Podcasts about Takeuchi

The Dedeaux Download Podcast returns with Shotgun Spratling and podcast co-host Kasey Kazliner breaking down USC baseball's 3-1 week that featured a series win over Gonzaga and a dominant midweek win over Long Beach State. Shotgun and Kasey break down all the action, looking at the positives of the Trojans improving to 26-14 with an 11-7 mark in Big Ten play and a fourth-place spot in the standings behind only two ranked teams and Iowa. They discuss the play of Adrian Lopez powering the offense all weekend against the Zags as well as Ethan Hedges seeming to get back on track after a rough spell. Shotgun and Kasey also look at how the Trojans were able to bounce back after dropping the opener against Gonzaga with some uncharacteristically sloppy play thanks to the bullpen stepping up throughout the week. The podcasters also look at three negatives, including Kevin Takeuchi reinjuring his left shoulder during Tuesday's win at Long Beach and the RPI hit that one poor game can have as the Trojans start looking toward the postseason. After a break, USC head coach Andy Stankiewicz then joins the show to talk about how the Big Ten schedule, including the back-and-forth travel, has treated his team and how his players have handled and adjusted to the differences and challenges. He also discusses how the Trojans have tried to deal with a spate of injuries with multiple pitchers lost for the season as well as Takeuchi's shoulder issues. Stankiewicz then takes the listener through some strategic thought processes of how he tries to use late-inning opportunities in blowout games as well as how he handles his star players being in a funk, especially later in the season. The Trojan head man chats about Hedges, Lopez, Bryce Martin-Grudzielanek, Caden Hunter, Andrew Johnson, Jack Basseer and others. Shotgun and Kasey close out the show taking a look at where the Trojans stand after winning another series and taking a peek at where the Trojans could wind up in the postseason. The podcast then previews USC's upcoming week of action with the Trojans heading to Minneapolis to take on an injury-riddled Minnesota team that continues to battle despite 11 significant injuries, including five of the season-ending variety. Please review, rate and subscribe to the Peristyle Podcast on Apple Podcasts! Make sure you check out USCFootball.com for complete coverage of USC Trojans football, basketball, baseball and recruiting.  To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Send us a textMeet David Gummo, CTEM, Equipment Manager at Sands Point Golf Club in Sands Point, New York. Sands Point is a private 18-hole golf and skeet club where David manages a mostly Toro fleet, with a few pieces of John Deere and a lone Jacobsen.David shares how his journey began at just 14 years old in a vocational high school outdoor power equipment program, eventually becoming part of the inaugural graduating class of Penn State's Turf and Agricultural Equipment program. Now a father of three-year-old twins and an avid gamer, David talks about the unique challenges he faced after making a major geographic move, and how prioritizing physical fitness and mental health helped him thrive in his new role and in life.From his appreciation for fabricating and working on Takeuchi equipment to his thoughts on shop organization and managing with limited help in the shop, David brings valuable insight and honesty to the mic Tweet us @ReelTurfTechs and @MTrentManning Email us at ReelTurfTechs@gmail.com Check out our YouTube Channel

A conversation with Marika Takeuchi - pianist / composer who has created music for movies, TV, radio, commercials, games and her own solo releases. From Tokyo, now based in California Takeuchi talks about her musical journey including writing songs from the age of eight, how the piano got her through difficult times and creating music inspired by her first child.

https://youtu.be/zX-frOmbW00On today's episode of Still To Be Determined we're talking about graphene batteries, as well as an interview with Dr. Ichiro Tak-ay-yuchi about how a shape changing metal alloy could be the future of heating and cooling. Sci-fi or Sci-real?Watch the Undecided with Matt Ferrell episode, How Solid State Cooling Could Change Everything https://youtu.be/GHl6buYjZGE?list=PLnTSM-ORSgi7uzySCXq8VXhodHB5B5OiQYouTube version of the podcast: https://www.youtube.com/stilltbdpodcastGet in touch: https://undecidedmf.com/podcast-feedbackSupport the show: https://pod.fan/still-to-be-determinedFollow us on X: @stilltbdfm @byseanferrell @mattferrell or @undecidedmfUndecided with Matt Ferrell: https://www.youtube.com/undecidedmf To vote for me in the RODE Creator of the Year contest go here: https://undecided.link/RodeVote  Thanks! ★ Support this podcast ★

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[7.5✮]   Juandapo y Diego hablan sobre Sailor Moon Cosmos, obviamente nos cuentan cuál es su Sailor Scout favorita, pero sobre todo hablan de que aunque les gustó les dolieron muchas decisiones que se tomaron.  ·

Japanese scientists have found a way to attach living skin tissue to robotic faces and make them "smile." This breakthrough could be helpful not only in robotics, but also in cosmetics and medicine.日本科学家找到了一种将活体皮肤组织附着在机器人面部并使其“微笑”的方法。这一突破不仅对机器人技术有帮助，还可以应用于化妆品和医学领域。Researchers at the University of Tokyo started the process by growing human skin cells in the shape of a face. Then, they used attachments that are similar to the ligaments in a human to pull the tissue into a wide smile.东京大学的研究人员首先将人类皮肤细胞培养成面部的形状。然后，他们使用类似于人类韧带的附件将组织拉成一个大大的微笑。Lead researcher Shoji Takeuchi is a professor at the University of Tokyo. He said the result is an important step towards building more life-like robots. Using the attachments, he said, “it became possible to manipulate living skin for the first time.”首席研究员竹内昌治是东京大学的教授。他表示，这一结果是朝着构建更逼真机器人迈出的重要一步。他说，通过使用这些附件，“首次能够操纵活体皮肤”。The study about the smiling robot appeared last month in Cell Reports Physical Science. It represents 10 years of research by Takeuchi and his lab on how to best combine biological and artificial machines.关于微笑机器人的研究上个月发表在《细胞报告物理科学》杂志上。这代表了竹内及其实验室十年来如何最好地结合生物和人工机器的研究。Living tissue is better for this application than metals and plastics, Takeuchi said. He noted that brains and muscles are more efficient in use of energy and the skin can repair itself.竹内说，活体组织比金属和塑料更适合这种应用。他指出，大脑和肌肉的能量利用效率更高，而皮肤可以自我修复。In the future, the researchers aim to add more elements to the lab-grown skin, including a circulatory system and nerves. That could lead to safer testing methods for cosmetics and drugs absorbed, or taken in, through the skin.未来，研究人员计划在实验室培育的皮肤中添加更多元素，包括循环系统和神经。这可能会导致化妆品和通过皮肤吸收或摄入的药物的更安全的测试方法。It could also produce more realistic and functional coverings for robots. The remaining issue is how people react to machines that appear almost lifelike, but do not look exactly like humans.它还可以为机器人提供更逼真和功能性的覆盖物。剩下的问题是人们如何应对看起来几乎栩栩如生但不完全像人类的机器。"There's still a bit of that creepiness to it," Takeuchi said about the robot.竹内在谈到机器人时说：“它仍然有点令人毛骨悚然。”He added, "I think that making robots out of the same materials as humans and having them show the same expressions might be one key to overcoming the uncanny valley."他补充说：“我认为，用与人类相同的材料制造机器人并让它们表现出相同的表情，可能是克服恐怖谷的关键之一。”The “uncanny valley” is an idea that relates to how humans react to robots or other machines that act like humans. “Uncanny” is an adjective that means “being beyond what is normal or expected.”“恐怖谷”是一个与人类对机器人或其他像人类一样行动的机器的反应有关的概念。“Uncanny”是一个形容词，意思是“超出正常或预期的范围”。Japanese robotics scientist Masahiro Mori published a work, Bukimi No Tani, or “Uncanny Valley” in 1970. It proposed how people would react to lifelike robots, or androids.日本机器人科学家森政弘在1970年发表了一部作品《不気味の谷》，即“恐怖谷”。它提出了人们将如何对栩栩如生的机器人或人形机器人作出反应。Mori thought that at first, people would have positive feelings about robots that look a little bit like humans. But as robots got closer to being realistic human models, he believed those feelings would become more negative.森政弘认为，起初，人们对看起来有点像人类的机器人会有积极的感觉。但随着机器人变得更接近真实的人类模型，他认为这些感觉会变得更加负面。Those negative feelings are the so-called low point, or “valley,” in a chart that represents the relationship between the human-like appearance of robots and humans' feelings toward and acceptance of such robots.这些负面情绪就是所谓的低点或“谷底”，在一个表示机器人类人外观与人类对这些机器人的感觉和接受度之间关系的图表中表现出来。

The Milan-based designer shares some of the principles central to his design process. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Bee declines feature prominently in the news today. But what are the causes for it? Using the example of the UK, we follow the Woodland Trust to explore this issue. Plus, we also discuss two papers which hold differing viewpoints about the pollination crisis generally... Sources for this episode: Briggs, H., BBC News (2019), Bees: Many British pollinating insects in decline, study shows (online) (Accessed 05/03/2024). Engel, M. S., Rasmussen, C. and Gonzalez, V. H. (2021), Bees. In: Starr, C. K. (ed.), Encyclopedia of Insects. Springer Nature Switzerland. Ghazoul, J. (2005), Buzziness as usual? Questioning the global pollination crisis. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 20(7): 367-373. Hine, R. S. (2019), Oxford Dictionary of Biology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kennedy, P. J., Ford, S. M., Poidatz, J., Thiéry, D., & Osborne, J. L. (2018). Searching for nests of the invasive Asian hornet (Vespa velutina) using radio-telemetry. Communications Biology, 1, 88. Lima, C. G., Sofia Vaz, A., Honrado, J. P., Aranha, J., Crespo, N., & Vicente, J. R. (2022). The invasion by the Yellow-legged hornet: A systematic review. Journal for Nature Conservation, 67, 126173. Paxton, R. J. (2010), Does infection by Nosema ceranae cause “Colony Collapse Disorder” in honey bees (Apis mellifera)? Journal of Apicultural Research 49(1): 80-84. Rader, R., Bartomeus, I., Garibaldi, L. A. and Woyciechowski, M. (2015), Non-bee insects are important contributors to global crop pollination. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(1): 146-151. Renner, S. S. and Zohner, C. M. (2018), Climate Change and Phenological Mismatch in Trophic Interactions Among Plants, Insects and Vertebrates. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 49: 162-182. Takahashi, J., Okuyama, H., Kiyoshi, T., Takeuchi, T., & Martin, S. J. (2019). Origins of Vespa velutina hornets that recently invaded Iki Island, Japan and Jersey Island, UK. Mitochondrial DNA Part A, 30(3), 434–439. Van Engelsdorp, D., et al. (2009), Colony Collapse Disorder: A Descriptive Study. PLOS ONE 4(8): e6481. Varela, C. (2023), Why are bees important? And how you can help them (online) (Accessed 01/03/2023). Vogel, G. (2017), Where have all the insects gone? Science 356(6338): 576-579. Author unknown, Climate Action Tracker (date unknown), The CAT Thermometer (online) (Accessed 05/03/2024).

Bio Dr. Jeff Sutherland is the inventor and co-creator of Scrum, the most widely used Agile framework across the globe.  Originally used for software development, Jeff has also pioneered the application of the framework to multiple industries and disciplines. Today, Scrum is applied to solve complex projects in start-ups and Fortune 100 companies. Scrum companies consistently respond to market demand, to get results and drive performance at speeds they never thought possible. Jeff is committed to developing the Agile leadership practices that allow Scrum to scale across an enterprise.   Dr. Sutherland is the chairman and founder of Scrum Inc. He is a signatory of the Agile manifesto and coauthor of the Scrum Guide and the creator Scrum@Scale. Jeff continues to teach, create new curriculum in the Agile Education Program and share best practices with organizations around the globe. He is the founder of Scrum Inc. and coauthor of, Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time, that has sold over 100,000 copies worldwide.    Social Media:                 LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jeffsutherland                 Twitter: @jeffsutherland Website: Scrum Inc https://scruminc.com               Books/ Articles: The Scrum Guide by Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber http://www.scrumguides.org/index.html Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland The Scrum Fieldbook by JJ Sutherland Agile Competitors and Virtual Organisations by Steven Goldman, Roger Nagel and Kenneth Preiss https://www.amazon.co.uk/Agile-Competitors-Virtual-Organizations-Engineering/dp/0471286508 Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster Moving World by John P. Kotter Leading Change by John P. Kotter Process Dynamics, Modeling and Control by Babatunde A. Ogunnaike and Harmon W. Ray A Scrum Book: The Spirit of the Game by Jeff Sutherland, James Coplien, Mark den Hollander, et al    Interview Transcript Ula Ojiaku: Hello everyone, my guest today is Dr Jeff Sutherland. He is the inventor and co-creator of Scrum, the most widely used Agile Framework across the globe. Originally used for Software Development, Jeff has also pioneered the application of the framework to multiple industries and disciplines. Today, Scrum is applied to deliver complex projects in startups and Fortune 100 companies. Dr Jeff Sutherland is the Chairman and Founder of Scrum Inc. He is a signatory of the Agile Manifesto and co-author of the Scrum Guide and the creator of Scrum at Scale. Jeff continues to teach, create new curriculum in the Agile education programme and share best practices with organisations around the globe. He has authored and co-authored a number of books which include Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time – which has sold over 100,000 copies worldwide. In this episode, Dr Sutherland shares the backstory of how he and Ken Schwaber developed the Scrum framework. I was pleasantly surprised and proud to learn that one of the inspirations behind the current Scrum framework we now have was the work of Prof Babatunde Ogunnike, given my Nigerian heritage. Dr Sutherland also talked about the importance of Agile Leadership and his current focus on helping organisations fix bad Scrum implementations. I'm sure you'll uncover some useful nuggets in this episode. Without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, my conversation with Dr Sutherland.   Ula Ojiaku: Thank you, Dr. Sutherland, for joining us on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. It's a great pleasure to have you here. Jeff Sutherland: Glad to be here. Looking forward to it. Ula Ojiaku: Fantastic. So could you tell us about yourself? Jeff Sutherland: Well, I grew up in a small town in Massachusetts. And I always felt that I would go to West Point of the United States Military Academy, even at a very young age. And I finally made it there. I spent four years there. And I went on to a program where a certain number of cadets could join the Air Force. And I told the Air Force, if they made me a fighter pilot, I would move into the Air Force, which I did. I spent 11 years as a fighter pilot in the Air Force. And most of the operational aspects of Scrum actually come from that training. My last tour in the Air Force was actually at the US Air Force Academy, I was a professor of mathematics. And I had gone to Stanford University in preparation for that position. And I had worked closely with the, at the time he was Head of the Department of Psychiatry, became the Dean of Stanford who had studied under my father-in-law, he had become an MD under my father-in-law, who was a brilliant physician. And I was working on research papers with him, both at Stanford and at the Air Force Academy. And I asked him for guidance. And I said, I'm thinking about, given all the work we've done in the medical area. Starting in Stanford, I'm thinking maybe becoming a doctor - become an MD. And he strongly recommended against that he said, ‘you'll just go backwards in your career, what you need to do is you build on everything you've done so far. And what you have is your fighter pilot experience, your experience as a statistician, and a mathematician, you want to build on that.' So, I had already started into a doctoral program at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, which was not far from the Air Force Academy. And so, I talked to my department Chairman there who offered me a position in the department running a large research grant, funded by the National Cancer Institute and so, I decided to exit the Airforce and join the medical school. While I was finishing up my doctoral degree. And as soon as my doctorate was finished, I became a professor of Radiology, preventive medicine and biometrics. I was a joint across multiple departments. And I was doing mathematical research on modeling, particularly the human cell on a supercomputer, (to) determine what caused cancer. And to do that required extensive mathematical research as well as the medical research. But at the end of the day, what we found was for any complex adaptive system, like a human cell, or a person or a team, they go through different states. And they're moved from one state to the next by some kind of intervention. And so, if you understand what causes those changes… turned out in the case of cancer, there were four different states that led to a tumor. And in every state, there were certain interventions, and if you knew what they were, you could prevent them and prevent cancer. Or you could even, to my surprise, take a cancer cell and make it go backward into a normal cell. So, this fundamental understanding is the theory behind Scrum. So, while I'm doing this all at the medical school, a large banking company came by and said, ‘you know, over the medical school, you guys have all the knowledge about the technologies; the new technology, we're using (for) banking, you're using for research.' And they said, ‘you guys have all the knowledge but we have all the money and they made me an offer to come join the bank'    Ula Ojiaku: [Laughs]You couldn't refuse Jeff Sutherland: Not just me, it was my family. So, I wind up as Vice President for Advanced Systems, which was effectively was the CTO for 150 banks that we were running across North America.   Each was, you know, a dozen, 50, 100 branches. And of course, we were mainly doing the software, installation and support to run the banking operation, which is largely computer stuff – (this) is what banks run off. And as we're building these systems with hundreds and hundreds of developers, one of the first things I noticed is that all the projects were late. And I look at what they're doing. And they're using this process where they spend, you know, six months defining requirements, and then they put all the requirements into a Gantt chart. And then they, they plan on taking six months to build something, but it's never done. Because as soon as they start testing that they find there's all kinds of things that are broken. So, virtually every single project of the bank is late. So, as a head of technology, one day I walked into the CEO's office and I said, ‘Ron,  have you noticed all your projects are late?' He said, ‘Yes'. He says, ‘Every morning at least five CIOs or CEOs of the banks, they call me up.' And he says, ‘they scream at me.' I said, ‘wow', I said, ‘You know, it's going to get worse, not better. Because these guys are using this, these Gantt Charts.' And I showed him one. And then being a mathematician, I mathematically proved that every project would be late at the bank. And he was stunned. And he said, ‘what should I do?' I said, ‘we need a completely different operating system in the bank.' This is back in 1983. ‘Let's take one business unit. Let's take the one that's losing the most money, okay, the worst business unit' Ula Ojiaku: They have nothing to lose then. Jeff Sutherland: And it was the automated teller division that was rolling out cash machines all over North America. It was a new technology and they had a ton of problems. So, I said, ‘let's take that unit and every one, sales, market, support, installation, we're going to split them down into small teams. And we're going to have Product Marketing come in on Monday with a backlog prioritized by business value. And at the end of the week, on Friday, we're going to deploy to 150 banks.' ‘And I'm going to train them how to land a project every week, just like I trained fighter pilots to land aircraft. I'm going to give them a burndown chart, we're going to throw away the Gantt Chart, I'm going to give them a burndown chart to show them how to land the project.' So, he said, ‘Well, that's gonna be a big headache.' I said, ‘look, the bank needs to be fixed.' He said, ‘Okay, you got it.' So, I took that unit. I told them, ‘I know it's gonna take several weeks,' today we call them sprints, ‘for you to be successful.' Because as new pilots, trained to land, these high-performance jets, they tend to come in high and then they have to come around and try to land again, they over and over, they practice until they can nail it. And it took them six weeks, six sprints to actually nail the end of the week (and) deploy (to) 150 banks. But within six months, it became… it went from the worst business unit in the bank to the most profitable business unit in the bank. And the senior management said, ‘you know, Jeff, here's another 20 million dollars to throw at whatever that thing you're doing  it's the most profitable thing in the bank, we're gonna put more money in that. So that was the first prototype of what we call today Scrum at Scale. Now, I've been CTO of 11, or CTO or CEO of 11 different companies. And for the next 10 years, I prototyped that model and advanced technology teams until in 1993, at a company called Easel Corporation, we found that because of the tooling we were building and selling to customers, we needed to build the tool with what today we call Agile Practice. Ula Ojiaku: Yes Jeff Sutherland: And we need to train the customer to use the tool by having teams do an agile practice. So, in order to train our customers properly in 1993, we actually had to formalize what I've been prototyping for 10 years. And we wrote it down and at the time we were reading this paper, we're going through 1000 papers in the journals I, you know, I had done many new technology. And, in every one of them, you have to read everything that's ever been done so that you can go beyond. You can use everything that's been done, but then you go beyond, okay? Ula Ojiaku: Yeah Jeff Sutherland:  So, it's a tremendous amount of research to launch new technology. And at about the 300th paper in our file, it was a paper out of the Harvard Business Review, which really surprised me, by two Japanese Business School professors, Professors Takeuchi and Nonaka. And in there, they described the best teams in the world. They were lean hardware teams that reminded them of a game of rugby, they said, ‘we're going to call what they're doing Scrum Project Management.' So, I said to the team, ‘we need a name for this thing that we're going to train our customers in, and let's call it Scrum.' And off we went. So, for the next two years, we were actually using Scrum within Easel deploying products. But it was not public, to the general industry. And Easel got acquired by a larger company. And at that time, I felt that this needed to be rolled out into the industry because we had benchmarked it with the best tooling in the world from the leading productivity company, and showed that it was… that (it) went 10 times faster. The quality was 10 times better, which is what you need for a new technology innovation. And so, I felt it was ready to go to the industry as a whole. So, I called up an old friend, Ken Schwaber. And he was a CEO of a traditional Project Management software company, a waterfall (methodology). He sold these methodologies with 303 ring binders, a software package that would make Gantt Charts. So, I said, ‘Ken, I want you to come up and see the Scrum, because it actually works and that stuff you're selling doesn't work – it makes projects late.' And he agreed to come in, he actually came up, he met with me. He stayed for two weeks inside the company, working, observing the Scrum team. And at the end of those two weeks, he said, ‘Jeff, you're right. This really works - it's pretty much the way I run my company.' He said, ‘if I ran my company with a Gantt Chart, we would have been bankrupt a long time ago.' So, I said, ‘well, why don't you sell something to work that works instead of inflicting more damage on the industry?' So, he said so we said ‘okay, how (do) we do it?' I said, ‘it needs to be open source, it needs to be free.' Ken felt we needed to take the engineering practices, many of which appear today in extreme programming… Ula Ojiaku: Yes Jeff Sutherland: …and let Kent Beck (creator of eXtreme Programming, XP) run with them because Kent had been sending me emails, ‘Jeff, send me every...', he had been following the development of Scrum, ‘…send me everything on Scrum, I'm building a new process. I want to use anything that you've done before and not try to reinvent anything.' So, he (Ken Schwaber) said, ‘let Kent take the engineering practices, we'll focus on the team process itself.' And we agreed to write the first paper on this to present at a big conference later that year. And writing that paper was quite interesting. Ken visited DuPont Chemical Corporation, the leading Chemical Process Engineers there that they had hired out of academia to stop chemical plants from blowing up. And when Ken met with them, they said, describe what we were doing in the software domain. They said, ‘you know, well, that process that traditional project management is a Predictive Process Control System. We have that in the chemical industry.' ‘But it's only useful if the variation in the process running is less than 4%.' They said, ‘do you have less than 4% change in requirements while you're building software?' Ken says, ‘no, of course not! It's over 50%!' And they started laughing at him. They said, ‘your project's going to be exploding all over the place.' ‘Because every chemical plant that has blown up has been somebody applying a predictive control system to a system that has high variability. You need to completely retrain industry to use Empirical Process Control, which will stop your projects from blowing up. And they said, here it is, here's the book, they had the standard reference book for Chemical Process Engineering. And in there, there's a chapter on Empirical Process Control, which is based on transparency, inspection, and adapting to what's happening in real time. Okay, so those are the three pillars of Scrum that are today at the base of the Scrum guide. Ula Ojiaku: Do you still remember the title of the book that the chemical engineers recommended to Mr. Schwaber by any chance? Jeff Sutherland: Yeah, so I have a, when I do training, I have a slide that has a picture of the book (Process Dynamics, Modelling and Control). It's written by Ogunnaike and Ray. But that is the root of the change that's gone on in the industry. And so then from 1995, forward, Ken and I started working together, I was still CTO of companies. And I would get him to come in as a consultant and work with me. And we'd implement and enhance the Scrum implementations in company after company after company. Until 2001, of course, Scrum was expanding but Extreme Programming in 2001, was actually the most widely deployed. They were only two widely-deployed agile processes at the time of Scrum and Extreme Programming. Extreme Programming was the biggest. And so, the Agile Manifesto meeting was convened. And it had 17 people there, but three of them were Scrum guys - that had started up Scrum, implemented it in companies, four of them were the founders of Extreme Programming. And the other 10 were experts who have written books on adaptive software development or, you know, lightweight processes, so, industry experts. And we, we talked for a day and everybody explained what they were doing and there was a lot of arguments and debate. And at the end of the day, we agreed because of this book, Agile Competitors, a book about 100 hardware companies - lean hardware companies, that have taken Lean to the next level, by involving the customer in the creation of the product. And we said, ‘we think that we all need to run under one umbrella. And we should call that Agile.' Ula Ojiaku: So, did you actually use the word umbrella in your (statement)? Oh, okay. Jeff Sutherland: Often, people use that right? Ula Ojiaku: Yes, yes Jeff Sutherland: Because at the time, we had Agile and Extreme Programming, and now everybody's trying to come up with their own flavor, right?  All under the same umbrella of ‘Agile'. And that caused the both Scrum and Extreme Programming started to expand even more, and then other kinds of processes also. But Scrum rapidly began to take dominant market share, Scrum today is about 80% of what people call Agile. The reason being, number one, it was a technology that was invented and created to be 10 times better. So, it was a traditional new technology developed based on massive amounts of research. So, it worked. But number two, it also scaled it worked very well for many teams. I mean, there are many companies today like Amazon that have thousands of Scrum teams. And Extreme Programming was really more towards one team. And (reason number) three, you could distribute it across the world. So, some of the highest performing teams are actually dozens of teams or hundreds across multiple continents. And because of those three characteristics, it's (Scrum has) dominated the market. So that brings us to in 2006, I was asked by a Venture Capital firm to help them implement Scrum in their companies, they felt that Scrum was a strategic advantage for investment. And not only that, they figured out that it should be implemented everywhere they implemented it within the venture group, everybody doing Scrum. And their goal was to double their return on investment compared to any other venture capital firm. They pretty much have done that by using Scrum, but then they said, ‘Jeff, you know, we're hiring you as a consultant into our companies. And you're a CTO of a healthcare company right now. And we don't want to build a healthcare company, we want to build a Scrum company.' ‘So, why don't you create Scrum Inc. right here in the venture group? We'll support it, we'll do the administrative support. We'll write you a check - whatever you want.' So, I said, ‘well, I'm not going to take any money because I don't need it. I understand how that works. If the venture capital firm owns your company, then (in the) long term, you're essentially their slave for several years. So, I'm not taking any money. But I will create the company within the venture group. If you provide the administrative support, I'll give you 10% of the revenue and you can do all the finances and all that kind of stuff. So, that's the way Scrum Inc. was started to enable an investment firm to launch or support or invest in many dozens of Scrum companies. Ula Ojiaku: That's awesome Jeff Sutherland: And today, we're on the sixth round of investment at OpenView Venture Partners, which was the company the six round is 525 million. There's a spin out from OpenView that I'm working with, that has around this year, 25 million. And over the years, just co-investing with the venture group I have my own investment fund of 50 million. So, we have $570 million, right this year 2021 that we're putting into Scrum companies. Agile companies, preferably Scrum. Ula Ojiaku: Now when you say Scrum companies is it that they facilitate the (Scrum) training and offer consulting services in Scrum or is it that those companies operate and you know, do what they do by adopting Scrum processes? Jeff Sutherland: Today, Scrum Inc sometimes help some of those companies, but in general, those companies are independently implementing Scrum in their organizations.   Ula Ojiaku: Right Jeff Sutherland: And okay, some of them may come to Scrum training, maybe not. But since Scrum is so widely deployed in the industry, Scrum Inc, is only one of 1000 companies doing Scrum training and that sort of stuff. So, they have a wide variety, wide area of where they can get training and also many of the startups, they already know Scrum before they started the company. They are already Agile. So, what we're interested in is to find the company that understands Agile and has the right team players, particularly at the executive level, to actually execute on it. Ula Ojiaku: No matter what the product or services (are)… Jeff Sutherland: Products or services, a lot of them are software tooling companies, but some of them are way beyond that, right? So, turns out that during COVID… COVID was a watershed. The companies that were not agile, they either went bankrupt, or they were crippled. That meant all the Agile companies that could really do this, started grabbing all the market share. And so, many of our companies, their stock price was headed for the moon during COVID. While the non-agile companies were flatlined, or are going out of business, and so the year of COVID was the best business year in the history of venture capital because of Agility. So, as a result, I'm spending half my time really working, investing in companies, and half of my time, working with Scrum (Inc.) and supporting them, helping them move forward. Ula Ojiaku: That's a very impressive resume and career story really Dr. Sutherland. I have a few questions: as you were speaking, you've called Scrum in this conversation, a process, a tooling, the technology. And you know, so for some hardcore Agilists, some people will say, you know, Agile is all about the mindset for you, what would you say that Scrum is it all of these things you've called it or would it be, you know, or it's something (else)...? Jeff Sutherland: So, certainly the (Agile) mindset is important. But from an investment point of view, if the organization can't deliver real value, quickly, agile is just a bunch of nonsense. And we have a huge amount of nonsense out there. In fact, the Standish group has been publishing for decades. 58% of Agile teams are late over budget with unhappy customers. So, when you get these hardcore Agilist, that are talking about mindset, you have to figure out ‘are they in the 42% that actually can do it or are they in the 58% that are crippled?' My major work with Scrum Inc. today is to try to get to fix the bad Scrum out there. That is the biggest problem in the Agile community. People picking up pieces of things, people picking up ideas, and then putting together and then it doesn't work. That is going to that's going to be really bad for agile in the future. If 58% of it continues not to work. So, what we found, I mean, it was really interesting. Several years ago, the senior executive (of) one of the biggest Japanese companies flew to Boston wanted meet with me. And he said to me, ‘the training is not working in Japan for Scrum.' He said, ‘I spent 10 years with Google, in Silicon Valley. So, I know what it looks like what actually works. And I can tell you, it's not working in Japan, because the training is… it's not the training of the Scrum that is high performing. And in fact, our company is 20% owned by Toyota, and we are going to be the trainers of Toyota. And we cannot deliver the training that's currently being given to Toyota, it will not work, it will not fly. And we want to create a company called Scrum Inc. Japan. And we're a multibillion-dollar company, we're ready to invest whatever it takes to make that happen.' To give them the kind of training that will produce the teams that Takeuchi and Nonaka were writing about in the first paper on Scrum. And as we work with them to figure out what needs to be in that training, we found that the Scrum Guide was only 25% of the training. Another 25% was basic Lean concepts and tooling, right? Because the original Scrum paper was all about Lean hardware companies. So Lean is fundamental to Scrum. If you don't understand it, you can't do it. And then third, there are certain patterns of performance that we've developed over the years, we spent 10 years writing a book on patterns - Scrum patterns. And there's about a dozen of those patterns that have to be implemented to get a high performing team. And finally, scaling to multiple teams. It turns out, right about this time I started working with the Japanese, I was at a conference with the Agile Leadership from Intel. And they told me that they'd introduced Scaling Frameworks into Intel division, some of which had more than 500 Scrum teams in the divisions and the Scaling Frameworks had slowed them down. And it made the senior executives furious and they threw them all out and they said, we did not want to hear the word Scrum at Intel anymore. But you guys need to go twice as fast as you're going now. So, they came to me, they said, ‘we're desperate. We have to go twice as fast. We can't even use the word “Scrum”. What should we do?' And they blamed me, they said, ‘Sutherland you're responsible you caused problem, you need to fix it.' So, I started writing down how to do what today we call Scrum at Scale. And everybody, you know, most of those people in the industry were implementing IT scaling frameworks. They were all upset. ‘Why are you writing down another framework?' Well, it's because those IT frameworks do not enable the organization to show Business Agility, and win in the market. And in the best companies in the world, they're being thrown out. So, I've had to write down how do you add, how do you go to hundreds and thousands of Scrum teams - and never slow down as you're adding more and more teams. You know, every team you add is as fast as the first team when you start. Yeah, that's what Scrum at Scale is all about. So, there's two primary things that I'm focused on today. One is to fix all this bad Scrum. Second is to fix the scaling problem. Because it turns out that if you look at the latest surveys from Forbes magazine, and the Scrum Alliance on successful Agile transformations - I learned recently, that almost every company in the world of any significance is going through an Agile transformation or continuing transformation they'd already started years ago. And 53% of them do not meet management expectations. And the MIT Sloan Business Review did an analysis of what happens if an agile transformation fails, and 67% of those companies go out of business. So, this is becoming really serious, right? To be successful today, if you're competing in any significant way, you have to be agile. And number two, if you try to be agile and fail, you have a 67% chance going out of business. And the failure rate is 53%. So, this is the problem that we're wrestling with. And half of that 53% failure is due to the bad Scrum we talked about, but the other half is due because of the leadership not being Agile. Ula Ojiaku: I was just going to say, as you said something about the leadership not being agile. In my experience, you know, as an agile coach in some organizations whilst the teams would embrace you know, Scrum and embrace Agility - the practices and the processes and everything. There's a limit to, you know, how much they can get done… Jeff Sutherland: Absolutely… Ula Ojiaku: …if the leadership are not on board. So… Jeff Sutherland: …you hit this glass ceiling. So, I've been, you know, giving presentations on Agile Transformations around the world. And I can remember multiple times I've had 300 people in the room, say, and I say okay, ‘How many of you are agile, in Agile transformations or continuing the ones you'd started?' Of course, everybody raises their hand. ‘How many of you have waterfall traditional management that expects you to deliver all the old Gantt Chart reports that we always got, and don't understand what you're doing?' There's 300 people in the room and 297 people raised their hand. I said, ‘you need to give your leadership the book by Professor Kotter called Accelerate.' Professor Kotter is one of the leading change experts of the world. Ula Ojiaku: And he also, yeah, He also wrote ‘Leading Change' as well - the book, yes. Jeff Sutherland: And in that book, he says, if the leadership of the Agile part of the organization is traditional in their mindset and requirements, the Agile Transformation will eventually fail 100% of the time. Ula Ojiaku: Those are sobering statistics in terms of, you know, the failure rate and how much of you know the success hinges on business agility and the leadership being agile as well and taking the time to know and care what it means. Yeah. Jeff Sutherland: And what's happening is that the Agile Leadership today, if you look at some of the companies that have been most successful during COVID, one of them is John Deere Corporation, the biggest farm equipment manufacturer in the world, probably the oldest. Their stock price went up more than Amazon during COVID. And the board of directors gave their Agile Leadership, the Agile Coaches, Scrum Masters, the highest award in the Corporation for producing that result. So that's another reason I'm trying to communicate to Agile people. The success and survival of your company depends on you. You think your management's going to save you but no, if they are old-style people, they are going to run that company out of business. And you need to either save it before it goes out of business or run to another company before bad things happen. Ula Ojiaku: It's impressive that, you know, John Deere being a farm equipment manufacturer… I think they were ahead of the curve you know, (compared to some of their contemporaries in that industry as well) and embraced agile ways of working. Do you know how their Agile Leadership were able to quantify their contributions to the company? Jeff Sutherland: John Deere started to get Agile more than 10 years ago. So, they've been at it a long time. But in recent years, they really started to build… build internally… Agile leadership, you know, based on my work and they started applying that across the company. I mean, the major focus has not been software actually – it's been in other parts of the company. What has to happen to run a company that's building tractors? Well, there's all kinds of things that have to happen, you know - purchasing, there's legal, there's acquiring all the pieces, it's putting them together at the assembly line, you know, software is a piece of it. You know, that's probably the easiest piece to fix with Agile, it's the rest of the company that's the challenge. They have started doing that really well which is reflected in their stock price. Ula Ojiaku: Amazing. So, you said something about you know, you're out to fix a couple of things, the problem with bad Scrum out there. And, you know, the problem with scaling agile. Jeff Sutherland: Right Ula Ojiaku: So, with respect to the first one, the point about bad Scrum, what in your experience would be the root cause of bad Scrum implementations in organizations? Jeff Sutherland: There're about 11 things, that if you fix them, the team will go twice as fast. And it's multiplicative. So, you know, we have extensive data on, you know, really big companies. What's the difference between the fastest team and the slowest teams? The fastest teams are 2000 times faster than the slowest teams. So why is that? Well, first, the team has to be small. The optimal team size is four or five people. If you have a 10-person team, that's going to take at least 50% longer to get anything done. If you go out, look at the team size, you'll see companies have even not only ten-people teams, they have 15 people in a team, 25 people in a team, okay? Those teams are never gonna meet Agile performance. Second, the backlog needs to be really ready in a sense of small, it's clearly understood, it's properly prioritized. So, you need somebody managing that backlog that can get it right, because we have extensive data for multiple case studies showing the team's production doubles immediately. As soon as you get that backlog right. So you go into many companies, you'll see, there's still arguing about what's the top priority, right? Or everything's top priority. That's just gonna create a massive mess. Third, teams are constantly interrupted. You know, the only teams I know that aren't interrupted are people… these teams and defense contractors working on top secret stuff. And they work in a locked room, the door, it says ‘no managers can enter' and they don't get interrupted. But for the rest of us, there's always somebody coming in wanting something else done. And there's a way to manage that using a pattern we call the interrupt buffer. And if you don't have that pattern implemented properly, you're gonna go half as fast. If you're lucky, you might go half as fast. Ula Ojiaku: And what do you say the Scrum Master has a part to play in making sure the interrupt buffer is there and it's enforced? Jeff Sutherland: The scrum master needs to set this all up. Fifth, in high performing teams, we see this pattern called swarming, where multiple people are working on a story together. That increases the process efficiency, which doubles the performance of the team. So, if people are specialists working independently, that team is going to be really slow. So I'm up to number five, there are six more things, but you probably want to go through them. It's very clear, what makes agile teams suck, we know exactly why. And it needs to be fixed. So, I appeal to anyone listening to this help fix bad agile, it's hurting us all. Ula Ojiaku: Thank you for sharing that. Would this be in any of any of your books or in any of your articles that you've written? Jeff Sutherland: Yeah, it's everywhere and (in) everything I've written, but the best summary, it's the red book Scrum … Scrum, The Art of Doing Twice the Work and Half the Time And we've had people pick, pick this up. A CEO in Kenya came to New York to one of my courses, he said, ‘Jeff, I just read your book. And I'm CEO with three new energy startups in Kenya. And my teams implemented that, and they're going… they're doing three times the work and a third of the time. So, your book is too conservative.' He says to me, this guy, he only read the book, he had no training. So, this book is enough to really get off on the right foot. And if you're having problems, it's enough to fix things. In fact, recently before COVID when we could get everybody together, we had an Apple employee in the class and she said, Jeff, do you know why Apple always meet its states? I said, no, you know, Apple is really secretive. They don't tell anybody anything. She says ‘it's because they do Scrum by the book.' So, I said, ‘What book?' She says, ‘The Red Book - Scrum, The Art of Doing Twice the Work and Half the Time - they do it exactly by the book.' So, again, my message to the Agilists out there: Apple is winning. They are the most valuable company in the world. And it's because they do Scrum exactly by that book. So, you probably should read it. Ula Ojiaku: Definitely. So going by the book, would you say there's any wriggle room for adapting to one's context, or is it about you know, going, ‘check- we've done page 123…' Jeff Sutherland: Well, the whole thing about adapting is fundamental to Scrum. So, one of the things I'm constantly doing in my talks, training, is I'm going back to before Scrum and reading a paper from the leading researchers on complex adaptive systems, in which they mathematically proved, you model things on the computer, that systems evolve more quickly, if they have more degrees of freedom, up until you hit a boundary where the system goes into a chaotic state. So, from the very beginning in Scrum, maximizing the freedom and the decision capability of the team has been fundamental. And we talked about this as self-organization. Now, unfortunately, that term has been so misused, misunderstood that we had to take self-organization out of the Scrum guide. And what we inserted was self-managing. And we put next to it goals, okay, the theme is self-managing to achieve a goal. And to make that happen, they need a commitment to do that. And so, this is one of the fundamental things for Agile teams that work that they have that self-managing commitment to achieve a goal. And the teams that are not working, they're fuzzy about that, right. So, we want the maximum degree of adaptation, the thing that they don't want to change is the basic structure that's in the red book, if they change that, it has the control mechanisms to allow the maximum degree of self-organization - not to go off the rails. Ula Ojiaku: Right. Jeff Sutherland: So, we see a lot of Agilists, ‘oh, you know, let's just tweak the framework this way or that way.' And then the self-organization takes a team off the rails, and then they fall into that 58% that can't deliver, they're late, they're over budget, the customers aren't happy. And so, this is the really one of the hardest things to communicate to people. There're certain things that you absolutely have to be disciplined about. You have to be more disciplined to get a great Agile team than in all ways of working. And that discipline is what allows the maximum degree of self-organization and self-determination, right? So, understanding those two things together, you know, it makes it makes people's brain explode, right? It's hard. Ula Ojiaku: But it works. Jeff Sutherland: But it works right.  Ula Ojiaku: You've already mentioned a lot of books in the course of this interview session, and these would be in the show notes. So, would there be anything any final word of advice you'd have for the leaders that would be listening to this podcast in terms of their transformation journey? Jeff Sutherland: So, one of the things we did to Scrum at Scale is that the difference between that and most of the other scaling frameworks is that it's all about the leadership. So, we need an operating leadership team, that is a Scrum team that needs a Scrum Master, a Product Owner, backlog. And its objective is to improve the Agile implementation of the organization. On the prioritization side, we need a leadership team that, led by a Chief Product Owner, that is prioritizing backlog across the organization. So, you know, I've had the Chief Product Owner of Hewlett Packard in my course, he had a $200 billion portfolio. He learned from that class. Says this class is pretty good.' He said, ‘In just one slide I figured out how to get $20 billion more a year with no additional resources'. Just by understanding how to work the framework right? At the $200 billion level. Ula Ojiaku: And you're talking about the Scrum at Scale course, right? Jeff Sutherland: No, this was a product owner course. Product Owner course. He came to it. We're now doing a Scrum at Scale… we're actually doing a Chief Product Owner course. So, a Product Owners at Scale course which it has been really well received by the leading Agile Practitioners. (They) really like that because they need to work more in the large than in the small often. Ula Ojiaku: Definitely. That means this available on the Scrum Inc site? Jeff Sutherland: Yes. Ula Ojiaku: Okay. Jeff Sutherland: So, one of the things I would recommend I would really recommend is the Scrum Field Book. It's a bunch of case studies for organizations, large and small, that have tried to take the whole organization to Scrum. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Sutherland - it's been a great pleasure having you and hopefully we could have a you know, follow up conversation sometime. Jeff Sutherland: Yes. Thanks for inviting me and glad to do it again. Ula Ojiaku: That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com. Also share with friends and leave a review. This would help others find the show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com. Till next time, take care and God bless!    

Sailor Noob is the podcast where a Sailor Moon superfan and a total noob go episode by episode through the original Sailor Moon series!The treachery continues this week as Nehellenia expands her dark power through the reflections of Tokyo! Can the Sailor Senshi find a way to meet this overwhelming new challenge or is the world in for a new dark age?In this episode, we discuss the learning English in Japan. We also talk about junior boomers, Myler: The Real Enemy, bootleg "Just Shoot Me", domesticating the Outers, Charlie Chaplin suits, 3 Women and a Former Baby, Phantom 90, BASICheads, Lynchian vibes, being "filler-proof", World History movies, frenetic obstacles, le weed, Sailor Moon: Civil War, and being treated like a potato!Are you there, Takeuchi? It's me, Haruka.We're on iTunes and your listening platform of choice! Please subscribe and give us a rating and a review! Arigato gozaimasu!https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sailor-noob/id1486204787Answer this week's show question on Spotify!Become a patron of the show and get access to our live-action PGSM, Animedification, Utena, and Evangelion podcasts!http://www.patreon.com/sailornoobPut Sailor Noob merch on your body!http://justenoughtrope.threadless.comSailor Noob is a part of the Just Enough Trope podcast network. Check out our other shows about your favorite pop culture topics and join our Discord!http://www.twitter.com/noob_sailorhttp://www.justenoughtrope.comhttp://www.instagram.com/noob_sailorhttps://discord.gg/49bzqdpBpxBuy us a Kōhī on Ko-Fi!https://ko-fi.com/justenoughtrope

1-2% of the world's population have red hair. So, we're giving the phenomenon its own episode! Today, we discuss the gene/protein that causes red hair, as well as its psychological and possible medical effects... Sources for this episode: Bryant, NIH Research Matters (2021), Study finds link between red hair and pain threshold (online) (Accessed 12/01/2024). Gradwohl, S. C., Aranake, A., Abdallah, A. B., McNair, P., Lin, N., Fritz, B. A., Villafranca, A., Glick, D., Jacobsohn, E., Mashour, G. A. and Avidan, M. S. (2015), Intraoperative awareness risk, anesthetic sensitivity, and anesthetic management for patients with natural red hair: a matched cohort study. Canadian Journal of Anesthesia 62: 345 355. Massachusetts General Hospital, Science Daily (2021), Research reveals why redheads have different pain thresholds (online) (Accessed 12/01/2024). Regan, K. O. (2014), “Red hair in popular culture and the relationship with anxiety and depression”. Thesis submitted for University College, Cork. Rees, J. L. (2000), The Melanocortin 1 Receptor (MC1R): More Than Just Red Hair. Pigment Cell Research 13: 135-140. Robinson, K. C., Kemény, L. V., Fell, G. L., Hermann, A. L., Allouche J., Ding, W., Yekkirala, A., Hsiao, J. J., Su, M. Y., Theodosakis, N., Kozak, G., Takeuchi, Y., Shen, S., Berenyi, A., Mao, J., Woolf, C. J. and Fisher, D. E. (2021), Reduced MC4R signalling alters nociceptive thresholds associated with red hair. Science Advances 7: eabd1310. Author unknown, Wikipedia (date unknown), Nociception (online) (Accessed 12/01/2024). Author unknown, Worldometer (date unknown), World Population Clock: 8.1 Billion People (LIVE, 2024) (online) (Accessed 11/01/2024).

How Do Agile Leaders Support Self-Organizing Teams This week, I want to talk about the leader's role regarding self-organizing teams.Influence, Don't CommandI got introduced to agile principles and practices back in the 1990s before people had formalized the term agile. I was leading software teams then, and just like now, I read every book I could get my hands on about how to be better at my job.One I enjoyed was Wicked Problems, Righteous Solutions. The authors, Peter DeGrace and Leslie Stahl, had read the original paper on Scrum by Takeuchi and Nonaka in the Harvard Business Review.So DeGrace and Stahl wrote about how in an agile approach like Scrum, leaders are still exerting control over teams. But here's the key as they saw it: much of that control is “subtle and indirect.” In fact, it's so subtle and indirect that influence may be a more accurate term than control.Agile leaders influence teams by the goals they pick, but they also influence teams in other ways, including via the team composition itself.Suppose you've got a software team and their goal is to finish an app and then hand it over to an ops group that will install it. So your team isn't charged with deploying the software, just getting it ready for deployment.Now imagine you decide to put a DevOps engineer on that team. That team will behave differently with an Ops person in the mix. I have no idea if they'll behave better or worse (it's going to depend on a lot of things) but I know they will do things differently. So team constitution is one way to influence.Leaders also have a tremendous influence on teams just by how they answer questions such as:  How big of a problem do we give the team? How clearly have we defined the problem? And that's not a bad thing. Leaders are there to lead. When a manager exerts influence, someone might think, “Oh no, they're moving toward command and control.” But I disagree. Agile leaders have not only the right, but also the responsibility to exert their influence to help teams thrive. But that influence should be, as DeGrace and Stahl wrote, subtle and indirect.Recognizing the subtle ways they can bring out the best in teams will help leaders (and their organizations) succeed with agile. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

It's day 2 of the “Best of 2023” coverage on America's Work Force Union Podcast. Today's highlighted interview featured then-vice president, now president, of the Writers Guild of America East, Lisa Takeuchi Cullen. She spoke about the WGA strike, which was then in its third month. Takeuchi Cullen explained her journey into the industry and how she found herself as a scriptwriter by accident. Finally, she discussed what a fair, modern contract win involving artificial intelligence would look like and the impact it could have on the entertainment industry. The Executive Secretary of the North Shore AFL-CIO and president of the American Federation of Musicians Local 4 in Cleveland, Len DiCosimo, joined the America's Work Force Union Podcast to recap the year for Local 4, the new standard set by the contract with the Cleveland Orchestra and Ohio AFL-CIO's regional labor federations efforts to get a new redistricting proposal on the ballot in 2024.

sirva a Deus por Amor

Manga by Miyokawa, Masaru (Art), Takeuchi, Ryousuke (Story)   Space is vast and empty, much like this series.   We and our guest YouTuber Shaybs discuss Shonen Jump manga ST&RS.    Show Notes: • You can reach us at Twitter @shonenflopcast or email us shonenflop@gmail.com   • You can find our guest at www.youtube.com/@CaribouCoon and www.youtube.com/@shaybs2466   • Help keep the show running by joining the Shonen Flop Patreon at patreon.com/shonenflop. Get perks like early access to episodes; joining us during recordings, and exclusive episodes on manga like Agravity Boys, Magu-chan: God of Destruction, and PPPPPP.   • Get Shonen Flop merch, including this episode's cover art, on a shirt, mug, print, or whatever else might catch your eye https://www.teepublic.com/stores/shonen-flop?ref_id=22733   • Become a member of our community by joining our Discord. You can hang out with us, submit your questions or six word summaries! Find it at https://discord.com/invite/4hC3SqRw8r   • Want to be a guest? You can ask to be on a future episode at bit.ly/shonen_flop_guest   Credits: • Shonen Flop is hosted by David Weinberger and Jordan Forbes   • Additional editing assistance by Dylan Crider you can find his podcast, Anime Out of Context at animeoutofcontext.com   • Assistance with pronunciation, translation, and other miscellaneous research done by Tucker Whatley and MaxyBee   • Episode art by Merliel (IG: mer_liel)   • Cover art funded by our generous art benefactor Nigel Francis   MAL Description: On August 10, 2019, at 3:02:40 a.m. UTC, Earth received a simple message from space: to meet on Mars on July 7, 2035. With the possibility of discovering an intergalactic species on the horizon, scientists everywhere begin a desperate race to develop the most sophisticated technology and send humans to the Red Planet. On the same day at the exact same time, baby Maho Shirafune utters his very first word—"Mars."   Years later, in time for high school applications, the space enthusiast Maho has his sights set on the prestigious Space Academy. The institution only accepts around one percent of applicants, but enrolling in the school will allow Maho to achieve his dream of going to Mars on that determined day. Together with his childhood friend Meguru Hoshihara and classmate Wataru Amachi, Maho begins to take the two-week academy admission test.   Facing dauntless competition from some of the best astronaut prospects, Maho's chances of making it to the top are looking quite grim. Interestingly, the academy's principal, Fifi Collins, suspects that Maho may be a critical part of the July 7 mission. With his fate possibly written in the stars already, Maho braces himself to persevere through this life-changing trial.  

Manga by Miyokawa, Masaru (Art), Takeuchi, Ryousuke (Story)   Is this manga out of this world? It soon will be.    David and Jordan give their first thoughts on the discuss Shonen Jump manga ST&RS. Listen in as they give an overview of the first chapter, where they think it will go from there, and ultimately their “power word” to describe the series so far. They also dive into some listener questions.    Show Notes: • You can reach us at Twitter @shonenflopcast or email us shonenflop@gmail.com   • Help keep the show running by joining the Shonen Flop Patreon at patreon.com/shonenflop. Get perks like early access to episodes; joining us during recordings, and exclusive episodes on manga like Agravity Boys, Magu-chan: God of Destruction, and PPPPPP.   • Get Shonen Flop merch, including this episode's cover art, on a shirt, mug, print, or whatever else might catch your eye https://www.teepublic.com/stores/shonen-flop?ref_id=22733   • Become a member of our community by joining our Discord. You can hang out with us, submit your questions or six word summaries! Find it at https://discord.com/invite/4hC3SqRw8r   • Want to be a guest? You can ask to be on a future episode at bit.ly/shonen_flop_guest   Credits:   • Shonen Flop is hosted by David Weinberger and Jordan Forbes   • Additional editing assistance by Dylan Crider you can find his podcast, Anime Out of Context at animeoutofcontext.com   • Episode art by Shannon (IG: illuminyatea)   MAL Description: On August 10, 2019, at 3:02:40 a.m. UTC, Earth received a simple message from space: to meet on Mars on July 7, 2035. With the possibility of discovering an intergalactic species on the horizon, scientists everywhere begin a desperate race to develop the most sophisticated technology and send humans to the Red Planet. On the same day at the exact same time, baby Maho Shirafune utters his very first word—"Mars."   Years later, in time for high school applications, the space enthusiast Maho has his sights set on the prestigious Space Academy. The institution only accepts around one percent of applicants, but enrolling in the school will allow Maho to achieve his dream of going to Mars on that determined day. Together with his childhood friend Meguru Hoshihara and classmate Wataru Amachi, Maho begins to take the two-week academy admission test.   Facing dauntless competition from some of the best astronaut prospects, Maho's chances of making it to the top are looking quite grim. Interestingly, the academy's principal, Fifi Collins, suspects that Maho may be a critical part of the July 7 mission. With his fate possibly written in the stars already, Maho braces himself to persevere through this life-changing trial.  

Vice President of the Writers Guild of America East, Lisa Takeuchi Cullen, joined the America's Work Force Union Podcast to talk about the ongoing writers' strike. Cullen also talked about the energy and support for the strike and what a fair, modern contract win involving artificial intelligence would look like and the impact it would have on the entertainment industry. A trio of members from the Documentary Workers United (CWA Local 9003), Kenyon Johnson, Anisa Hosseinnezhaf, and Gabriella Ortega Ricketts, joined the America's Work Force Union Podcast to discuss the work done to earn the first contract for the DWU. The group discussed the work done by the International Documentary Association (IDA) and the importance of unions for the non-profit sector. 

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/east-asian-studies

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/anthropology

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language

Jae DiBello Takeuchi's Language Ideologies and L2 Speaker Legitimacy: Native Speaker Bias in Japan (Mulitlingual Matters, 2023) examines dilemmas faced by second language (L2) Japanese speakers as a result of persistent challenges to their legitimacy as speakers of Japanese. Based on an ethnographic interview study with L2-Japanese speakers and their L1-Japanese-speaking friends, co-workers and significant others, the book examines ideologies linked to three core speech styles of Japanese – keigo or polite language, gendered language and regional dialects – to show how such ideologies impact L2-Japanese speakers. The author demonstrates that speaker legitimacy is often tenuous for L2 speakers and argues that, despite increasing numbers of Japanese-speaking foreign residents in Japan, native speaker bias remains a persistent issue for L2-Japanese speakers living and working in Japan. This book extends the discussion of native speaker bias beyond educational contexts, and in the process reveals tensions between how L2 speakers aspire to speak and how L1 speakers expect them to speak. Jingyi Li is a PhD Candidate in Japanese History at the University of Arizona. She researches about early modern Japan, literati, and commercial publishing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

Some people start tango because they fall in love with the music or love the dance, others start it because they have to stop doing Japanese Kendo. This was the case for Toshi Takeuchi, my guest for this episode.In our banter we touched on a variety of interesting aspects of tango including how different tango is in Japan, the similarities between kendo and tango, and how to cabeceo when you can't make eye contact.Join my private FaceBook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1281203268944812Watch this episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Ppolc3kzPRkQuestions/comments? Reach out to me⁣⁣⁣⁣Web: imsotango.com⁣Email: connect@imsotango.com⁣⁣⁣⁣Facebook⁣ @‌IMSO Tango⁣⁣⁣Instagram @‌imso_tango

Heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) is, in many ways, a fascinating tale of modern cardiovascular medicine that, according to lead author Dr. Joshua Hare (University of Miami Miller School of Medicine), has taught cardiovascular researchers and clinicians a lot of humility. Understanding HFpEF in a variety of animal models has led to a paradigm shift away from heart failure linked to low ejection fraction. In this episode Associate Editor Dr. Jonathan Kirk (Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine) interviews Dr. Hare along with expert Dr. Julie McMullen (Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, Melbourne, Australia) about the latest study by Kanashiro-Takeuchi et al. The Hare Lab was originally attracted to a cardiometabolic model of HFpEF pioneered by Dr. Joseph Hill, because in a large proportion of human patients, HFpEF is due to metabolic syndrome, which is a combination of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension. Armed with the ability to create this cardiometabolic HFpEF model, Hare and co-authors decided to test growth hormone-releasing hormone-agonist using a powerhouse of methods to determine if exercise intolerance could be improved. Kanashiro-Takeuchi et al. found that diastolic function and exercise performance improved, and myocyte hypertrophy and fibrosis were restored. Essentially all of the features of cardiometabolic HFpEF responded to treatment with GHRH-agonist. The authors did not see a reduction in blood pressure or weight, indicating a direct myocardial effect. In a wide-ranging discussion that touches on skeletal muscle, aging, sarcomeric proteins, and the technical complexities of running titin gels and PV loops, our experts explain why HFpEF is such a challenging syndrome to treat and why this translational research is so important. Listen now.   Rosemeire M. Kanashiro-Takeuchi, Lauro M. Takeuchi, Raul A. Dulce, Katarzyna Kazmierczak, Wayne Balkan, Renzhi Cai, Wei Sha, Andrew V. Schally, Joshua M. Hare Efficacy of a Growth Hormone-Releasing Hormone Agonist in a Murine Model of Cardiometabolic Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol, published April 25, 2023. DOI: 10.1152/ajpheart.00601.2022.

This episode we talk about the first recorded instance of Buddhism--or at least the worship of the Buddha--in Japan, and we look at some of the politics and issues surrounding its adoption, as well as some of the problems in the story we have from the Chronicles.  We also look at what legend says happened to the oldest Buddhist image and where you can find it, today.  Hint: It is in a place that once hosted the Winter Olympics! For more check out our podcast website:  https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-85 Rough Transcript:   Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 85: The Buddha Comes to Japan. Last couple episodes we've talked about Buddhism.  We talked about its origins in the Indian subcontinent, with the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, aka Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha, and how those teachings spread out from India to Gandhara, and then followed the trade routes across the harsh deserts of the Tarim Basin, through the Gansu corridor, and into the Yellow and Yangzi River Valleys.  From there the teachings made it all the way to the Korean peninsula, and to the country of Baekje, Yamato's chief ally on the peninsula. This episode we'll look at how Buddhism came to the archipelago and its initial reception there.  For some of this we may need to span several reigns, as we'll be looking at events from early to late 6th century.  This is also about more than just religion, and so we may need to dive back into some of the politics we've covered up to this point as well.  Hopefully we can bring it all together in the end, but if it is a bit of a bumpy ride, just hang with me for a bit. So let's start with the official account in the Nihon Shoki, which we already mentioned two episodes ago: the first mention of Buddhism in the Chronicles.  The year was 552, or the 13th year in the reign of Ame Kunioshi, aka Kimmei Tennou.  That winter, during the 10th month—which was probably closer to December or January on a modern calendar—King Seongmyeong of Baekje had a special gift for his counterpart, the sovereign of Yamato.  By this time there are numerous accounts of gifts to Yamato, generally in conjunction with the Baekje-Yamato alliance and Baekje's requests for military support in their endeavors on the peninsula, generally framed in the Yamato sources as centering on the situation of the country of Nimna. In this case, the gift was a gilt-bronze image of Shakyamuni Buddha, several flags and umbrellas, and a number of volumes of Buddhist sutras.  King Seongmyeong sent a memorial explaining his intent:  “This doctrine” (aka Buddhism) “is amongst all doctrines the most excellent.  But it is hard to explain, and hard to comprehend.  Even the Duke of Zhou and Confucius had not attained to a knowledge of it.  This doctrine can create religious merit and retribution with appreciation of the highest wisdom.  Imagine a man in possession of treasures to his heart's content, so that he might satisfy all his wishes in proportion as he used them.  Thus it is with the treasure of this wonderful doctrine.  Every prayer is fulfilled and naught is wanting.  Moreover, from distant India it has extended hither to the three Han, where there are none who do not receive it with reverence as it is preached to them. “Thy servant, therefore, Myeong, King of Baekje, has humbly dispatched his retainer, Nuri Sacchi, to transmit it to the Imperial Country, and to diffuse it abroad throughout the home provinces, so as to fulfil the recorded saying of Buddha: ‘My law shall spread to the East.' “ Upon receiving all of these things and hearing the memorial, we are told that the sovereign, Ame Kunioshi, literally leapt for joy.  He thanked the envoys, but then put the question to his ministers as to how they should proceed.  Soga no Iname no Sukune, holding the position of Oho-omi, recommended that they should worship the statue of the Buddha.  After all, if all of the “Western Frontier lands” were worshipping it, then should Yamato really be left out? On the other side of the argument were Mononobe no Okoshi as well as Nakatomi no Kamako.  They argued against stopping the traditional worship of the 180 kami of Heaven and Earth and replacing it with worship of some foreign religion. With this split decision, Ame Kunioshi decided to have Soga no Iname experiment, first.  He told him to go ahead and worship the image and see what happens. And so Soga set it up at his house in Oharida, purified it, and, per Buddhist tradition, retired from the world.  He had another house, in nearby Mukuhara, purified and made into a temple.  Here he began to worship the Buddha. Around that same time, there was a pestilence—a disease—that was in the land.  People were getting sick and some were dying.  This was likely not unprecedented.  Healthcare was not exactly up to our modern standards, and while many good things traveled the trade routes, infection and disease likely used them as pathways as well.  So diseases would pop up, on occasion.  In this instance, though, Mononobe no Okoshi and Nakatomi no Kamako seized on it as their opportunity.  They went to Ame Kunioshi and they blamed Soga no Iname and his worship of the Buddha for the plague. Accordingly, the court removed the statue of the Buddha and tossed it into the canal at Naniwa, and then they burned down Soga no Iname's temple—which, as you may recall, was basically his house.  As soon as they did that, though, Ame Kunioshi's own Great Hall burst into flames, seemingly out of nowhere, as it was otherwise a clear day. Little more is said about these events, but that summer there were reports from Kawachi of Buddhist chants booming out of the sea of Chinu near the area of Idzumi.  Unate no Atahe was sent to investigate and found an entire log of camphorwood that was quote-unquote “Shining Brightly”.  So he gave it to the court, where we are told they used it to have two Buddha images made, which later were installed in a temple in Yoshino; presumably at a much later date. And then the Chronicles go quiet for the next couple decades, at least on the subject of Buddhism, but this is the first official account of it coming over, and there is quite a bit to unpack.  For one thing, the memorials and speeches once again seem like something that the Chroniclers added because it fit with their understanding of the narrative, including their insistence that Yamato was a fully fledged imperial state, and there is some fairly good evidence that King Seongmyeong's memorial is clearly anachronistic.  But there are a few other things, and conflicting records on things such as dates and similar. So first off, let's acknowledge that there are too many things in the main narrative in the Chronicles that are just questionable, such as the sovereign “leaping with joy” at the chance to hear about Buddhism, and the fact that King Seongmyeong's memorial apparently quotes a part of the sutra of the Sovereign Kings of Golden Light, known in Japanese as the Konkoumyou-saishou-ou-kyou, but that translation wasn't done until 703, during the Tang dynasty, by the monk Yijing in the city of Chang'an.  While it would have been known to knowledgable monks like Doji, who may have been helping put the narrative together in 720, it is unlikely that it was in use during the 6th century, when the memorial is said to have been written. In addition, there is question about the date that all of this supposedly happened.  The Nihon Shoki has this event taking place in 552, well into the reign of Ame Kunioshi.  However, there are at least two 8th century sources, roughly contemporary with the writing of the Nihon Shoki, the Gangoji Garan Engi and the Jouguuki, and both of these put the date at 538, a good fourteen years earlier, and in the era of Ame Kunioshi's predecessor, Takewo Hiro Kunioshi, aka Senka Tenno.  The first of these, the Gangoji Garan Engi, is a record of the founding of the first permanent temple in Japan, Gangoji, aka Hokoji or, informally, Asukadera, which was founded by Soga no Iname's heir, Soga no Umako.  More on the temple itself, later, but for now we want to focus on the historical aspects of this account, which mostly corroborate the story, talking about Soga no Iname's role in receiving the image and enshrining it, as well as the early conflict between the Soga clan and their rivals.  The other source, the Joguki, focuses on the life of Shotoku Taishi, aka Prince Umayado, who will become a major subject of our narrative at the end of the 6th and early 7th centuries.  Not only is he considered the father of Japanese Buddhism, but he had strong connections to the Soga family.  Today, most scholars accept the 538 date over the 552 date when talking about Buddhism's initial arrival into the islands   If the Chroniclers did move the event from 538 to 552, one has to wonder why.  This isn't a simple matter of being off by 60 years, and thus attributable to a mistake in the calendrical sexagenary zodiac cycle of stems and branches, so there must have been something else.  One suggestion is that the date conflicted with the chronology that had already been set for the sovereigns.  538 is during the reign of Takewo no Ohokimi, aka Senka Tenno, but what if succession was not quite as cut and dried as all that?  What if Ame Kunioshi no Ohokimi had his own court and was in some way ruling at the same time as his half-brothers, Magari no Ohine and Takewo no Ohokimi? They were from different mothers, and thus different factions at court.  Ame Kunioshi was young, so it was possible that there were rival lineages attempting to rule, or even some kind of co-ruler deal hearkening back to more ancient precedent.  Some even theorize that Magari no Ohine and Takewo Hiro Kunioshi were simply fictional inserts to help span the period between Wohodo and Ame Kunioshi. Whatever the reason, this theory suggests that it would not have happened in the 13th year of Ame Kunioshi's reign, but that his reign started in 526, rather than 540.  An intriguing hypothesis, but one that begs the question of whether everything in the reign would then need to be shifted to account for that.  Given that there are a few attributable events noted that fit with outside sources as well, that doesn't seem quite as plausible without some very conscious efforts to change the timeline. Another thought is that the compilers weren't sure exactly when this event happened, but given Ame Kunioshi's reputation and long reign, they chose his reign to place it in because it just fit.  I suspect that this happened more than once, with people more likely attributing past events to well-remembered sovereigns.  If this is the case, then when searching for a date they may have just chosen one that seemed auspicious.  In this case, 552 CE was, in some reckonings, an important year in Buddhist history, as there were those who say it as the beginning of the age of “mappou”, the “End of the Law” or perhaps the “Latter days of the Law”. This definitely is an intriguing theory, and resonates strongly.  For most of Japanese history, the idea that we are in this period of “mappo” has had a strong influence, and to a certain extent it is kind of an apocalyptic view of things.  The idea of mappo is that while the Buddha was alive, his teachings were fresh and available to all living things.  However, after his death, his teachings had to be remembered and passed on.  Even with the advent of writing, the meaning and understanding of his teachings, and thus an understanding of dharma, would also atrophy.  Different translations, changes in meaning, and just bits and pieces lost to time would mean that for the first 500 to 1,000 years, the Buddha's disciples would keep things well and the meaning would be protected, but in the next 500 to 1,000 years things would decline, but still be pretty close to the truth.  Then – and this is when the period of “mappo” starts - things would really start to decline, until finally, about 5,000 to 10,000 years later—or about 1,000 to 12,000 years after the time of the historical Buddha—things would break down, factions would be fighting one another, and eventually everyone would have forgotten the dharma entirely.  It was only then that there would come a new Buddha, Miroku or Maitreya, who would once again teach about the dharma and how to escape suffering, and the whole cycle would start again. The year 552 would have coincided, according to some estimates, with 1,000 years since the time of Siddhartha Gautama, and so it would have had particular significance to the people of that time, particularly if you counted each of the first two Ages as 500 years each, meaning that the word of the Buddha, that his teachings would spread to the East, would have been completed just as we entered the latter days of the Law. Regardless of the time—and, as I said earlier, 538 is the more accepted date—the general events described – the statue, the offer of Soga to experiment, and the resulting events - are usually agreed to, although even here we must pause, slightly and ask a few questions. First off, was this truly the first time that Buddhism had ever shown up in Japan?  The answer to that is probably not.  There had been many waves of immigrants that had come over to Japan from the peninsula, and even if only a small handful of them had adopted the new religion before coming over it is likely that there were pockets of worshippers.  Later, we will see that there are people in Japan who are said to have had prior experience as a monk, or who had their own Buddhist images.  These images were probably used by people in their homes—there is no evidence of any particular temples that had been built, privately or otherwise, and so there is no evidence that we have any active monks or nuns in the archipelago, but who knows what was going on in communities outside of the elite core?  There were plenty of things that were never commented on if it wasn't directly relevant to the court. Furthermore, with all of the envoys that had been to Baekje, surely some of them had experience with Buddhism.  And then there were the envoys *from* Baekje, who no doubt brought Buddhist practices with them.  So there was likely some kind of familiarity with the religion's existence, even if it wasn't necessarily fully understood. The second point that many people bring up is the role of the sovereign, Ame Kunioshi, or whomever was in charge at the time that the first image came over.  While the Nihon Shoki attempts to portray a strong central government with the sovereign at its head, we've already seen how different households had arisen and taken some measure of power for themselves.  At the end of the 5th and into the early 6th century, the Ohotomo and Mononobe houses were preeminent, with Ohotomo Kanamura taking on actions such as negotiating dealings with the continent and even manuevering around the Crown Prince.  The Mononobe wielded considerable authority through their military resources, and now, the Soga appeared to ascendant.  It is quite possible that the idea of the sovereign giving any sort of permission or order to worship Buddhism is simply a political fig leaf added by the Chroniclers.  The Soga may have been much more independent in their views and dealings.  To better understand this, let's take a look at the uji family system and the Soga family in particular. Now the Nihon Shoki paints a picture as though these noble uji families were organic, and simply part of the landscape, descending from the kami in the legendary age, with lineages leading down to the present day, although there is some acknowledgment that the earliest ancestors did not necessarily use the family names until a later date.  For much of Japanese history, the concept that these family, or uji, were one of the core building blocks of ancient Japanese political and cultural spheres is taken as a matter of course.  However, in more modern studies, this view has been questioned, and now the prevailing view is that these families are somewhat different.  In fact, the uji are likely just as much an artificial construct as the corporate -Be family labor groups. According to this theory, early on people were associated with local groups and places.  Outside of the immediate family, groups were likely held together by their regional ties as much as anything else.  Names appear to be locatives, with ancient titles indicating the -hiko or -hime of this or that area. Some time in the 5th century, Yamato—and possibly elsewhere in the peninsula—began to adopt the concept of -Be corporate groups from Baekje.  We talked about this back in Episode 63, using the Hata as a prime example of how these groups were brought together.  More importantly, though, was that each of these -Be groups reported to someone in the court, sometimes with a different surname.  These were the uji, created along with the -Be to help administer the labor and work of running the state.  They were essentially arms of the state itself, in many ways.  The kabane system of titles emphasizes this, with different families having different ranks depending on what they did, whether locally, regionally, or at the central court.  Some of these titles, like -Omi and -Kimi, were likely once actual jobs, but eventually it came to represent something more akin to a social ranking. There have been some questions and emails asking for a bit more in depth on this, and I'd really like to, but I'm afraid that would be too much for now.  At the moment I want to focus more on the uji, particularly on those at the top - the uji with the kabane of either Omi or Muraji, as these are the ones most likely to be helping to directly run the government.  They even had their own geographical areas within the Nara basin, and elsewhere, that were uji strongholds.  The Hata had areas near modern Kyoto, the Mononobe clearly had claims to land around Isonokami, in modern Tenri, and the Soga clan had their holdings in the area of modern Asuka and Kashihara city.  At the very least, that is where Soga no Iname's house was—in Mukuhara and Oharida, both located in the modern area of Asuka, which will become important in the future. It wasn't just the landholdings that were important, though.  Each uji had some part to play in the functioning of the government.  In many cases it was the production or control of a particular service, such as the Hata and silk weaving, or the Mononobe and their affinity with all things military.  For the Soga, they appear to have had a rather interesting portfolio. Traditionally, the Soga family is said to trace its lineage back to Takechi no Sukune, the first Oho-omi back in the time of Okinaga no Tarashi Hime and Homuda Wake no Ohokimi—see episode 46 for more on him.  That lineage is likely fabricated, however, and the earliest actual evidence for the family may be from the Kogoshui, where we are told that Soga no Machi was put in charge of the Three Treasuries.  These were the Imikura, or sacred treasury; the Uchikura, or royal household treasury; and the Ohokura, the government treasury.  This seems like quite the position of responsibility, and it would fit with some of what we see later as the Soga are involved in helping set up Miyake, the various royal storehouses across the land that acted as Yamato court administrative centers for the purposes of collecting goods and funneling them to the court, as well as keeping an eye on the local regions.  Although here I feel I would be remiss if I didn't also note that the “Three Treasuries”, or “Sanzou” is one way to translate the Tripitaka, and given the Soga's role, I don't think I can entirely ignore that point. So the Soga family had experience with administration, and specifically they were dealing with a variety of different goods produced in different regions.  If that is the case, then their authority did not necessarily derive from the standard uji-be constructed familial connections, but rather they were deriving positional authority from the central government itself.  This may seem like common sense to us, but in the world of ancient Yamato, where family connections were everything, this may have been something new and innovative—and very in keeping with various continental models of administration.  It is quite likely that the Soga were dealing with some of the latest innovations in government and political authority, which would also have opened them up to the possibility of new ideas. In addition, their position meant they likely had wide-ranging contacts across the archipelago and even onto the peninsula.  The Soga themselves have connections to the peninsula in the names of some of their members, such as Soga no Karako, where “Karako” can be translated as a “Son of Kara” or a “Son of Gaya”, possibly referring to their origins, and Soga no Kouma, where “Kouma” is a general term for Goguryeo, and so quite possibly indicates a connection with them as well.  On top of that, there is a now-out-of-favor theory that once suggested that Soga no Machi might be the same as Moku Machi, an important Baekje official in the late 5th century.  While that has been largely discredited, the fact that “Machi” is possibly of Baekje origin cannot be entirely overlooked. Then there are a series of notes in the Nihon Shoki, particularly surrounding the area of Shirai, in the land of Kibi.  These start in 553, just one year after Soga no Iname's failed attempt to launch a Buddhist temple, at least according to the Nihon Shoki's record of events.  It is a relatively simple note, but it mentions how Soga no Iname made a man by the name of Wang Jinnie the “Funa no Fubito”, or “Recorder of Ships”, and put him in charge of the shipping tax—all at the behest of the sovereign, of course. Later, in 555, Soga no Iname went with Hozumi no Iwayumi no Omi to Kibi, where they consolidated five districts, or agata, under the administration of a single administrative Miyake in Shirawi.  Later, in 556, he would go back to Kibi and establish a Miyake in Kojima, putting in place Katsuraki no Yamada as the Tazukai, or “rural rice field governor”.  That same year he and others went to the Takachi district in Yamato and established the Miyake of Ohomusa, or “Great Musa”, for immigrants from Baekje and then Womusa, or “Small Musa”, for immigrants from Goguryeo. In 569, the person that Soga no Iname had put in charge of recording the ships, Wang Jinnie, had a nephew, Itsu—or possibly Danchin, depending on how you read it—go out to Shirawi to take a census.  This is the same Shirawi that Soga no Iname had helped establish in 555.  Itsu becomes the Shirawi no Obito, and in 574 we see Soga no Umako, Iname's heir, heading out to Shirawi with an updated register for Itsu. So, in short, the Soga family clearly is doing a lot of government administration, and particularly of the Miyake, which is the extension of the court authority into the rest of the archipelago.  On top of that, look at how often the names that are coming up in conjunction with what they are doing are referencing immigrant groups.  Even the Hozumi family are known at this point for their work on the peninsula, and we see the Soga heavily involved with the Wang family and their fortunes, not to mention Greater and Lesser Musa and the Baekje and Goguryeo individuals there.  Wang Jinnie will have even more of a part to play, but we'll hold onto that for later. Given everything we can see about how they are operating, is it any surprise that the Soga would advocate in favor of Buddhism?  I'd also note that, while other clans have clear connections to heavenly ancestors and kami whom they worshipped, it is unclear to me if the Soga had anything similar.  There is mention in the 7th century of the creation of a shrine to their titular ancestors, Takeuchi no Sukune and Ishikawa no Sukune, and today there is a shrine that is dedicated to Soga tsu Hiko and Soga tsu Hime—Basically just lord and lady Soga.  But there isn't anything like the spirit of Futsunushi or Ohomononushi, let alone an Amaterasu or Susano'o. Why is that important?  Well, prior to the 6th century, a lot of clans claimed authority from the ritual power they were perceived to wield, often related to the prestige of their kami.  One of the ways that Yamato influence had spread was through the extension of the Miwa cult across the archipelago, and there were even members of the Himatsuribe and the Hioki-be, basically groups of ritualists focused on sun worship, which upheld the royal house.  The Mononobe controlled Isonokami shrine, where they worshipped their Ujigami, Futsu-mitama, the spirit of the sound of the sword.  And then there were the Nakatomi, who haven't had much to do in the narrative so far, but we know that they were court ritualists, responsible for ensuring that proper rituals were carried out by the court for the kami to help keep balance in the land. The dispute between the Soga and the Mononobe and Nakatomi is presented as a struggle between a foreign religion and the native kami of Japan—leaving aside any discussion, for now, about just how “native” said kami actually were.  This is, in fact, the primary story that gets told again and again, that the Mononobe and Nakatomi were simply standing up for their beliefs, sincerely believing that if too many people started worshipping foreign gods then it would supplant the worship already present in the islands. And that may have been a genuine fear at the time, but I would suggest that it was only a small one.  What seems more apparent is that we are really looking at just an old fashioned power struggle.  Because what all of the information we have about the Soga distills down to is: they were the new kid on the block.  The Soga were the up and coming nobility.  They had connections with the continent and various immigrant groups.  That gave them access to new ideas and new forms of resources.  The Mononobe were built on a more traditionalist line.  They had been around, ever since at least Wakatake no Ohokimi, playing a significant role in things, alongside the Ohotomo.  The Mononobe were at their apex, claiming descent through their own Heavenly Grandson, and having held sway at court through numerous reigns at this point.   They represent, in many ways, the old guard. Worship of a fancy new religious icon—effectively a new kami—threatened to give the Soga even more power and sway.  They already had control of the three treasuries, if the Kogoshui is to be believed, and likely had a rather impressive administrative apparatus.  Soga no Iname had also ended up successfully marrying off two of his daughters to Ame Kunioshi, making him father-in-law to the current sovereign.  If he added to that a spiritual focus that people came to believe in, that would only enhance the Soga's power and place in the hierarchy. And what better way to taint all of that, and neutralize these upstarts, than to blame this new god for the plague and pestilence that was killing people.  We see it all too often, even today—when people are scared and when there are problems, the easiest people to scapegoat are the foreigners and the outsiders.  Those whom we do not see as “us”.  It was probably easy to turn the court against Buddhism, at least initially.  They threw the image in the canal and burned down the temple, and no doubt they were pleased with themselves. But that was merely the opening salvo, and as we'll see in the coming years, the Soga family were hardly done with Buddhism.  One can argue whether they were truly devout or if this was merely for political gain, but the Soga family tied themselves to this new foreign religion, for good or for ill, and they wouldn't be pushed around forever. When next we touch base on this topic we'll look at Soga no Iname's heir, Soga no Umako, and his attempts to start up where his father left off.  He would again clash with the Mononobe, and the outcome of that conflict would set the path for the next half a century.  It would also see Buddhism become firmly enmeshed with the apparatus of the state.  As this happens , we'll also see the character of Buddhist worship in the archipelago change.  Initially, the Buddha was treated little differently from any other kami, and based on the way it is described, probably worshiped in a very similar manner.  However, as more sutras came to light and as more people studied and learned about the religion—and as more immigrants were brought in to help explain how things were supposed to work—Buddhism grew in the islands to be its own distinct entity.  In fact the growth of Buddhism would even see the eventual definition of “Shinto”, the “Way of the Gods”, a term that was never really needed until there was another concept for native practices to be compared against. Before we leave off, there is one other story I'd like to mention.  It is tangential to our immediate discussion of Buddhism and the Soga, but I think you may find it of interest, nonetheless.  This is the story of just what happened—supposedly—to that first Buddhist icon that was tossed into the Naniwa canal. Because you see, according to tradition, that gilt-bronze icon did not stay stuck in the mud and muck of the canal, nor did it just disappear.  Instead there is a tradition that it was found almost a century later.  The person who retrieved it was named Honda no Yoshimitsu, and from Naniwa he traveled all the way to Shinano, to the area of modern Nagano, and there he would found a temple in 642.  Another reading of his name, Yoshimitsu, is Zenko, and so the temple is named Zenkoji, and you can still go and visit it today.  In fact, the main hall of Zenkoji is considered a national treasure, and it was featured prominently during the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.  It is a popular attraction for tourist both in Japan and from abroad, and if you get a chance I highly recommend going to see it.  On the street leading up to the temple entrance are many traditional shops that still sell various foods and traditional arts and crafts, and there are many intriguring features.  For example, there is a narrow walkway underneath the main temple that is completely dark, where you are meant to feel along the wall to try to find the key to enlightenment, a kind of physical metaphor of Buddhist teaching. And of course there is the icon that Honda Yoshimitsu is said to have fished out of the canal. According to the temple, the icon still exists, and many worshippers believe it to be the oldest extant Buddhist icon in Japan, even older than the icons at Horyuji.  However, there is one catch—nobody is allowed to see it.  Shortly after it was installed in the temple, the statue was hidden in a special container, or zushi, and it became what is known as a hidden Buddha.  This is a tradition particularly prevalent in Japan, where some Buddhas are hidden away and only brought out on very special occasions.  Some cynics might note that those occasions are often when the temple needs to raise funds.  As for this hidden Buddha, however, it has not been seen more than a handful of times since it was locked away in the 7th century. Despite that, we know what it looks like—or at least what it is supposed to look like.  The image is said to be a triad, and though the Nihon Shoki claims it was an image of Shakyamuni, the central figure of the Zenkoji triad is actually the figure of Amida, aka Amithabha, as in the Pure Land sect of Buddhism.  Amida Nyorai is flanked by two attendants.  We know all of this because a copy of the Zenkoji image was made in the Kamakura period, and that image, said to be a faithful recreation of the original is also kept at Zenkoji.  While the original is kept hidden in the back, the replica, which is thought to have all of the miraculous powers of the original, sits in front, and is therefore called the Maedachi Honzon, basically the image standing in front, vice the original, the Gohonzon, the main image. Except it gets even better, because the replica is *also* kept hidden away most of the time, and only revealed on special occasions, known as Gokaicho, or “opening of the curtain”, which occurs once every seven years. The Zenkoji triad became extremely important in later centuries, and copies were made and installed in sub-temples throughout Japan.  Even today you may find a Zenkoji-style triad here or there, each one considered to have a spiritual tie back to the original, and some of them even have inscriptions confirming that they are, indeed, Zenkoji style triads Of course, the big question remains: does the original image actually still exist, and is there any chance that it actually is as old as it claims to be?  There really is no good way of knowing.  Zenkoji is not offering to open up the zushi any time soon.  We do know a few things, however.  We know that the temple has burned down at least 11 times over the years, and the Gohonzon was rescued each time, or so they say.  There are some who claim that it still exists, but perhaps it is damaged.  If that is the case, how did they make the replica, though? There was an inspection during the Edo period.  There was a rumor that it had been stolen, and so an Edo official was sent to check on the status.  They reported that it was still there, but crucially they never described actually laying eyes on the statue.  In one account where a monk did open the box it is said that their was a blinding light—kind of like the Ark of the Covenant in Indiana Jones but just overwhelming; no faces were melted, at least none that were reported. The monks of Zenkoji, when asked how they know the image is still there, will point to the weight of the container, which, when lifted, is apparently considerable.  They say that is how they know it is still there.  Of course, a melted lump of metal might be the same weight as it was when it was full statue, as long as it didn't lose any actual mass, so it is hard to tell if it is still in good condition. Even with all of that, there is the question about the veracity of the original objects lineage to begin with.  Did Honda Yoshimitsu really just find *the* original statue?  And even if he did, how would he have known what it was?  Was there an inscription:  To Yamato, from Baekje, hugs and kisses? I've yet to see anyone directly compare the purported replica with other statues, but I suspect that would be the route to at least check the age, but nobody seems to be saying that the style of the replica is blatantly wrong for a 6th or 7th century icon from the peninsula or by peninsular craftsmen.  Then again, there were plenty of local immigrants in the Naniwa area who could have potentially crafted an image.  Indeed, the area around modern Nagano even has traces of Goguryeo style burial cairns, possibly from immigrants settled out there to help with early horse cultivation, and so there is even the possibility that there were locals with the connections and skills to craft something. If you really want to know more, there is an entire work by Donald McCallum, titled “Zenkoji and Its Icon”, on not just the icon but the entire worship that sprang up around it and caused copies to spread throughout the archipelago. And that's where we will leave off for this episode.  In the next couple of episodes I want to finish up some of the secular history of this reign, and look a little bit outside of Yamato and the evidence in the Chronicles as well. Until then, thank you for listening and for all of your support.  If you like what we are doing, tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to Tweet at us at @SengokuPodcast, or reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  

This episode discusses the first half of the Sailor Moon manga by Naoko Takeuchi.It's our 100th main episode(!!), so we finally suck it up and cover one of the biggest shojo series of all time: Sailor Moon. To start off, Shojo & Tell host Ashley makes a shocking confession, which Anne LaRose, who runs the site Shojo Power dedicated to analyzing Sailor Moon, takes in stride. From there, Ashley and Anne respond to listener feedback on what makes Sailor Moon so beloved, rank their favorite Sailor Guardians, share feelings about Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask's romance, and explore how Takeuchi's series altered the course of magical girl stories. The story arcs discussed are the Dark Kingdom and Black Moon.REFERENCESSailor Moon is available from Kodansha ComicsThe 1992 anime is on HuluSailor Moon Crystal is on NetflixThe Sailor Moon Cosmos movie is coming out in the summer of 2023Other manga/anime mentioned:Codename: Sailor VMaid-Sama!Fushigi YugiCardcaptor SakuraThe Vision of EscaflowneSaint SeiyaHunter x HunterTokyo Mew MewCreamy MamiAlice 19thFruits BasketNanaAmerican cartoons/comics mentioned:Powerpuff GirlsBatman: The Animated SeriesSpider-Man: The Animated SeriesTeenage Mutant Ninja TurtlesThe Real GhostbustersThe IncrediblesGen Z/Generation Alpha doesn't understand the concept of files on a desktopAlethea and Athena Nibley did the Eternal Editions/Naoko Takeuchi collection translationsOutro song: "The Streatham Hill Gods" by DanosongsCONTACT USAnne runs shojopower.comFind Shojo Power on: Twitter, Facebook, and InstagramShojo & Tell on Twitter, Tumblr, and Instagram

Japan's Immigration Services Agency announced last week its intention to “simplify” visas with a new system aimed at high earners and graduates from some of the world's top universities. In the north, dozens of men gathered in the town of Misato last Wednesday evening for the traditional “Takeuchi” festival, while Xiang Xiang, the first giant panda born and raised at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo in almost three decades, will be sent to China tomorrow after repeated delays. And the year before the arrival of giant pandas Kang Kang and Lan Lan to Ueno Zoo in 1972, the New Shimbashi Building, facing the Yamanote line and Shimbashi JR station, marked the start of an altogether new breed of building in the capitol. — Get in touch: notebook.podcast@gmail.com Leave a message: speakpipe.com/notebook Instagram: @notebook_pod Twitter: @notebook_pod — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

# Mariya Takeuchi plastic love# singer songwriter # early 80s jam# still bumping respect --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/mr-maxxx/support

Welcome to Wednesday as we discuss the potential of US Honda Dealers being a service solution for the new Honda-Sony EV. We also review Vroom's latest earnings call, as well as one Chick-fil-a operator's 3-day work week that's working. Despite a proposed direct to consumer, online only sales model for the joint EV project between Honda and Sony, CFO Kohei Takeuchi, said the 1000+ US dealers are well situated to service the vehicles during the company's financial results announcement yesterdayHe noted that discussions are still ongoing about the servicing planRegarding the sales plan he continued the sentiments that it would be different from Honda's current way, saying: "It will be something unconventional, not Sony, not Honda, but something new," he said.Last month Honda and Sony announced deliveries as early as 2026 of the vehicles which will be produced in it's Ohio plant and exported to JapanThere were many questions from US Dealers who wanted to play a role in the new ventureHonda continues to trim its N.America outlook due to shortages however, Takeuchi noted "The worst of the period is over, but there are still shortages of specific applications."#TILI: Who wants to come up with the leapfrog plan for “something new”?!Vroom's recent earnings call touted record e-commerce gross profit per unit of $4,206, up 16%, decrease in expenses, net loss improvement from $(115.1) million to $(51.1) million, and a marginal improvement in EBITATom Shortt, Chief Executive Officer of Vroom, commented: “We continued to make progress on our three key objectives and four strategic initiatives as outlined during our Investor Day in May. We are intensely focused on improving the customer experience. He also noted 98% of their customers received completed registration before the expiration of temporary onesEarlier this year, Vroom shifted its focus to trim volume to focus on increasing gross profit per vehicle. .Similarly to the strategy change announced by Carvana last week.Vroom stock saw a 7.9% increase yesterday but is still down over 90% YoY. Carvana is down over 97%In a time when hiring and retention is a focus across the retail world, one Chick-fil-a operator is getting attention from his introduction of a 3-day work week at his store…and it seems to be workingJustin Lindsey designed and implemented a full-time three-day-a-week work schedule that has eliminated turnover at the restaurant and made it a magnet for new hiresDivided the team of 25 team members and 18 team leaders into two pods who work three regular 13-14 hour shifts each weekThey work 2 Saturdays a month and are never on callMr Lindsay shared what prompted the move; “Traditionally, we had used the term ‘the gift of time' to refer to seGet the Daily Push Back email at https://www.asotu.com/ JOIN the conversation on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/company/asotu/ Read our most recent email at: https://www.asotu.com/media/push-back-email Share your positive dealer stories: https://www.asotu.com/positivity ASOTU Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/automotivestateoftheunion

On this episode Morgana finally has the long awaited 5th omnibus of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Darfox checks out Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, and dakazu examines extreme fandom with Sachiko Takeuchi's Okkake!! Then we continue our Retrospective of Dorohedoro as thing really start getting weird!!! Send us emails! mangamachinations@gmail.com  Follow us on Twitter! @mangamacpodcast Check out our website! https://mangamachinations.com Check out our YouTube channel! https://www.youtube.com/mangamactv Buy us a Kofi! https://ko-fi.com/mangamac Timestamps: Intro Song: “Zero Gravity” by Dono, Opening, Introductions, Bidets and Porta Potties - 00:00:00 Whatchu Been Reading: Transition Song: “Funkymania” by The Original Orchestra, Morgana finally understands Melon from BEASTARS - 00:03:29 Omnibus 5 of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service has finally been released - 00:05:11 Darfox checks out the prologue episode of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury - 00:11:01 Sachiko Takeuchi goes into various hardcore fandom with Okkake! -00:19:47 Next Episode Preview and Rundown: 8 Year Anniversary Guest Gaiden: Horror & Hunter x Hunter with Whimsy, We will be celebrating 8 years of Manga Machinations with guest YouTuber Whimsy by discussing horror movies and manga, along with the 13th Chairman Election arc from Hunter x Hunter - 00:48:56 Main Segment Retrospective: Dorohedoro, Transition Song: “Paranormal” by Jay Ray, We review Q Hayashida's violent fantasy manga about amnesiac reptilian-headed Caiman, who hunts sorcerers in a post-apocalyptic world to search for clues of his origins(covers vols. 13-15) - 00:50:22 Next Week's Topic: Horror & Hunter x Hunter, Social Media Rundown, Sign Off Song: “Crazy for Your Love” by Orkas - 01:38:52

This week we're back with Liesl Takeuchi. The episode starts with both Sherif & Mariel, but listen to find out how it ends up being just the gals. Liesl chats with us about all things music supervision for film & tv, as well as reminiscing with Mariel about their rascal behavior in Europe. And be sure to check out the playlists Liesl mentions during this episode:  small little pebbles in my shoeLOATs (Desert Island)

After graduating with a Bachelor's Degree in Law from the University of Tokyo, Yasunori Takeuchi began his career in the financial sector by working for 12 years with the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan. This was followed by positions with Commerzbank, The Royal Bank of Scotland, ABN Amro Bank NV, WestLB Tokyo and Credit Suisse First Boston. Mr. Yasunori joined Standard Charted Bank Japan in 2012 as the Managing Director, Head of Corporate & Institutional Clients and Co-Head of Wholesale Banking, before becoming the current advisor/former CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Japan in 2015. When reflecting on his career Mr. Yasunori describes his role as a team leader in Japan for European banks partly being that of a translator or interpreter. He explains how many European banks, like the country they originate from, have a very direct culture. This does not always align with the Japanese culture of arriving at decisions through consensus building via official and unofficial methods. Mr. Yasunori states one of his leadership roles was to try and act as a cultural translator between these two conflicting styles. Soon after becoming the CEO of Standard Chartered Japan, Mr. Yasunori led the company to create a country vision document. At first, they tried doing it amongst the leadership but quickly realised that wouldn't work and it needed input from across the organisation. Mr. Yasunori explains how, apart from giving some opening comments and instructions, he deliberately excused himself from the process so that junior staff would feel more comfortable sharing their ideas in an open discussion. The result was a productive and interactive process. In his career in leadership, Mr. Yasunori has tried to develop positive corporate culture by breaking down the divisions within organisations, or silos, and increase interdepartmental interaction. He believes this can be achieved through unofficial means such as Diversity & Inclusion events. Events like International Women's Day, Mental Health Day, and a charity run that Standard Chartered has been hosting for 10 years that encourage staff participation are all opportunities for staff to engage within various departments. To foreign executives coming to work in Japan, Mr. Yasunori advises that while their core leadership style does not need to change, they need to understand how Japanese may respond. Are you getting silence in return? What will you do next? He also advises patience and the ability to create an atmosphere where Japanese feel comfortable to talk. On the topic of Japanese language skills, Mr. Yasunori does not believe they are of vital importance for a foreign businessperson - a useful tool but you can certainly get by without it.

Life gets busy. Has https://geni.us/scrum-free-audiobook (Scrum) been gathering dust on your bookshelf? Instead, pick up the key ideas now. We're scratching the surface here. If you don't already have the book, order it https://geni.us/scrum-sutherland-book (here) or get the audiobook https://geni.us/scrum-free-audiobook (for free) on Amazon to learn the juicy details. Get the full transcript, infographic, PDF, and animated book summary on our free app: https://www.getstoryshots.com (https://www.getstoryshots.com) About Jeff Sutherlandhttps://geni.us/jeff-sutherland (Jeff Sutherland) is a graduate of the US Military Academy with an engineering degree. He attributes his systematic way of thinking to his time working as a Vietnam fighter pilot. After working in the military for 11 years, Jeff became a doctor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. The University of Colorado is where he first became interested in IT systems development. He would eventually become a biometrics expert, an early innovator in ATM technology, and Vice President of Engineering or CTO at 11 different technology companies. Jeff attributes this success to following the foundations of Scrum.  Introduction https://geni.us/scrum-free-audiobook (Scrum) was groundbreaking when Jeff Sutherland introduced it as a way to improve human progress. Some describe the publication of Scrum in 2014 as being a pivotal moment in human history. Its name is borrowed from the game of rugby to emphasize the importance of intense teamwork. It is a strategy integrated into most of the world's top technology companies. We know it works, but this book outlines why it works. The book explores multiple real world  scenarios to explain how people struggle to conduct tasks with agility and efficiency. The author claims that Scrum strategies can solve this dilemma. Scrum orientation is found at the roots of many modern achievements. Jeff's system helped bring the FBI into the 21st century, for example. Scrum has also helped to reduce poverty in the developing world. This book is built upon insights Jeff gained from martial arts, judicial decision-making, advanced aerial combat, and robotics.  StoryShot #1: ATMs Were the Inspiration for Scrum Sutherland first identified society's flawed approach to productivity while he was helping to deploy ATMs throughout the US. He believed the traditional method of conducting software development, including the “waterfall” system associated with ATMs, was deficient. Sutherland also detested society's overuse of Gantt Charts that illustrate the schedule and status of piece parts of a project. He once stumbled across a Japanese paper, published in 1986, titled, “The New New Product Development Game.” This paper was written by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka, who focused on the importance of cross-functional teams in producing a faster and more flexible working environment.  StoryShot #2: The Scrum Fundamentals These are the takeaway messages, inspired by Takeuchi and Nonaka's paper, that formed the fundamentals of Scrum: Hesitation is Death - Do not hesitate for long. Instead, follow this series of actions: observe, orient, decide, and act. You need to know where you and your team currently are. Assess your options, make a decision, and then act on that decision. Look Outward for Answers - The most adaptive systems are those that learn from the surrounding environment. They observe the best features of other systems and apply them to their own. Teams Must Be Structured Correctly - For an organization to excel, its teams must be cross-functional, autonomous, and empowered. Don't Just Guess - Rather than guessing whether something will work, just do it. Plan what you want to do and then act. Check to see whether this action produced the desired outcome and then change your future decisions accordingly. Repeating this step in regular cycles will help you and your team...

Bio Dr. Jeff Sutherland is the inventor and co-creator of Scrum, the most widely used Agile framework across the globe.  Originally used for software development, Jeff has also pioneered the application of the framework to multiple industries and disciplines. Today, Scrum is applied to solve complex projects in start-ups and Fortune 100 companies. Scrum companies consistently respond to market demand, to get results and drive performance at speeds they never thought possible. Jeff is committed to developing the Agile leadership practices that allow Scrum to scale across an enterprise.   Dr. Sutherland is the chairman and founder of Scrum Inc. He is a signatory of the Agile manifesto and coauthor of the Scrum Guide and the creator Scrum@Scale. Jeff continues to teach, create new curriculum in the Agile Education Program and share best practices with organizations around the globe. He is the founder of Scrum Inc. and coauthor of, Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time, that has sold over 100,000 copies worldwide.    Social Media:                 LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jeffsutherland                 Twitter: @jeffsutherland Website: Scrum Inc https://scruminc.com               Books/ Articles: The Scrum Guide by Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber http://www.scrumguides.org/index.html Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland The Scrum Fieldbook by JJ Sutherland Agile Competitors and Virtual Organisations by Steven Goldman, Roger Nagel and Kenneth Preiss https://www.amazon.co.uk/Agile-Competitors-Virtual-Organizations-Engineering/dp/0471286508 Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster Moving World by John P. Kotter Leading Change by John P. Kotter Process Dynamics, Modeling and Control by Babatunde A. Ogunnaike and Harmon W. Ray A Scrum Book: The Spirit of the Game by Jeff Sutherland, James Coplien, Mark den Hollander, et al    Interview Transcript Introduction Ula Ojiaku: Hello everyone, my guest today is Dr Jeff Sutherland. He is the inventor and co-creator of Scrum, the most widely used Agile Framework across the globe. Originally used for Software Development, Jeff has also pioneered the application of the framework to multiple industries and disciplines. Today, Scrum is applied to deliver complex projects in startups and Fortune 100 companies. Dr Jeff Sutherland is the Chairman and Founder of Scrum Inc. He is a signatory of the Agile Manifesto and co-author of the Scrum Guide and the creator of Scrum at Scale. Jeff continues to teach, create new curriculum in the Agile education programme and share best practices with organisations around the globe. He has authored and co-authored a number of books which include Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time – which has sold over 100,000 copies worldwide.   In this episode, Dr Sutherland shares the backstory of how he and Ken Schwaber developed the Scrum framework. I was pleasantly surprised and proud to learn that one of the inspirations behind the current Scrum framework we now have was the work of Prof Babatunde Ogunnike, given my Nigerian heritage. Dr Sutherland also talked about the importance of Agile Leadership and his current focus on helping organisations fix bad Scrum implementations.   I'm sure you'll uncover some useful nuggets in this episode. Without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, my conversation with Dr Sutherland.    Ula Ojiaku: Thank you, Dr. Sutherland, for joining us on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. It's a great pleasure to have you here. Jeff Sutherland: Glad to be here. Looking forward to it. Ula Ojiaku: Fantastic. So could you tell us about yourself? Jeff Sutherland: Well, I grew up in a small town in Massachusetts. And I always felt that I would go to West Point of the United States Military Academy, even at a very young age. And I finally made it there. I spent four years there. And I went on to a program where a certain number of cadets could join the Air Force. And I told the Air Force, if they made me a fighter pilot, I would move into the Air Force, which I did. I spent 11 years as a fighter pilot in the Air Force. And most of the operational aspects of Scrum actually come from that training. My last tour in the Air Force was actually at the US Air Force Academy, I was a professor of mathematics. And I had gone to Stanford University in preparation for that position. And I had worked closely with the, at the time he was Head of the Department of Psychiatry, became the Dean of Stanford who had studied under my father-in-law, he had become an MD under my father-in-law, who was a brilliant physician. And I was working on research papers with him, both at Stanford and at the Air Force Academy. And I asked him for guidance. And I said, I'm thinking about, given all the work we've done in the medical area. Starting in Stanford, I'm thinking maybe becoming a doctor - become an MD. And he strongly recommended against that he said, ‘you'll just go backwards in your career, what you need to do is you build on everything you've done so far. And what you have is your fighter pilot experience, your experience as a statistician, and a mathematician, you want to build on that.' So, I had already started into a doctoral program at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, which was not far from the Air Force Academy. And so, I talked to my department Chairman there who offered me a position in the department running a large research grant, funded by the National Cancer Institute and so, I decided to exit the Airforce and join the medical school. While I was finishing up my doctoral degree. And as soon as my doctorate was finished, I became a professor of Radiology, preventive medicine and biometrics. I was a joint across multiple departments. And I was doing mathematical research on modeling, particularly the human cell on a supercomputer, (to) determine what caused cancer. And to do that required extensive mathematical research as well as the medical research. But at the end of the day, what we found was for any complex adaptive system, like a human cell, or a person or a team, they go through different states. And they're moved from one state to the next by some kind of intervention. And so, if you understand what causes those changes… turned out in the case of cancer, there were four different states that led to a tumor. And in every state, there were certain interventions, and if you knew what they were, you could prevent them and prevent cancer. Or you could even, to my surprise, take a cancer cell and make it go backward into a normal cell. So, this fundamental understanding is the theory behind Scrum. So, while I'm doing this all at the medical school, a large banking company came by and said, ‘you know, over the medical school, you guys have all the knowledge about the technologies; the new technology, we're using (for) banking, you're using for research.' And they said, ‘you guys have all the knowledge but we have all the money and they made me an offer to come join the bank' [Laughs].   Ula Ojiaku: [Laughs]You couldn't refuse Jeff Sutherland: Not just me, it was my family. So, I wind up as Vice President for Advanced Systems, which was effectively was the CTO for 150 banks that we were running across North America.   Each was, you know, a dozen, 50, 100 branches. And of course, we were mainly doing the software, installation and support to run the banking operation, which is largely computer stuff – (this) is what banks run off. And as we're building these systems with hundreds and hundreds of developers, one of the first things I noticed is that all the projects were late. And I look at what they're doing. And they're using this process where they spend, you know, six months defining requirements, and then they put all the requirements into a Gantt chart. And then they, they plan on taking six months to build something, but it's never done. Because as soon as they start testing that they find there's all kinds of things that are broken. So, virtually every single project of the bank is late. So, as a head of technology, one day I walked into the CEO's office and I said, ‘Ron,  have you noticed all your projects are late?' He said, ‘Yes'. He says, ‘Every morning at least five CIOs or CEOs of the banks, they call me up.' And he says, ‘they scream at me.' I said, ‘wow', I said, ‘You know, it's going to get worse, not better. Because these guys are using this, these Gantt Charts.' And I showed him one. And then being a mathematician, I mathematically proved that every project would be late at the bank. And he was stunned. And he said, ‘what should I do?' I said, ‘we need a completely different operating system in the bank.' This is back in 1983. ‘Let's take one business unit. Let's take the one that's losing the most money, okay, the worst business unit' Ula Ojiaku: They have nothing to lose then. Jeff Sutherland: And it was the automated teller division that was rolling out cash machines all over North America. It was a new technology and they had a ton of problems. So, I said, ‘let's take that unit and every one, sales, market, support, installation, we're going to split them down into small teams. And we're going to have Product Marketing come in on Monday with a backlog prioritized by business value. And at the end of the week, on Friday, we're going to deploy to 150 banks.' ‘And I'm going to train them how to land a project every week, just like I trained fighter pilots to land aircraft. I'm going to give them a burndown chart, we're going to throw away the Gantt Chart, I'm going to give them a burndown chart to show them how to land the project.' So, he said, ‘Well, that's gonna be a big headache.' I said, ‘look, the bank needs to be fixed.' He said, ‘Okay, you got it.' So, I took that unit. I told them, ‘I know it's gonna take several weeks,' today we call them sprints, ‘for you to be successful.' Because as new pilots, trained to land, these high-performance jets, they tend to come in high and then they have to come around and try to land again, they over and over, they practice until they can nail it. And it took them six weeks, six sprints to actually nail the end of the week (and) deploy (to) 150 banks. But within six months, it became… it went from the worst business unit in the bank to the most profitable business unit in the bank. And the senior management said, ‘you know, Jeff, here's another 20 million dollars to throw at whatever that thing you're doing [chuckles] it's the most profitable thing in the bank, we're gonna put more money in that [Laughs]. So that was the first prototype of what we call today Scrum at Scale. Now, I've been CTO of 11, or CTO or CEO of 11 different companies. And for the next 10 years, I prototyped that model and advanced technology teams until in 1993, at a company called Easel Corporation, we found that because of the tooling we were building and selling to customers, we needed to build the tool with what today we call Agile Practice. Ula Ojiaku: Yes Jeff Sutherland: And we need to train the customer to use the tool by having teams do an agile practice. So, in order to train our customers properly in 1993, we actually had to formalize what I've been prototyping for 10 years. And we wrote it down and at the time we were reading this paper, we're going through 1000 papers in the journals I, you know, I had done many new technology. And, in every one of them, you have to read everything that's ever been done so that you can go beyond. You can use everything that's been done, but then you go beyond, okay? Ula Ojiaku: Yeah Jeff Sutherland:  So, it's a tremendous amount of research to launch new technology. And at about the 300th paper in our file, it was a paper out of the Harvard Business Review, which really surprised me, by two Japanese Business School professors, Professors Takeuchi and Nonaka. And in there, they described the best teams in the world. They were lean hardware teams that reminded them of a game of rugby, they said, ‘we're going to call what they're doing Scrum Project Management.' So, I said to the team, ‘we need a name for this thing that we're going to train our customers in, and let's call it Scrum.' And off we went. So, for the next two years, we were actually using Scrum within Easel deploying products. But it was not public, to the general industry. And Easel got acquired by a larger company. And at that time, I felt that this needed to be rolled out into the industry because we had benchmarked it with the best tooling in the world from the leading productivity company, and showed that it was… that (it) went 10 times faster [chuckles]. The quality was 10 times better, which is what you need for a new technology innovation. And so, I felt it was ready to go to the industry as a whole. So, I called up an old friend, Ken Schwaber. And he was a CEO of a traditional Project Management software company, a waterfall (methodology). He sold these methodologies with 303 ring binders, a software package that would make Gantt Charts [chuckles]. So, I said, ‘Ken, I want you to come up and see the Scrum, because it actually works and that stuff you're selling doesn't work – it makes projects late.' And he agreed to come in, he actually came up, he met with me. He stayed for two weeks inside the company, working, observing the Scrum team. And at the end of those two weeks, he said, ‘Jeff, you're right. This really works - it's pretty much the way I run my company.' He said, ‘if I ran my company with a Gantt Chart, we would have been bankrupt a long time ago.' So, I said, ‘well, why don't you sell something to work that works instead of inflicting more damage on the industry?' So, he said so we said ‘okay, how (do) we do it?' I said, ‘it needs to be open source, it needs to be free.' Ken felt we needed to take the engineering practices, many of which appear today in extreme programming… Ula Ojiaku: Yes Jeff Sutherland: …and let Kent Beck (creator of eXtreme Programming, XP) run with them because Kent had been sending me emails, ‘Jeff, send me every...', he had been following the development of Scrum, ‘…send me everything on Scrum, I'm building a new process. I want to use anything that you've done before and not try to reinvent anything.' So, he (Ken Schwaber) said, ‘let Kent take the engineering practices, we'll focus on the team process itself.' And we agreed to write the first paper on this to present at a big conference later that year. And writing that paper was quite interesting. Ken visited DuPont Chemical Corporation, the leading Chemical Process Engineers there that they had hired out of academia to stop chemical plants from blowing up. And when Ken met with them, they said, describe what we were doing in the software domain. They said, ‘you know, well, that process that traditional project management is a Predictive Process Control System. We have that in the chemical industry.' ‘But it's only useful if the variation in the process running is less than 4%.' They said, ‘do you have less than 4% change in requirements while you're building software?' Ken says, ‘no, of course not! It's over 50%!' And they started laughing at him. They said, ‘your project's going to be exploding all over the place.' ‘Because every chemical plant that has blown up has been somebody applying a predictive control system to a system that has high variability. You need to completely retrain industry to use Empirical Process Control, which will stop your projects from blowing up. And they said, here it is, here's the book, they had the standard reference book for Chemical Process Engineering. And in there, there's a chapter on Empirical Process Control, which is based on transparency, inspection, and adapting to what's happening in real time. Okay, so those are the three pillars of Scrum that are today at the base of the Scrum guide. Ula Ojiaku: Do you still remember the title of the book that the chemical engineers recommended to Mr. Schwaber by any chance? Jeff Sutherland: Yeah, so I have a, when I do training, I have a slide that has a picture of the book (Process Dynamics, Modelling and Control). It's written by Ogunnaike and Ray. But that is the root of the change that's gone on in the industry. And so then from 1995, forward, Ken and I started working together, I was still CTO of companies. And I would get him to come in as a consultant and work with me. And we'd implement and enhance the Scrum implementations in company after company after company. Until 2001, of course, Scrum was expanding but Extreme Programming in 2001, was actually the most widely deployed. They were only two widely-deployed agile processes at the time of Scrum and Extreme Programming. Extreme Programming was the biggest. And so, the Agile Manifesto meeting was convened. And it had 17 people there, but three of them were Scrum guys - that had started up Scrum, implemented it in companies, four of them were the founders of Extreme Programming. And the other 10 were experts who have written books on adaptive software development or, you know, lightweight processes, so, industry experts. And we, we talked for a day and everybody explained what they were doing and there was a lot of arguments and debate. And at the end of the day, we agreed because of this book, Agile Competitors, a book about 100 hardware companies - lean hardware companies, that have taken Lean to the next level, by involving the customer in the creation of the product. And we said, ‘we think that we all need to run under one umbrella. And we should call that Agile.' Ula Ojiaku: So, did you actually use the word umbrella in your (statement)? Oh, okay. Jeff Sutherland: Often, people use that right? Ula Ojiaku: Yes, yes Jeff Sutherland: Because at the time, we had Agile and Extreme Programming, and now everybody's trying to come up with their own flavor, right?  All under the same umbrella of ‘Agile'. And that caused the both Scrum and Extreme Programming started to expand even more, and then other kinds of processes also. But Scrum rapidly began to take dominant market share, Scrum today is about 80% of what people call Agile. The reason being, number one, it was a technology that was invented and created to be 10 times better. So, it was a traditional new technology developed based on massive amounts of research. So, it worked. But number two, it also scaled it worked very well for many teams. I mean, there are many companies today like Amazon that have thousands of Scrum teams. And Extreme Programming was really more towards one team. And (reason number) three, you could distribute it across the world. So, some of the highest performing teams are actually dozens of teams or hundreds across multiple continents. And because of those three characteristics, it's (Scrum has) dominated the market. So that brings us to in 2006, I was asked by a Venture Capital firm to help them implement Scrum in their companies, they felt that Scrum was a strategic advantage for investment. And not only that, they figured out that it should be implemented everywhere they implemented it within the venture group, everybody doing Scrum. And their goal was to double their return on investment compared to any other venture capital firm. They pretty much have done that by using Scrum, but then they said, ‘Jeff, you know, we're hiring you as a consultant into our companies. And you're a CTO of a healthcare company right now. And we don't want to build a healthcare company, we want to build a Scrum company.' ‘So, why don't you create Scrum Inc. right here in the venture group? We'll support it, we'll do the administrative support. We'll write you a check - whatever you want.' So, I said, ‘well, I'm not going to take any money because I don't need it [chuckles]. I understand how that works. If the venture capital firm owns your company, then (in the) long term, you're essentially their slave for several years. So, I'm not taking any money. But I will create the company within the venture group. If you provide the administrative support, I'll give you 10% of the revenue and you can do all the finances and all that kind of stuff. So, that's the way Scrum Inc. was started to enable an investment firm to launch or support or invest in many dozens of Scrum companies. Ula Ojiaku: That's awesome Jeff Sutherland: And today, we're on the sixth round of investment at OpenView Venture Partners, which was the company the six round is 525 million. There's a spin out from OpenView that I'm working with, that has around this year, 25 million. And over the years, just co-investing with the venture group I have my own investment fund of 50 million. So, we have $570 million, right this year 2021 that we're putting into Scrum companies. Agile companies, preferably Scrum. Ula Ojiaku: Now when you say Scrum companies is it that they facilitate the (Scrum) training and offer consulting services in Scrum or is it that those companies operate and you know, do what they do by adopting Scrum processes? Jeff Sutherland: Today, Scrum Inc sometimes help some of those companies, but in general, those companies are independently implementing Scrum in their organizations.   Ula Ojiaku: Right Jeff Sutherland: And okay, some of them may come to Scrum training, maybe not. But since Scrum is so widely deployed in the industry, Scrum Inc, is only one of 1000 companies doing Scrum training and that sort of stuff. So, they have a wide variety, wide area of where they can get training and also many of the startups, they already know Scrum before they started the company. They are already Agile. So, what we're interested in is to find the company that understands Agile and has the right team players, particularly at the executive level, to actually execute on it. Ula Ojiaku: No matter what the product or services (are)… Jeff Sutherland: Products or services, a lot of them are software tooling companies, but some of them are way beyond that, right? So, turns out that during COVID… COVID was a watershed. The companies that were not agile, they either went bankrupt, or they were crippled. That meant all the Agile companies that could really do this, started grabbing all the market share. And so, many of our companies, their stock price was headed for the moon during COVID [laughs]. While the non-agile companies were flatlined, or are going out of business, and so the year of COVID was the best business year in the history of venture capital because of Agility. So, as a result, I'm spending half my time really working, investing in companies, and half of my time, working with Scrum (Inc.) and supporting them, helping them move forward. Ula Ojiaku: That's a very impressive resume and career story really Dr. Sutherland. I have a few questions: as you were speaking, you've called Scrum in this conversation, a process, a tooling, the technology. And you know, so for some hardcore Agilists, some people will say, you know, Agile is all about the mindset for you, what would you say that Scrum is it all of these things you've called it or would it be, you know, or it's something (else)...? Jeff Sutherland: So, certainly the (Agile) mindset is important. But from an investment point of view, if the organization can't deliver real value, quickly, agile is just a bunch of nonsense. And we have a huge amount of nonsense out there. In fact, the Standish group has been publishing for decades. 58% of Agile teams are late over budget with unhappy customers. So, when you get these hardcore Agilist, that are talking about mindset, you have to figure out ‘are they in the 42% that actually can do it or are they in the 58% that are crippled?' My major work with Scrum Inc. today is to try to get to fix the bad Scrum out there. That is the biggest problem in the Agile community. People picking up pieces of things, people picking up ideas, and then putting together and then it doesn't work (laugh). That is going to that's going to be really bad for agile in the future. If 58% of it continues not to work. So, what we found, I mean, it was really interesting. Several years ago, the senior executive (of) one of the biggest Japanese companies flew to Boston wanted meet with me. And he said to me, ‘the training is not working in Japan for Scrum.' He said, ‘I spent 10 years with Google, in Silicon Valley. So, I know what it looks like what actually works. And I can tell you, it's not working in Japan, because the training is… it's not the training of the Scrum that is high performing. And in fact, our company is 20% owned by Toyota, and we are going to be the trainers of Toyota. And we cannot deliver the training that's currently being given to Toyota, it will not work, it will not fly. And we want to create a company called Scrum Inc. Japan. And we're a multibillion-dollar company, we're ready to invest whatever it takes to make that happen.' To give them the kind of training that will produce the teams that Takeuchi and Nonaka were writing about in the first paper on Scrum. And as we work with them to figure out what needs to be in that training, we found that the Scrum Guide was only 25% of the training. Another 25% was basic Lean concepts and tooling, right? Because the original Scrum paper was all about Lean hardware companies. So Lean is fundamental to Scrum. If you don't understand it, you can't do it. And then third, there are certain patterns of performance that we've developed over the years, we spent 10 years writing a book on patterns - Scrum patterns. And there's about a dozen of those patterns that have to be implemented to get a high performing team. And finally, scaling to multiple teams. It turns out, right about this time I started working with the Japanese, I was at a conference with the Agile Leadership from Intel. And they told me that they'd introduced Scaling Frameworks into Intel division, some of which had more than 500 Scrum teams in the divisions and the Scaling Frameworks had slowed them down. And it made the senior executives furious and they threw them all out and they said, we did not want to hear the word Scrum at Intel anymore. But you guys need to go twice as fast as you're going now. So, they came to me, they said, ‘we're desperate. We have to go twice as fast. We can't even use the word “Scrum”. What should we do?' And they blamed me, they said, ‘Sutherland you're responsible [Laugh] you caused problem, you need to fix it.' So, I started writing down how to do what today we call Scrum at Scale. And everybody, you know, most of those people in the industry were implementing IT scaling frameworks. They were all upset. ‘Why are you writing down another framework?' Well, it's because those IT frameworks do not enable the organization to show Business Agility, and win in the market. And in the best companies in the world, they're being thrown out. So, I've had to write down how do you add, how do you go to hundreds and thousands of Scrum teams - and never slow down as you're adding more and more teams. You know, every team you add is as fast as the first team when you start. Yeah, that's what Scrum at Scale is all about. So, there's two primary things that I'm focused on today. One is to fix all this bad Scrum. Second is to fix the scaling problem. Because it turns out that if you look at the latest surveys from Forbes magazine, and the Scrum Alliance on successful Agile transformations - I learned recently, that almost every company in the world of any significance is going through an Agile transformation or continuing transformation they'd already started years ago. And 53% of them do not meet management expectations. And the MIT Sloan Business Review did an analysis of what happens if an agile transformation fails, and 67% of those companies go out of business. So, this is becoming really serious, right? To be successful today, if you're competing in any significant way, you have to be agile. And number two, if you try to be agile and fail, you have a 67% chance going out of business. And the failure rate is 53%. So, this is the problem that we're wrestling with. And half of that 53% failure is due to the bad Scrum we talked about, but the other half is due because of the leadership not being Agile. Ula Ojiaku: I was just going to say, as you said something about the leadership not being agile. In my experience, you know, as an agile coach in some organizations whilst the teams would embrace you know, Scrum and embrace Agility - the practices and the processes and everything. There's a limit to, you know, how much they can get done… Jeff Sutherland: Absolutely… Ula Ojiaku: …if the leadership are not on board. So… Jeff Sutherland: …you hit this glass ceiling. So, I've been, you know, giving presentations on Agile Transformations around the world. And I can remember multiple times I've had 300 people in the room, say, and I say okay, ‘How many of you are agile, in Agile transformations or continuing the ones you'd started?' Of course, everybody raises their hand. ‘How many of you have waterfall traditional management that expects you to deliver all the old (laugh) Gantt Chart reports that we always got, and don't understand what you're doing?' There's 300 people in the room and 297 people raised their hand. I said, ‘you need to give your leadership the book by Professor Kotter called Accelerate.' Professor Kotter is one of the leading change experts of the world. Ula Ojiaku: And he also, yeah, He also wrote ‘Leading Change' as well - the book, yes. Jeff Sutherland: And in that book, he says, if the leadership of the Agile part of the organization is traditional in their mindset and requirements, the Agile Transformation will eventually fail 100% of the time. Ula Ojiaku: Those are sobering statistics in terms of, you know, the failure rate and how much of you know the success hinges on business agility and the leadership being agile as well and taking the time to know and care what it means. Yeah. Jeff Sutherland: And what's happening is that the Agile Leadership today, if you look at some of the companies that have been most successful during COVID, one of them is John Deere Corporation, the biggest farm equipment manufacturer in the world, probably the oldest. Their stock price went up more than Amazon during COVID. And the board of directors gave their Agile Leadership, the Agile Coaches, Scrum Masters, the highest award in the Corporation for producing that result. So that's another reason I'm trying to communicate to Agile people. The success and survival of your company depends on you. You think your management's going to save you but no, if they are old-style people, they are going to run that company out of business. And you need to either save it before it goes out of business or run to another company before bad things happen. Ula Ojiaku: It's impressive that, you know, John Deere being a farm equipment manufacturer… I think they were ahead of the curve you know, (compared to some of their contemporaries in that industry as well) and embraced agile ways of working. Do you know how their Agile Leadership were able to quantify their contributions to the company? Jeff Sutherland: John Deere started to get Agile more than 10 years ago. So, they've been at it a long time. But in recent years, they really started to build… build internally… Agile leadership, you know, based on my work and they started applying that across the company. I mean, the major focus has not been software actually – it's been in other parts of the company. What has to happen to run a company that's building tractors? [chuckles]. Well, there's all kinds of things that have to happen, you know - purchasing, there's legal [Laugh], there's acquiring all the pieces, it's putting them together at the assembly line, you know, software is a piece of it. You know, that's probably the easiest piece to fix with Agile, it's the rest of the company that's the challenge. They have started doing that really well which is reflected in their stock price. Ula Ojiaku: Amazing. So, you said something about you know, you're out to fix a couple of things, the problem with bad Scrum out there. And, you know, the problem with scaling agile. Jeff Sutherland: Right Ula Ojiaku: So, with respect to the first one, the point about bad Scrum, what in your experience would be the root cause of bad Scrum implementations in organizations? Jeff Sutherland: There're about 11 things, that if you fix them, the team will go twice as fast. And it's multiplicative. So, you know, we have extensive data on, you know, really big companies. What's the difference between the fastest team and the slowest teams? The fastest teams are 2000 times faster than the slowest teams. So why is that? Well, first, the team has to be small. The optimal team size is four or five people. If you have a 10-person team, that's going to take at least 50% longer to get anything done. If you go out, look at the team size, you'll see companies have even not only ten-people teams, they have 15 people in a team, 25 people in a team, okay? Those teams are never gonna meet Agile performance. Second, the backlog needs to be really ready in a sense of small, it's clearly understood, it's properly prioritized. So, you need somebody managing that backlog that can get it right, because we have extensive data for multiple case studies showing the team's production doubles immediately. As soon as you get that backlog right. So you go into many companies, you'll see, there's still arguing about what's the top priority, right? Or everything's top priority. That's just gonna create a massive mess. Third, teams are constantly interrupted. You know, the only teams I know that aren't interrupted are people… these teams and defense contractors working on top secret stuff. And they work in a locked room, [Laughs] the door, it says ‘no managers can enter', [Laugh] and they don't get interrupted. But for the rest of us, there's always somebody coming in wanting something else done. And there's a way to manage that using a pattern we call the interrupt buffer. And if you don't have that pattern implemented properly, you're gonna go half as fast. If you're lucky, you might go half as fast. Ula Ojiaku: And what do you say the Scrum Master has a part to play in making sure the interrupt buffer is there and it's enforced? Jeff Sutherland: The scrum master needs to set this all up. Fifth, in high performing teams, we see this pattern called swarming, where multiple people are working on a story together. That increases the process efficiency, which doubles the performance of the team. So, if people are specialists working independently, that team is going to be really slow. So I'm up to number five, there are six more things, but you probably want to go through them. It's very clear, what makes agile teams suck, we know exactly why. And it needs to be fixed. So, I appeal to anyone listening to this help [Laugh] fix bad agile, it's hurting us all. Ula Ojiaku: Thank you for sharing that. Would this be in any of any of your books or in any of your articles that you've written? Jeff Sutherland: Yeah, it's everywhere and (in) everything I've written, but the best summary, it's the red book Scrum … Scrum, The Art of Doing Twice the Work and Half the Time And we've had people pick, pick this up. A CEO in Kenya came to New York to one of my courses, he said, ‘Jeff, I just read your book. And I'm CEO with three new energy startups in Kenya. And my teams implemented that, and they're going… they're doing three times the work and a third of the time. So, your book is too conservative.' He says to me, this guy, he only read the book, he had no training. So, this book is enough to really get off on the right foot. And if you're having problems, it's enough to fix things. In fact, recently before COVID when we could get everybody together, we had an Apple employee in the class and she said, Jeff, do you know why Apple always meet its states? I said, no, you know, Apple is really secretive. They don't tell anybody anything. She says ‘it's because they do Scrum by the book.' So, I said, ‘What book?' She says, ‘The Red Book - Scrum, The Art of Doing Twice the Work and Half the Time - they do it exactly by the book.' So, again, my message to the Agilists out there: Apple is winning. They are the most valuable company in the world. And it's because they do Scrum exactly by that book. So, you probably should read it. Ula Ojiaku: Definitely. So going by the book, would you say there's any wriggle room for adapting to one's context, or is it about you know, going, ‘check- we've done page 123…' Jeff Sutherland: Well, the whole thing about adapting is fundamental to Scrum. So, one of the things I'm constantly doing in my talks, training, is I'm going back to before Scrum and reading a paper from the leading researchers on complex adaptive systems, in which they mathematically proved, you model things on the computer, that systems evolve more quickly, if they have more degrees of freedom, up until you hit a boundary where the system goes into a chaotic state. So, from the very beginning in Scrum, maximizing the freedom and the decision capability of the team has been fundamental. And we talked about this as self-organization. Now, unfortunately, that term has been so misused, misunderstood that we had to take self-organization out of the Scrum guide. And what we inserted was self-managing. And we put next to it goals, okay, the theme is self-managing to achieve a goal. And to make that happen, they need a commitment to do that. And so, this is one of the fundamental things for Agile teams that work that they have that self-managing commitment to achieve a goal. And the teams that are not working, they're fuzzy about that, right. So, we want the maximum degree of adaptation, the thing that they don't want to change is the basic structure that's in the red book, if they change that, it has the control mechanisms to allow the maximum degree of self-organization - not to go off the rails. Ula Ojiaku: Right. Jeff Sutherland: So, we see a lot of Agilists, ‘oh, you know, let's just tweak the framework this way or that way.' And then the self-organization takes a team off the rails, and then they fall into that 58% that can't deliver, they're late, they're over budget, the customers aren't happy. And so, this is the really one of the hardest things to communicate to people. There're certain things that you absolutely have to be disciplined about. You have to be more disciplined to get a great Agile team than in all ways of working. And that discipline is what allows the maximum degree of self-organization and self-determination, [Laugh] right? So, understanding those two things together, you know, it makes it makes people's brain explode, [Laugh] right? It's hard. Ula Ojiaku: But it works. Jeff Sutherland: But it works right. [Laugh] Ula Ojiaku: You've already mentioned a lot of books in the course of this interview session, and these would be in the show notes. So, would there be anything any final word of advice you'd have for the leaders that would be listening to this podcast in terms of their transformation journey? Jeff Sutherland: So, one of the things we did to Scrum at Scale is that the difference between that and most of the other scaling frameworks is that it's all about the leadership. So, we need an operating leadership team, that is a Scrum team that needs a Scrum Master, a Product Owner, backlog. And its objective is to improve the Agile implementation of the organization. On the prioritization side, we need a leadership team that, led by a Chief Product Owner, that is prioritizing backlog across the organization. So, you know, I've had the Chief Product Owner of Hewlett Packard in my course, he had a $200 billion portfolio. He learned from that class. Says this class is pretty good.' He said, ‘In just one slide I figured out how to get $20 billion more a year with no additional resources' [Laugh]. Just by understanding how to work the framework right? At the $200 billion level. Ula Ojiaku: And you're talking about the Scrum at Scale course, right? Jeff Sutherland: No, this was a product owner course. Product Owner course. He came to it. We're now doing a Scrum at Scale… we're actually doing a Chief Product Owner course. So, a Product Owners at Scale course which it has been really well received by the leading Agile Practitioners. (They) really like that because they need to work more in the large than in the small often. Ula Ojiaku: Definitely. That means this available on the Scrum Inc site? Jeff Sutherland: Yes. Ula Ojiaku: Okay. Jeff Sutherland: So, one of the things I would recommend I would really recommend is the Scrum Field Book. It's a bunch of case studies for organizations, large and small, that have tried to take the whole organization to Scrum. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Sutherland - it's been a great pleasure having you and hopefully we could have a you know, follow up conversation sometime. Jeff Sutherland: Yes. Thanks for inviting me and glad to do it again. Ula Ojiaku: That's all we have for now. Thanks for listening. If you liked this show, do subscribe at www.agileinnovationleaders.com. Also share with friends and leave a review. This would help others find the show. I'd also love to hear from you, so please drop me an email at ula@agileinnovationleaders.com. Till next time, take care and God bless!   PROMOTION: Sign up for a free month's trial with Amazon Music to get unlimited, ad-free access to 75 million songs, podcasts  in HD here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/music/unlimited?tag=agileinnovati-21 *  * By clicking "Sign up and pay," you agree to the Terms of Use and authorize Amazon to charge your default card, or another card £7.99 per month after your trial. Your subscription renews automatically until cancelled. Cancel renewal anytime by visiting Your Amazon Music Settings.

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