In 201x, the global financial markets collapsed. Reason: mortgages were given to people who couldn’t afford them. This debt was then repackaged and sold to banks and other institutions as good debt. (“The Big Short” by Michael Lewis is an excellent indictment of this time). However, the bigger question remained. Why didn’t the financial regulator […]
Agile
“Because Our Competitors Are” is No Reason to Become an Agile Organization
Companies are starting to fall into a trap, and it goes something like this, “Our partners/competitors/… are Agile, so we need to be Agile.” Becoming Agile without a valid reason will harm your organization. I can’t state that any simpler. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, rival manufacturers often visited Toyota plants, and Toyota was delighted […]
Vision to User Stories – What is the Best Flow?
In a recent Product Owner Course I was asked to provide a picture of the flow from Vision to User Stories, with all the steps in between. I think the attendee was hoping for something like: There are a couple of challenges. Scrum, being a framework, doesn’t tell the Product Owner or the Dev Team […]
5 Steps for Creating High-Performance Teams eBook
Certified Scrum Trainer Mark Levison has been around the block, more than a few times, and he was getting frustrated by what he saw happening in Scrum. When Mark is invited into businesses and industries to talk with Scrum teams, it’s typically with the request to help them do Scrum better so they can be more […]
Welcome to the High-Performance Teams Game
Your team is working on the World’s Smallest Online Bookstore, a site that provides the best results (just a few) for every search, not every result on earth. We’re a vulture capital funded company, so if we don’t deliver, our funding will be cut. So begins the opening of the High-Performance Teams Game. My goal […]
Agile in a Tweet
John Miller recently challenged some of us to summarize Agile for the K-12 crowd. I wound up writing a tweet I could share with my nine year old: “Focus on the customer. Build amazing quality stuff. Release frequently. Always improving. Two heads are better than one.” MJ and George both take issue with “Always Improving”. […]
The Culture Game – Book Review
Taking a leaf out of Dan’s book for Agile leaders, The Culture Game, this review is written using the Perfection Game. (I rate the book 8 out of 10.)
Agile Voices Finally
An ongoing list of people who are active in the Agile community and who write about their experiences, either good or bad.