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile.  Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE.  Agile Framework Fight Night, the SECOND SERIES happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle.  You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia from Team DAThis “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels.  He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/Ron Quartel AKA "Crocodile Ron-dee"Software Crafter, Disruptor, Pioneer and Intrapreneuer. On a mission to unleash the human spirit in the workplace. Founder of FAST Agile. https://www.fastagile.ioViktor "the Simplifier" GrgicViktor is an Agile Coach, software developer and Certified LeSS trainer with 17 years of experience in delivering enterprise systems and Agile adoptions. He worked first 15 years in The Netherlands, and since 2013 in Hong Kong. https://less.works/profiles/viktor-grgicBarry Smith, the Nexus KnightIs a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers.   His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms.https://www.linkedin.com/in/barrylsmith/Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating“Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrandeHere is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night:  https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/Other Agile Framework Fight Night BoutsYou can listen to the first and second Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/Resources about the TopicHOW TO USE PRODUCT EXTRACTION TO BREAK TECHNICAL DEPENDENCIES: https://www.leadingagile.com/2022/02/how-to-use-product-extraction-to-break-technical-dependencies/Putting the Enterprise Back in Enterprise Architecture w/ Ross BeurmannLeSS on Architecture & Design: https://less.works/less/technical-excellence/architecture-designNexus Dispelling the Myth that Scrum Teams Don't Think About Architecture: https://www.scrum.org/resources/dispelling-myth-scrum-teams-dont-think-about-architectureNexus Why architecture should emerge?: https://www.scrum.org/resources/blog/why-architecture-should-emergeNexus Whitepaper: You Can't Scale Enterprise Agility Without Architecture https://www.scrum.org/resources/whitepaper-you-cant-scale-enterprise-agility-without-architectureDA Enterprise Architecture: https://www.pmi.org/disciplined-agile/process/enterprise-architectureThe Disciplined Agile Enterprise (DAE) Layer: https://www.projectmanagement.com/blog/blogPostingView.cfm?blogPostingID=66383&thisPageURL=/blog-post/66383/The-Disciplined-Agile-Enterprise--DAE--Layer#_=_ 

This is the third series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the SECOND SERIES happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia from Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Ron Quartel AKA "Crocodile Ron-dee" Software Crafter, Disruptor, Pioneer and Intrapreneuer. On a mission to unleash the human spirit in the workplace. Founder of FAST Agile. https://www.fastagile.io Viktor "the Simplifier" Grgic Viktor is an Agile Coach, software developer and Certified LeSS trainer with 17 years of experience in delivering enterprise systems and Agile adoptions. He worked first 15 years in The Netherlands, and since 2013 in Hong Kong. https://less.works/profiles/viktor-grgic Barry Smith, the Nexus Knight Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ Other Agile Framework Fight Night You can listen to the first and second Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/ Mentioned in this episode Dynamic Reteaming: https://www.amazon.com/Dynamic-Reteaming-Wisdom-Changing-Teams-ebook/dp/B08B48ZTJ5/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=dynamic+reteaming&qid=1681092242&sprefix=dynamic+reteaming%2Caps%2C151&sr=8-1 Creating Great Teams: How Self-Selection Lets People Excel: https://www.amazon.com/Creating-Great-Teams-Self-Selection-People-ebook/dp/B019EKWG6M/ref=sr_1_1?crid=20WLOY01G4ED3&keywords=self+selection&qid=1681092286&sprefix=self+selection%2Caps%2C100&sr=8-1

This is the third series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the SECOND SERIES happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia from Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Ron Quartel AKA "Crocodile Ron-dee" Software Crafter, Disruptor, Pioneer and Intrapreneuer. On a mission to unleash the human spirit in the workplace. Founder of FAST Agile. https://www.fastagile.io Viktor "the Simplifier" Grgic Viktor is an Agile Coach, software developer and Certified LeSS trainer with 17 years of experience in delivering enterprise systems and Agile adoptions. He worked first 15 years in The Netherlands, and since 2013 in Hong Kong. https://less.works/profiles/viktor-grgic Barry Smith, the Nexus Knight Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ You can listen to the first and second Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/ The following resources are related to what was discussed in this episode ACM paper about metrics https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3454124 Goal Question Metric (GQM) https://www.leadingagile.com/2017/05/agile-metrics-gqm-approach/ LeSS Experience Reports (referred to as case studies, some of which have metrics): https://less.works/case-studies

This is the third series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the SECOND SERIES happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia from Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Ron Quartel AKA "Crocodile Ron-dee" Software Crafter, Disruptor, Pioneer and Intrapreneuer. On a mission to unleash the human spirit in the workplace. Founder of FAST Agile. https://www.fastagile.io Viktor "the Simplifier" Grgic Viktor is an Agile Coach, software developer and Certified LeSS trainer with 17 years of experience in delivering enterprise systems and Agile adoptions. He worked first 15 years in The Netherlands, and since 2013 in Hong Kong. https://less.works/profiles/viktor-grgic Barry Smith, the Nexus Knight Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ You can listen to the first and second Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/

This is the third series of Agile Framework Fight night. This fight night was hosted in Seattle by Beyond Agile. Like the first Agile Framework Fight Night, we brought together another winning panel of experts to represent the frameworks of DA, Fast Agile, LeSS, and SaFE. Agile Framework Fight Night, the SECOND SERIES happened at Beyond Agile, transmitted from Seattle. You can find Beyond Agile at Meetup.com here: https://www.meetup.com/BeyondAgile/ The expert panelists are: Ricardo “Dad of Doom” Garcia from Team DA This “Dad of Doom” has over 30 years of industry experience and has implemented and managed numerous software projects using Agile Practices for Fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in white papers, cover stories in magazines, and is a frequent speaker at conferences and Agile expert panels. He is the organizer behind Seattle Disciplined Agile Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Seattle-Disciplined-Agile-Meetup/ Ron Quartel AKA "Crocodile Ron-dee" Software Crafter, Disruptor, Pioneer and Intrapreneuer. On a mission to unleash the human spirit in the workplace. Founder of FAST Agile. https://www.fastagile.io Viktor "the Simplifier" Grgic Viktor is an Agile Coach, software developer and Certified LeSS trainer with 17 years of experience in delivering enterprise systems and Agile adoptions. He worked first 15 years in The Netherlands, and since 2013 in Hong Kong. https://less.works/profiles/viktor-grgic Barry Smith, the Nexus Knight Is a member of Unify's Lean-Agile practice, and committed to helping product teams to enjoy a better way of working and delivering exceptional value to their customers. His over 25+ years of working in technology has shown him that innovation can be fostered anywhere, from startups to Fortune 500 firms. Lancer “Unkind” Kind, moderating “Unkind” lives in Kirkland, and loves nothing more than writing micro tested software. For the last five years he has delivered consulting services in China, India, as well as the USA. He's a publishing author of science fiction and Agile Noir, a project management business novel. He's podcasting at Agile Thoughts, 敏捷理念 (the Chinese edition of Agile Thoughts), and SciFi Thoughts. His Agile at scale business novel is “continuously delivered” via Lean Pub at: https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande Here is a link to this Beyond Agile event in Meetup which contains comments about the fight night: https://www.meetup.com/beyondagile/events/286465281/ You can listen to the first and second Bouts of Agile Framework Fight Night series here: https://agilenoir.biz/en/agilethoughts/agile-framework-fight-night/ Chat record from Bout 3 of Agile Framework Fight Night Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:04 PM) I know Niels Pflaeging. Would you like me to ask him if he'd like to speak to this group? Aki Namioka to Everyone (10:05 PM) Where is Niels Pflaeging located? Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:06 PM) Germany Ricardo to Everyone (10:08 PM) For Jobs at Costco pls send me an email at ricardo.garcia@costco.com shama to Everyone (10:08 PM) Ron Lichty to Everyone (10:10 PM) Enterprise Agile Global Community: Dennis Stevens: Agile for Execs: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89071064881?pwd=a1NoY2ptN3BudGd1OGNINXNtQ0ZYQT09 Josh Novajosky to Everyone (10:11 PM) Amazing shirt Ron Barry L Smith to Everyone (10:18 PM) “LeSS”, of course, refers to “Lightweight Similarity to Scrum" - really, they copied all their good ideas from Nexus. Ron Lichty to Everyone (10:24 PM) I thought I heard Paige Watson describe the FAST meeting as five PdMs bringing in the five priorities for the cycle? Is a “nexus” essentially what others are calling a "tribe”? Barry L Smith to Everyone (10:27 PM) Yes, similar to tribe or ART (Agile Release Train) - the group of teams that are collaborating in developing & delivering a Product Backlog. Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:29 PM) Seems like HUGE enterprises would have HUGE concerns (problems) to resolve for the people of the world and inside the organization. Silpa to Everyone (10:31 PM) Our scrum team is of 16 members. We formed mini scrum teams of 4 in each team with 1 PO, 1 SM, making sure we have a process expert supporting each mini scrum team. Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:31 PM) The crafting of experiments to see if hardware/software or other kinds of “works” is what runs through an organization. Which of the Frameworks are predicated on the assumption that software products are the resolution of these concerns? Barry L Smith to Everyone (10:32 PM) Jon, are you essentially asking, “Is experimentation a core element of your framework”? Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:32 PM) yes Me to Aki Namioka (Direct Message) (10:33 PM) What is our "finish" time? One hour or? Jon Jorgensen to Everyone (10:33 PM) And “What kind of professionals are involved in the experiment?” Barry L Smith to Everyone (10:34 PM)

Learn about SAFe from our resident Scaled Agile Expert Jacob Anderson. In this episode he explores Values 9 and 10. #9 – Decentralize decision-making Achieving fast value delivery requires decentralized decision-making. This reduces delays, improves product development flow, enables faster feedback, and creates more innovative solutions designed by those closest to the local knowledge. However, some decisions are strategic, global, and have economies of scale that justify centralized decision-making. Since both types of decisions occur, creating a reliable decision-making framework is a critical step in empowering employees and ensuring a fast flow of value. #10 – Organize around value Many enterprises today are organized around principles developed during the last century. In the name of intended efficiency, most are organized around functional expertise. But in the digital age, the only sustainable competitive advantage is the speed with which an organization can respond to the needs of its customers with new and innovative solutions. These solutions require cooperation amongst all the functional areas, with their incumbent dependencies, handoffs, waste and delays. Instead, Business Agility demands that enterprises organize around value to deliver more quickly. And when market and customer demands change, the enterprise must quickly and seamlessly reorganize around that new value flow.

Jamil interviews Cyrus Taghehchian, Founder, CEO @ Splyt Core Foundation about his positive and life changing initiative. Linkedin.com/in/taghehchian About Maker of things awesome, Executive and Lean-Agile coach, blockchain nerd, people motivator, Deloitte Consulting alum, digital hipster, business professional and kid at heart. An accomplished entrepreneur with leadership, strategy, and business execution expertise in e-commerce, digital marketing, Lean-Agile dev, and blockchain. Curious. Persistent. Courageous. I spend my time thinking of the Future of Work and my intention in life is to heal people by empowering them to follow their purpose using agile, blockchain, social media, e-commerce, and/or just believing in themselves. Purpose before profits makes the world more whole. Things I care about: youth privilege equality and sustainability. What good is it to have a unicorn exit when you're destroying future generation's opportunities and/or the planet? "NFTs and its immutable data nature will be the most coveted commodity in the future once we reach singularity. Blockchain preserves our reality." -me About Splyt: Splyt is an e-commerce NFT infrastructure that connects e-commerce stores, brands, and affiliates. A unique eNFT is assigned to each item providing users with a globally updating inventory. Users can also mint their products as eNFTs. There is a certificate of authenticity to prevent counterfeits, a built in smart contract that holds money in escrow to avoid scams, and a commission to incentivise affiliates and stores. The protocol is equipped with automated dispute and arbitration mechanisms, and is governed by consensus to maintain decentralization, flexibility, and user engagement. Visit Splyt Website: https://Spl.yt Follow Splyt on Twitter Follow Splyt on Medium Follow Splyt on Instagram --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/crypto-hipster-podcast/support

Dan and Prateek (with a Nisha slideshow) take the stage at Lean Agile London to answer questions from a live audience.

Daniel is a 20-year software industry veteran who got his start as a Java Developer/Architect. He has spent most of the last 15 years focusing on Lean and Agile Practices. In 2007, he helped develop the Kanban Method for knowledge work. He even managed the world's first project implementation of Kanban that year and, ever since, has been conducting Kanban training, coaching, and consulting. As the co-founder and CEO of ActionableAgile, Daniel provides industry-leading predictive analytics tools and services for any Lean-Agile process.   Topics of Discussion: [4:19] Daniel explains why he feels as though the right curriculum is not yet taught in college. [8:00] It's important to bridge your conversations both in terms of the risk and your ability to deliver on a date in terms of risk. Then, you can have a conversation about what you want to do as a business to mitigate the risks and also accept that they are there in the first place. [10:14] Daniel explains his more data-informed approach when asked how long something is going to take. Jeffrey asks, but how do we find the data that helps us make informed decisions in the first place? [14:43] What are those numbers that give the right visibility? [16;03] The four aspects every manager of a software team should have at their disposal and be monitoring: Work in progress Throughput Cycle Time The age of items that they are working on right now [19:00] Our ability to come up with ideas is always going to outstrip our ability to execute them. That's why backlogs grow over time. [21:49] Daniel explains the method to go from using Azure DevOps to having numbers at your disposal, and what are the two important pieces of data that you need? [24:41] How does the ActionableAgile tool help when every team board is totally different? [28:44] If your engineering practices are continuous, your process should be continuous as well.   Mentioned in this Episode: Architect Tips — New video podcast! Azure DevOps Clear Measure (Sponsor) .NET DevOps for Azure: A Developer's Guide to DevOps Architecture the Right Way, by Jeffrey Palermo — Available on Amazon! Jeffrey Palermo's YouTube Jeffrey Palermo's Twitter — Follow to stay informed about future events! Daniel's previous interview: “Daniel Vacanti On ActionableAgile” Daniel's latest book: When Will It Be Done? LinkedIn: danielvacanti Twitter: @danvacanti Email: Daniel@ActionableAgile.com ActionableAgile   Want to Learn More? Visit AzureDevOps.Show for show notes and additional episodes.

Full episode video available here: https://youtu.be/gWWkD9hQVtA  Ula's Bio: Uloaku (Ula) Ojiaku is a Business Agility Strategist, coach, mentor and trainer with a focus on helping leaders and their teams in large organisations embrace a Lean-Agile mindset and adopt its associated ways of working to improve how they operate, effectively respond to changes in the marketplace and ultimately deliver value to their customers. With nearly 20 years of professional experience, she has worked in multiple countries, in a variety of technical, business and leadership roles across industries including Oil & Gas, Telecommunications, Financial Services, Government, Higher Education and Consulting. A certified Technology Business Management (TBM) Council Executive, SAFe 5.0 Program Consultant (SPC 5.0) and ICAgile Coach, Ula has a Masters degree in Computer Science from the University College London (UCL) and a Bachelors degree in Electronics Engineering from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN). She is the Founder/ Principal Consultant of Mezahab Group Ltd (a UK-based Lean Agile Innovation training and consulting company). She also currently serves a multi-national retail organisation as a Senior Agile Coach and is a guest lecturer at Coventry University.  Social Media/ Websites: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/uloakuojiaku/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/uloakuojiaku Website: www.agileinnovationleaders.com  Episode Transcript Ula Ojiaku Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast. I'm Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more, with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Hi everyone. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast. I had the privilege on the 30th of March 2022 to speak at the Agile Coach Conference organised by Gladwell Academy. My talk was focused on the SLoMoSH Canvas, which is the tool that I had developed to help with facilitating conversations amongst teams, to clarify roles and responsibilities. The SLoMoSH Canvas has other use cases, however my talk was just focused on the clarification of roles and responsibilities and how it could be used in that situation. Without further ado, my talk at the 2022 Agile Coach Conference in Amsterdam. Thank you, it's a great privilege to be here, live and in person. The last time I attended and participated in a face to face conference was back in 2019, December 2019, San Francisco, so you can't imagine how refreshing it is to be out here. So I'm here, all the way from the United Kingdom, I'm here to speak to you about the topic ‘Set up for Success: Clarifying Roles and Responsibilities using the SLoMoSH Canvas.' I know, ‘what's that word SLoMoSH'? I made it up, as you're going to come to realise. But without further ado, let me tell you about myself. I have about 20 years of professional experience. I started off in engineering, hands-on engineering roles in telecommunications, oil and gas industry, and then kind of moved on to that more business-facing, interfacing type of role with teams where you're kind of translating the conversations, and my first foray into agile ways of working was about 16 years ago as a field engineer, with Schlumberger as a field engineer. We had standups, we had kanbans and all that, but we didn't use the term agile, it wasn't a buzzword then. So as coaches, and I'm sure as we're predominantly agile coaches in the audience here, I've noticed. And we do have those… part of our satisfaction that comes from our jobs is when the teams, the leaders, the people we're coaching, have those ‘aha' moments, and I love what Lyssa (Adkins) said in the morning, it's really about taking a holistic view, building those relationships, meeting people where they are, so that's what I love about being an agile coach. I host a podcast, Agile Innovation Leaders, and I've been privileged to have people like Jeff Sutherland, Steve Blank, Alex Osterwalder, but that's not why we're here. So, we're going to do an ice breaker. I have two children, I have a son who's 11 and a daughter, Kiki, who's 9. So one day Kiki comes back from school and says, and I'm busy working and in the zone, and she says ‘mum, I have something for you, I have a game I have to play'. And I'm like, in my mind, I don't need this right now, but I have to be a loving parent with my children isn't it, so I say ‘all right Kiki, what do you have for me?' All right, so I'm going to teach you that. I don't need to tell you the story, but the key thing is now, I'm going to mention three words in succession, and after each word, you know, you use A, shout out A and raise your left hand if it's an A, if that word matches with an A, so if it's an animal, you raise your left hand, if it's a food, the word that I call, raise your right hand, you can also shout it out if you feel like that, and if it's a place, C, then raise both hands and say C. Does that sound clear enough? OK, let's do a trial run. So, A, well, you did it. So I was going to say ‘poodle', A, awesome. Burger! B. You guys are rocking it. And a castle. C. OK, awesome, you guys have gotten it. Now let's do the real thing. OK, so, I'm going to mention it in a random way. I know you're watching and wondering what I'm doing. Yoghurt. B. OK, B, good, good. Lion. A. Are you sure? Yes, it's an animal, lion is an animal. All right, third and the last, Turkey. (Laughter) That was exactly what my daughter did to me, you know she said, Turkey and I was like OK, where does it go, because mine was more like, A is stand here, B is stand here and C is stand here. But I will take the blame, as a responsible agile coach I will say, if I had wanted you to understand, I would have explained it better. That is the words of the famous Johan Cruyff. And I should have explained it better because, you know, I kind of, hands up if you know, you didn't quite go into the outliers, because you didn't, because the impression based on the instruction was the, you know, the words would fit into one box. Either it's going to be A, or B, or C. Hands up if that was your impression? OK, the rest of you could see that two, three steps ahead, awesome, please call me, because maybe we have a business to start because you can see into the future. But that's the case with transformation initiatives. There are lots of moving wheels, it's about change on a massive scale, and the fact is, with all the changes happening, and people are complex beings, and as Lyssa mentioned again, in her talk earlier on today. I was taking copious notes for all the speakers, when you all were speaking. It's really about moving from that mindset of an organisation and people as machines to an organisation as a complex eco system. And I don't know about you, but for most transformation, and no matter where you are on your transformation journey, whether you are very mature or whether you are just at the beginning of the journey or somewhere in between, the fact is there are always going to be moving parts, and we change, and we need to change and adapt as we go on. So, again, Lyssa, by now you all know I'm a massive Lyssa fan, but the key thing is how work has really impacted a lot of the things we do as agile coaches and the agile coaching competencies that she and Michael Spayd developed, you know has kind of helped with clarifying, what are those multiple hats, those balls that we need to juggle as agile coaches as we support and lead and help the teams as they move under transformation, the journey towards ways of agile working, and developing an agile mindset. Now, usually it would start with some sort of training, you know, to train people into the roles, to understand, because people need to be trained. And I think it was, you know, and I think it was during the session with Marcel, there was something about needing to combine education with coaching. So, in terms of like the initial starting point of training people, let's say classroom-based training, there would be, if you, as an agile coach, are the one running that training, you need to have your teacher's hat on. Lyssa, am I correct, or am I bungling it up? Lyssa Adkins You've been beautiful, I'm overwhelmed. Ula Ojiaku Ok, well please correct me, because you are the expert, and that's your work there. Anyway, so you have to have that teaching hat on, but the main message today that I want to bring to you here, the key point it this, more often than not, just classroom-based training or training of any sort isn't quite enough for the teams to start adapting or applying their learnings to their context. Even within the same organisation, you'll find out that no two teams are alike, and you might have a product owner in team A and a product owner in team B. They are on paper, they have the same role, the title, however, the nuances of what they do with it, it might mean that there are other things that they would need to take on as a result of the nature of their work and the team that they belong to. And so, in what I'm going to be sharing with you in terms of the case study, I've also had to become a neutral process holder, you know, to facilitate conversations with the teams. And this is with the purpose of helping them to connect the dots. OK, just to help them to connect the dots, because they need to get to a shared understanding of whatever topic it is that they are having. So I picked this graphic from the internet. Unfortunately, I don't know who the author, the original originator is, but credit to them, it kind of beautifully illustrates the concept. You might have the same people in the room, listening to this talk right now like we are, you know, if you look at this picture here, there are three people looking at a picture of a truck, but what you can see is something, different elements of the picture is coming out, jumping out at them. But you need to make sure that they also have a joined up view, you know, to have the bigger picture in mind. So how does that apply to us as agile coaches? It's not about having lots of different frameworks, and we don't want to go into that rut of being like the proverbial person with their hangman seeing everything as a nail, it's about taking the time to understand the context. And as Sharon and Yasmina said in their talk, you know, you need to have tools in the toolbox, but you also need to know that it's not about the tools in the toolbox, it's, according to my colleague Scott Henault, who says the power of the tool is in the conversation it creates. It goes back to the people, it's about helping them to have a conversation so that they have a shared understanding to work together more effectively. And so, a bit of the case study in my case. So I am currently a senior agile coach with a multi national retail organisation, if you read into my LinkedIn profile, you'll know which organisation that is. So there is this, there were these teams and when the organisation started its agile transformation about four years ago or something like thereabouts, for that team they were pivoted into agile, single agile team like team level team teams, OK. And then over time some further analysis was done and the leadership decided, that's a story for another day, but go with me here. So they decided they wanted it to be a SAFe ART and so the team was now being pivoted into the combined SAFe ART. Now I had joined the organisation after the initial, the first, you know, pivot to agile teams, and what I noticed interacting with those teams was that they, the teams, already struggled, because they were moving from a traditional projects management waterfall based approach to delivery into agile, and as agile teams, you know, scrum teams, Kanban teams, they were already struggling. I mean, they were delivering, it's almost like, have you ever had a toothache where you're able to eat, but how you ate and enjoyed your food when you had a toothache versus when your, when everything is OK, is much different. So they were delivering all right, but it's almost like you're chewing with a toothache, or hobbling with a bad foot, you're moving, but you're not moving in the most effective way you could. So I realised they had this problem, and just waving, if I could be a fairy godmother and wave the SAFe wand over them with all due respect, it wasn't going to make the problem go away. There was something we needed to get to the root cause. So, sometimes, yes, it's all about trying to make a light touch and as simple as possible reduce the cognitive load as Mariëlle said in the workshop earlier, but there are times that, you know, the hard things have to be done. There are times you have to strip down, get into the weeds, get into the detail, and based on the conversation with the RTE, I designed a session for the key roles, because those were the key points, if you know the theory of constraints, it's about looking at where the bottom leg is and then addressing the bottom leg to improve the flow, and of course you know as the system, because, you know, there would definitely be something else to improve, but right now the key bottom leg was with the Epic Owner roles, the product management roles, the product and scrum master roles, so those were the areas we decided to focus on, because you can't boil the ocean. So, the SLoMoSH Canvas. Now I wouldn't say that it all was original, but it's more of a synthesis of ideas , concepts, mental models that I've been exposed to over the past 20 years, but the main influence for this SLoMoSH Canvas was the work of Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, the business model canvas, and of course when I last spoke with Alex Osterwalder, you know, I had him as a guest on my podcast , he said it's really about making things visual, it's important, it makes it easier for conversations, it helps people to get on the same page. And another influence in developing this was from the work of an executive coach known as Tony Jeary, Jeary with a J, and he wrote this book ‘Strategic Acceleration' and he had the MOLO matrix, which is like 'more of, less of'. So based on that I kind of developed this, which I was using as well for personal reasons, you know, in terms of thinking where do I want to be in the future, how do I get there, what do I need to do more of, less of, what do I need to stop entirely, hand over. And I kind of, as I was thinking about this in the middle of the night, I thought, this might work for the teams we're talking about. So let me explain the SLoMoSH Canvas. Has anyone figured out why it's named SLoMoSH? OK, here you go. Audience member It's the first letters OK, yes, so the first letters, Start, Less of, More of, then Stop and Handover. So that's where the SLoMoSH came from, and I'm still thinking of, is there anything better to call this, so if you have any ideas, please let me know. But that's what it's called. Now, the key thing, how does it work? It's more in the centre you have the core responsibilities, that would be, let's say, common to all the roles, it's better when you do it role by role, so if it's about a particular role, it's something you're facing, you have those responsibilities and tasks in the centre, and there's no change, no action needs to be done, and usually that would be a starting point, OK, for the conversation. Now, the actions that will come out in the conversation will be when you're now looking at those key things, you kind of have a conversation about it, as we'll look at it later, and then you  find out, are there things that you need to, that you should be doing that you're not doing that you should start, you put it there, and the other thing is that you should be doing as part of your role that you're not doing as often as you should, maybe put them in the ‘More of'. You know, ‘Less of' would be the reverse of ‘More of' and then other things ‘Stop'. This part is really important, because as human beings we are adverse to, you know, kind of losing things and taking things out, kind of losing things, we'd rather pile up things without taking off some other things consequently and that is a mindset that we, you know, because there should be the art of maximising the work, the amount of work not done. So it's also important to challenge your teams, are there things that you should stop doing, and stop means stop. Don't hand it over to anyone because it's not adding value now, it wasn't adding value then, it's not going to add value in the future. And then, just as important, is the Handover part. Are there things that you're doing in your current role or in the current context, which in the new role, in the new structure, which don't necessarily apply to you, what your role as you understand it now, but someone needs to do it or else things will fall through the cracks and it's going to impact on delivery, and that would be in the Handover space. OK. So, this if for you now, two minutes, can we all take the time to pause and reflect, and I acknowledge it might not be applicable to you, we all have different situations and contexts, problems that we're solving right now. So if it doesn't apply to you, that's fine. Can you pause and reflect individually on what you've heard so far. Think about scenarios in your current context, your current work, where you could use the Canvas, or where you have, you're needing to have the conversations that this Canvas could help you with. What are those scenarios? So it's an individual pause and think. Can anyone share the result of your conversations? Audience member We were just discussing challenges that we have in multiple teams and the conclusion of the challenge was the team motivation and the relationship with the team members started deteriorating due to the moving to remote working, right. So, there were misunderstandings about what the team lead needs to do, what the product owner needs to do, what the scrum master needs to do, or even every single member of the team. So, what we did, we did different kinds of workshops, but now, when I see this, it perfectly fits into the, what I think we could use, or what we could benefit a lot from this. It was not structured like you did, but this is more clear and straightforward, yeah. Ula Ojiaku Wow, thank you for that, and yes, I'll be sharing my context, so thank you for sharing that. We have just enough time for you. Audience member I think we can use this in our organisation. I'm working for the government, for the POVmark we call that, the Product Owner Vakgroep Manager and agile coach, it's like, we talk about the teams, but not about the individuals, but not about the teams, but what are we talking about? Because we say the product owner is there for the product, and the manager is there for the people, and the agile coach is there for the team. But sometimes it feels like no one has the responsibility so we can use this very wise to, hey, what can we stop talking about? Ula Ojiaku Awesome! Well thank you for sharing. Right, thank you. So, what did I do? Let's move on. So, a case study with the very team that I was talking about, a team of teams in this case. Now, something else I didn't share about the challenges they were facing was this, you know. Having gone to the training, because, let's say for example some of them were previously project managers and as part of the transformation pivot, you know, they were now set, OK, the way it was done is another conversation. And it was more of a combination of OK, where do you think we fit in now that, you know, this is what this role does, and that's what that role does. So it was a combination of that and, you know, my management kind of making joint decisions to give people new roles. And so as a traditional project manager, you'd expect that you're making sure things are on time, you budget and schedule, you liaise with third parties, maybe vendors as required to make sure everyone is cooperating. That's the traditional project management role. You're also, you'd also be monitoring the spend, how much are we spending on this project? You know, the financial reporting, the compliance, to make sure you're being compliant, and being a publicly traded organisation, you also have to make sure that, you know, on the straight and narrow, it's not directly giving value to the end customer, but it needs to be done if you want to operate as an organisation, if you want to be legally trading. So, these things still need to be done. But in the new roles, you know, the new product owner role generally, it doesn't have anything about managing compliance issues, it doesn't have anything about financial reporting, and so when we're operating as that agile team, these things were falling through the cracks. You could have said, yes, I used to be a project manager but now I'm a scrum master, there's nothing that says, you know, as a scrum master, that I need to do that same thing with the product. So, who does it, because it needs to be done. OK. So in this simplified example, let's assume we're doing this session with product owners. Now, I populated the core area, or the continuum area with the generic responsibilities that a product owner would do. Of course, this is not exhaustive, this is only for illustration. And then at the start of the session I'll be like, OK, now these are the things, you know, generic things that the product owner would need to do. But are there other things that you currently do that's not in the box? Feel free to create a sticky(note) and put it there, because we need to have a conversation, we need to make it visible. Because most people have what they do in their heads, and other people, remember the picture with the, you the bus and all that, and three people are looking at, one is seeing the driver, the other one is seeing the cargo, the other one is seeing the vehicle. So, let's all visualise it and talk through it. I told you sometimes you need to get into the weed of things so that everyone has a shared understanding. So, imagine that the ones or the items in the bold italics are the ones that I can't add in, oh, I also manage compliance issues, oh I also participate in release value, oh and I also produce reports for the senior management. Let's put it there. Now, after having the conversation, sticky by sticky, let's assume in this hypothetical session, this is what we came up with. So, remember in the core part it's more of whatever it is that you're doing and you're happy with it, you think you're doing OK, there's nothing that needs to change, that's fine, you leave it there. So, for, let's assume, that the product owner group you know, you already create to start the stories. We prioritise our backlog and we also participate in release planning  and we think it's relevant to where we're going so we have to keep stay there. But there might be other things that they have, you know, had a conversation about, and they say OK, you know what, we haven't really been conducting backlog refinement sessions and we need to do that a bit more, thoughtfully and, you know, we need to just start doing it basically. That goes in the start place. And maybe they say something about contributing to the product vision and roadmap, and say it's been someone else that's been doing that, the product manager has been doing that, but we feel like, you know, the, it trickles down to us and it comes as a surprise, we need to contribute earlier so that we can also give the team perspective into things, so we can put that in the ‘More of' etc etc. But the key thing is, it's about facilitating those conversations. And it doesn't stop here. Once we've done this part, it's now about focusing on the elements in the outer rectangle to identify what's the action that's required for this. So, if you said you don't facilitate or you don't do backlog refinement sessions, what action needs to be done and who's going to own it after this session? And they, as a group, you know, there's this saying, if they write it, they won't fight it. As a coach, as an agile coach, it's not about being the sage on the stage, it's about being their guide by their side. So you ask them, OK, so you have, and of your own free will, I didn't tell you to start doing it, but you said you do need to start doing it, so what are you going to do about it? Because, you know, if you tell them, then the ownership for following up with that action is going to be on me if I told them, but if they said, this is what we think we need to do, and this is who, I mean, I think I'll own it, then they're more likely to follow through with the actual action, so they will, you know, identify who owns it, what they're going to do, and the writing of the same happens with the rest of the items on the board. So for this case study, some of the outcomes were, there was an improved visibility and shared understanding of what people were doing. And of course, during the session, the fact that it was visual, it wasn't like a spreadsheet or a long Word document, not that there's anything wrong with it, but most people process, you know we all process information differently and having it visually on stickys helped with, you know, bringing or bridging that gap in communication and giving us a point of reference that we all could zone into. So, it helped with relevant conversations, both as a group and after the session they were also able to show this to their line management, and have necessary conversations with them. And for some of them, the product management group, they were able to demonstrate, because they would say, I had a lot on my plate, and the line management would be like, she's complaining again, but by the time we did this, and they showed an electronic copy of it to the line management, they said, oh, you actually do a whole lot, right, and that meant a case for an additional set of business analysts to be added to the team to help them with those sorts of things, to invent the responsibility on their plate. It enabled them to identify actions to move from their current state to the desired future state and, you know, they have also role descriptions that takes into account the context of the work they do, that they can share with their stakeholders, because there was a confusion about who does what. So, some facilitation tips as I round off this. It's more effective if you do it role by role. You know, don't try to boil the ocean, there are instances you can do it as a whole team, but my focus right now, on this case study, is more about, you know, on a role, so if it's for scum masters, within a team of teams, then bring them together so they have a joint understanding. If it's a product management, or product owner etc etc, but do it role by role, because that helps with focusing the session. And don't start with a blank slate. Prepopulate the centre of the board with generic responsibilities and then have them add things or remove things as they see fit. Now it's really about being a neutral facilitator in this process, because it's now them having conversations. Now, encourage conversation and debate whilst keeping focused on desirable outcomes and then remind them that, you know, this is not a once and done activity. Things will change, and as they do, you don't have to do it often, but as things change, and you feel they're significantly changed that you need to have another of these conversations, you do so, and inspect and adapt as required. So, before we summarise, what would be your key takeaway from this talk? Anyone? OK, I'll walk to you, I'm not throwing. Audience member  Thank you. Maybe we all recognise, because I also saw it in your model, that stopping and handover are mainly the most difficult topics to discuss. How did you handle those things? Because if you look at the model now, it doesn't seem a lot went off their plate.  More or less it shifted or put on their plate. Ula Ojiaku OK, I was asking for key takeaways, but you know, you've given me a question so I will answer that. No problem. So you said stopping and handover are the most important aspects, and how did I get them, keep them focused on that conversation? It's all about asking questions but I can't tell them you have to stop it, you need to have them come to a realisation and sometimes it's a conversation that you might have with them a few times before they come to the realisation themselves, but it's not about telling them what to do, so I, when I facilitate these sessions, I don't tell them what they need to do, I just ask questions to clarify, OK, what you are doing, do you think you still need to keep it? Yes, OK. Is it adding value to your stakeholders, your customers, does it make it more efficient, no? So why do you think we should keep it, because it's the way we've always done it. OK, so I leave it there and it might not be the right time to pursue it, but I try to encourage them to, you know, consider things that they can stop and handover. So it's a interfaced question and it's also like there's no one-size-fits-all-approach. But thank you very much sir for that question. So, I'll just round up. Classroom based training is almost never enough. We need to support them to kind of, make sense of whatever they've learnt, and teams, because they as teams and individuals sometimes, I personally sometimes struggle to apply what I've learnt in the classroom, on a course, into my real life context. So sometimes that additional support is needed, sometimes we have to roll up our sleeves and help them to have those conversations. And my humble submission is, would you consider using maybe the SLoMoSH Canvas for these sort of conversations, would that help you? For me, for the team that I've used it with, it's made things clearer for them. I wouldn't say it's a Fairy Godmother. You know, I wave the wand and they lived happily ever after, but that hobble has definitely gone. I'm now going to find a dentist to go help me on with the toothache, because there are always going to be problems to be solved. So, with that, that's all I have. Thank you so much for listening and for not falling asleep on me. That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com or your favourite podcast provider. Also share with friends and do leave a review on iTunes. This would help others find this show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com Take care and God bless!

BONUS: The psychology of communicating data with Dan Vacanti About Dan Vacanti Daniel Vacanti is a 20+ year software industry veteran who has spent most of the last years focusing on Lean and Agile practices. In 2007, he helped to develop the Kanban Method for knowledge work. He also co-founded ActionableAgile which provides industry leading predictive analytics tools and services to any Lean-Agile process. Dan co-founded ProKanban.org a community focused initiative to help people learn about Kanban. You can link with Dan Vacanti on LinkedIn and connect with Dan Vacanti on Twitter.  Dan also hosts his own podcast, DrunkAgile. Check out Dan Vacanti's books on Amazon.

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. We explore a real-life project that Marcus was part of, and how the #NoEstimates methods he used helped him make predictions, even if did not estimate the work to be done. About Dan Vacanti and Marcus Hammarberg Daniel Vacanti is a 20+ year software industry veteran who has spent most of the last years focusing on Lean and Agile practices. In 2007, he helped to develop the Kanban Method for knowledge work. He also co-founded ActionableAgile which provides industry leading predictive analytics tools and services to any Lean-Agile process. Dan co-founded ProKanban.org a community focused initiative to help people learn about Kanban. You can link with Dan Vacanti on LinkedIn and connect with Dan Vacanti on Twitter.  Marcus Hammarberg is the author of Salvation: The Bungsu Story (available on Amazon), an inspiring and actionable story about how simple tools can help transform the productivity and impact of an organization. The real-life stories in The Bungsu can help you transform the productivity of your team. Marcus is also a renowned author in the Kanban community, he authored the book Kanban in Action with Joakim Sundén. Head of Curriculum School of applied technology.  You can link with Marcus Hammarberg on LinkedIn and connect with Marcus Hammarberg on Twitter.

Read the full Show Notes and search through the world's largest audio library on Scrum directly on the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast website: http://bit.ly/SMTP_ShowNotes. We explore a real-life project that Marcus was part of, and how the #NoEstimates methods he used helped him make predictions, even if did not estimate the work to be done. About Dan Vacanti and Marcus Hammarberg Daniel Vacanti is a 20+ year software industry veteran who has spent most of the last years focusing on Lean and Agile practices. In 2007, he helped to develop the Kanban Method for knowledge work. He also co-founded ActionableAgile which provides industry leading predictive analytics tools and services to any Lean-Agile process. Dan co-founded ProKanban.org a community focused initiative to help people learn about Kanban. You can link with Dan Vacanti on LinkedIn and connect with Dan Vacanti on Twitter.  Marcus Hammarberg is the author of Salvation: The Bungsu Story (available on Amazon), an inspiring and actionable story about how simple tools can help transform the productivity and impact of an organization. The real-life stories in The Bungsu can help you transform the productivity of your team. Marcus is also a renowned author in the Kanban community, he authored the book Kanban in Action with Joakim Sundén. Head of Curriculum School of applied technology.  You can link with Marcus Hammarberg on LinkedIn and connect with Marcus Hammarberg on Twitter.

Organizations must meet the demands for speed, quality, and flexibility to manage the expectations of both the business team and end customers. Organizations have made significant improvements in the past decade to implement Agile methodologies like Lean-Agile, Kanban, Scrum, Extreme Programming, etc, and modern software development tools. However, they are challenged by a lack of collaboration, low automation levels, and low focus on continuous improvement. The pandemic and remote made of working have also impacted some of the Agile practices and ceremonies. We talk with Lisa Crispin, an industry-renowned Agile Testing Coach, and Practitioner, in the episode. Lisa talks about improving software testing effectiveness, driving continuous improvement, and increasing test automation levels. Lisa also provides the need for having a common automation toolset and reviewing feedback from production.    

John Thacker and Jake Harrell are the hosts of "A Quality Podcast", where they discuss all things related to Operational Excellence, Continuous Improvement, Lean, Six Sigma, Leadership and more. John is the author of How to Win Right Now as an Operations Supervisor. Jake is the author of Chasing Excellence. John, Jake and I discuss the definition and pursuit of quality and explore the contrast between the lean approach of Toyota and the agile approach of Tesla. Guests: John Thacker | https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-thacker-leansixsigmablackbelt/ Jake Harrell | https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakeharrellchasingexcellence/ Host and Producer: Tim Hampton | https://www.linkedin.com/in/thetimhampton/ Virtual voice over https://www.nuance.com/ Music | Consequences by Nihilore https://youtu.be/BaWaucm-ewc --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/unusuallywellinformed/message

“Do things, learn, reflect, adapt, change on the premise that (hopefully) we will go faster each time we do that because we are addressing the fundamental process issues.” Keith Howells, Project4 Learning Lab In this episode of our Lean Agile Management Podcast, we discuss how Lean/Agile principles can be applied to the knowledge work domain. Our guests today are Keith Howells and Angeline Thorne. Keith is a managing partner at Project4 Learning Lab and an experienced engineer with 20 years of operational leadership experience in the Aerospace, Defence, Energy, and Marine sectors. Angeline is a partner at Project4 Learning Lab with a track record of delivering sustainable improvements in business performance in senior leadership roles. Both experienced in business agility, program and portfolio management, leadership development, and change management, today they will share valuable insights on applying Lean and Agile from their practice. The topics discussed in this episode: The benefits of practicing more discipline to project management by introducing the Lean pull system techniqueWhat do digital and physical simulations bring to the surface?The productivity paradox or how people confuse productivity with efficiency?Where to start the transition from “pushing in more work” to “pull principle”?What are some of the “push behavior” dysfunctions?How to approach planning in project management? Learn more about: Project4 Learning Lab is a renowned organization specializing in leadership training, development, Lean and Agile consulting. Through the use of a holistic and sustainable approach to learning, P4 Learning Lab coaches guide leaders and organizations to deliver outstanding performance. Project4 Learning LabLinkedIn Contact our guests: Angeline Thorne Keith Howells

How can you radically reduce idea-to-market cycle times? How do you build sustainable, profitable growth for the business through better product development and the elimination of waste? Learn more about lean/agile methodology and why lean product development is not about cost reduction. In this episode, we have guest Steve Stucky, Agile/Lean Product Development Coach and also the president of the Minneapolis Chapter PDMA. Steve Stucky talks about Lean-Agile methodology and how he employs a multi-layer approach to improve product development focusing on changes needed at the Process, Practice, and Pipeline layers. He shares his holistic approach on how the Lean-Agile methodology incorporates elements of both continuous delivery and continuous improvement, optimized across the entire value stream. Steve Stucky has more than +30 years of product development experience within the industrial manufacturing and medical device industry. He is known for improving product development performance, driving organic growth, and building highly effective teams. He is an Agile/Lean Product Development Coach and also the president of the Minneapolis Chapter PDMA. "There's a lot of waste in most business's product development practices, and it's about focusing on how to make sure that teams can deliver what's important for the business in a shorter cycle time than they were able to do today." Steve Stucky

“The goal isn't just to ‘get stuff done', it's to identify the highest value items and get those done first." Leila Rao takes us on a journey through her LeanAgile Compass framework and how this can be applied in 90-day cycles to help organizations transform and continuously improve. Leila is the founder of Agile Extended and the creator of The Compass for Agility, a book and framework that integrates design thinking, lean, facilitation, and agile into actionable principles. She is also the co-founder of LeanInAgile, a non-profit focused on amplifying the voices, talents, and experiences of women within the Lean and Agile communities across the globe. Connect with Leila on LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/agilextended/ --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/liwomenintech/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/liwomenintech/support