Agile Amped Podcast - Inspiring Conversations

Where will the Agile space be in ten years? This great question kicks off this edition of Round Table Roulette with our guests Aidee Fischer, Corey Post and Steve Kovach, three experienced Agile coaches here at SolutionsIQ. On the topic of the future of Agile, our guests are unanimous: "Agile will be everywhere." Other questions and conversation topics that host Howard Sublett guides our guests through include: Can Agile work at any scale? If no, at what size does it break down? (Fischer: "Depends on what we mean by Agile. If we're talking about the idea of delivery value quickly to customers, being more customer-centric... making our people or products the best that they can be, then I think that, yes: it could work at any scale.") What do you tell managers that want to compare Agile teams to each other? Is there a "Dunbar Number" for Agile? How do you know if someone is a good or great Agile coach? Share a story about Agile outside of software. (Kovach was moved last year by a session he attended at Mile High Agile by the teenaged Aaron Vadakkana who has been using Scrum at home for years. Listen here: Agileamped – Using-scrum-at-home-with-aaron-vadakkan) If you could only give one piece of advice to a new ScrumMaster, what would it be? Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

Neil Smith and Chuck Copello from Red Hat sat down with us to discuss how an Agile mindset can overcome the 6th principle of the Agile Manifesto: “The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.” Red Hat is a large open source software company with 11,000 employees globally, 2,000 of whom work from home. Both Chuck and Neil have team members across different continents, and they provide practical advice for how to be a distributed Agile team and still feel united. They even shared with us tips for helping distributed teams collaborate more effectively. Howard Sublett hosts. Get in touch with our guests: neil@redhat.comccopello@redhat.com Access the Google Doc mentioned here: https://www.solutionsiq.com/resource/agile-amped-podcast/distributed-agile-teams-collaboration-over-collocation-at-red-hat/ Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

When Agile coaches Nidhi Sharma and Michael Callahan are looking at changing someone’s mindset and changing the way that they behave and work, they want to start with a purpose. The pair tied it all together in their Four R’s model for transitioning to Lean thinking: - Why are we doing this work? (Right Reasons)- What work would fit that purpose? (Right Work)- Who needs to be in the room to have those conversations? (Right People)- What is the last responsible moment for doing the work? (Right Time) Howard Sublett hosts. Get in touch with our guests: michael.p.callahan@accenture.com and nidhi.t.sharma@accenture.com And find our podcast host on Twitter: @howardsublett Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

Agile coach Ashok Mohan and IT Product Owner Burkhard Lustig sit down with Agile Amped to share their stories working at Ableton, a business focused on making software and hardware for music makers. In particular, the duo discuss an pivotal learning experience with a difficult trade-in program. Although Product teams had already been leveraging Agile development and practices for 10 years, this was not the case for the Business. When the trade-in program revealed gaps in organizational capability, they decided to make changes, specifically taking four major steps: 1. They introduced team planning.2. To make work visible, they organized "expos" - demos more suited to their laid-back culture.3. Because WIP was too high and not enough was getting to done, middle management was brought together to own the work and the process, with coaching from Ashok and Brendan (another Ableton coach).4. After too much WIP, the second top impediment was lack of alignment, so they focused on establishing a shared purpose. Mohan echoed Marsha Shenk's sentiment (in this podcast - Agileamped – Limitations-opportunities-of-neurophysiology) that "as humans, every one of us wants to contribute... They don't know how to contribute in a system... [but] it's almost always about 'how can you get to people to contribute in a way that's meaningful for them?'" Leslie Morse hosts in NYC at Business Agility 2018. To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

Marsha Shenk, coach, consultant and founder of The BestWork People, takes us on a whirlwind tour of how the brain affects everyday interactions. Shenk believes that people fundamentally want to contribute - to be part of meaningful interactions, which is what life - including business - is made up of. Our favorite quote: "Business agility is not for the faint hearted." More nuggets of wisdom Shenk offers:- "People get dumbed down by having imperatives imposed on them."- "Fear shuts down the prefrontal cortex, which is where our executive function is... so nothing new happens"- "Business is a social activity. Some people now think that itʻs happening between computers - no. Thereʻs somebody out there making a decision and that person has a beating heart."- "I recommend respecting the limitations of technology and ... physiology."- "In order to keep learning after puberty, you have to develop the skill of building new neural pathways." Hosted by Leslie Morse in NYC at Business Agility 2018. To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

Lars Bruns and Sudhir Nelvagal started working together in GE Healthcare 13 years ago. In this episode, they share their experience helping GE with their Agile transformation. GE, being a long-standing business giant with its fingerprints in virtually every infrastructure domain and every industry, is still traditional in many ways, but it is transforming itself to become a lean startup. Bruns and Nelvagal share their experiences applying innovative Agile and Lean techniques across GE’s traditional hardware and physical engineering-oriented business units. Other topics touched on include failing fast and leadership buy-in. Hosted by Brent Barton in NYC at Business Agility 2018. To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

Natalie Warnert is an independent consultant and the founder of Women in Agile, which started five years ago and has spread far and wide. Since then, Warnert has written her theses about why women are less involved in the Agile community. In her research, she has uncovered interesting biases that men and women have about themselves and each other. She briefly touches on current social movements that show how views on equality, inclusivity and diversity are converging. She's also excited about the grassroots pop-up chapters of Women in Agile that people are starting: "It's been so great to see people taking initiative to do these things... I can't do it alone and I don't want to." Other topics include globalization, UX, and AI. Hosted by Leslie Morse in NYC at Business Agility 2018. Morse mentions this podcast: Agileamped – Limitations-opportunities-of-neurophysiology To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

“Everybody knows going into the budget process that people make up the numbers because they know they’re going to get cut, they’re going to get manipulated, they’re negotiating for their bonuses, so it’s already a bad document to begin with,” says Nevine White. White and Mike De Luca from Beyond Budgeting Round Table of North America sat down with us for a deep dive into Beyond Budgeting, including a definition of what it is and some history. They also walk us through two real-world examples of implementing it. De Luca says Beyond Budgeting requires a different philosophy around leadership: it needs to be very decentralized and is intended to drive decision making to the lowest appropriate level. He points out that the process of implementing Beyond Budgeting doesn’t really end since learning organizations must continue to refine and adapt. However, a lot of the heavy lifting can take anywhere from 6-18 months. Listen to find out what that entails, how to get started, how to measure and successfully transform financial planning in your organization. Leslie Morse hosts in NYC at Business Agility 2018. This episode of Agile Amped is part of a series in partnership with the Business Agility Institute. businessagility.institute/ Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media: Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped Instagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/  

Angela Wick is the founder of BA-Squared and in this episode she talks about how business analysis is shifting drastically and how leaders are championing the charge. Wick discusses how important it is for business analysts to collaborate with Product Owners to focus on building the right products: "Agile can't happen without analysis... If you're building the wrong thing, it doesn't matter how fast you are." But what is really exciting to Wick is how much the world and her field is changing as a result of AI and machine learning. What might take a BA weeks to produce, an algorithms today can do at a fraction of the cost and time. But the complexity in the world means that you have to pair vision with rapid experiments - and a dash of curiosity - to make sure your business is on the right path. Leslie Morse hosts in NYC at Business Agility 2018. To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

Joshua Seckel is an Agile coach and also Sevatec’s Chief Solution Architect for Agile and DevOps. Joshua drives the the adoption of business, technical, and management agility both internally and at client sites. His presentation at Business Agility Conference 2018 is called "Agile Contracting in the Federal Government" and in this podcast he shares his experience helping USCIS not only contract Agile teams but also to evolve the procurement process to be more Agile. With a focus on enabling experimentation and cross-department collaboration, Seckel helped stand up 20 Agile development teams who are able today to deliver to production 4-5 times a week - in a federal environment! Some recommendations that Seckel wants to share are:1. Many changes are risk-driven, which is directly related to the corporate culture. By adapting the business to allow a little more risk, you can unlock a lot more learning and success.2. Learn fast. Succeed either in learning (e.g., from failure) or in execution.3. Meet people where they are. Hosted by Leslie Morse in New York City at the Business Agility 2018 conference. To receive real-time updates: Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Subscribe to our newsletter: www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Connect on Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFollow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped

Allison Flaten is an HR practitioner (and one of our favorite people) with over a decade of experience in working with and leading HR departments in variety of industries, five of which she has spent in an Agile organization. She walks us through the differences between traditional HR departments where the focus tends to be on risk mitigation, compliance, and policy-driven communication, and Agile HR that focuses on how to make the organization the best place for its employees. Flaten’s advice includes: - Ensure HR can adapt and shift with the needs of the business, as well as with the employees. - Share your HR backlog - Get feedback from employees and leadership to get buy-in before releasing policies - Provide fast performance feedback which can result in immediate adjustment, rather than waiting for an annual performance review Howard Sublett hosts. Find him on Twitter: @howardsublett Get in touch with our guest: allison.flaten@accenture.com Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

Why should a job interview for a role on an Agile team follow the traditional interview format with high anxiety and low level of psychological safety? How do you find people who are natural collaborators? Jason Tice, VP of business innovation at Worldwide Technology, spoke with Agile Amped about using collaborative activities, or games, during job interviews to gather feedback and assess necessary skills. Tice says creating a safe space where candidates are willing to be vulnerable is a game changer for finding the right candidates for high-performing teams. Hosted by Howard Sublett. This episode of Agile Amped is part of a series in partnership with the Business Agility Institute. Register for the Business Agility Conference in New York March 14-15, 2018 and use code solutionsiq-founding-member to save 25% off registration: businessagilityconf.com/ Find Jason Tice on Twitter: @TheAgileFactor And find our podcast host: @howardsublett Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media: Twitter: twitter.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/agileamped Instagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

We chat with SolutionsIQ's Dave Wylie, a seasoned consultant, manager and developer with 35 years of experience. Wylie wants to make sure that, while Agile has expanded beyond IT, people especially in IT remember that good engineering practices are foundational for a successful Agile transformation. Agile software development approaches, techniques and mindsets are drivers for business value and make it possible for Product Owners to ship when they're ready to ship. Dave argues that foundational development practices - writing tests as well as reviewing, integrating and continuously improving code - are important for everybody. Unfortunately, according to Wylie, ”There's lots and lots of people in the software development world that [have] had zero formal training or informal training or mentorship on these practices.” Howard Sublett hosts. Get in touch with our guest: david.wylie@accenture.comAnd find our podcast host on Twitter: @howardsublett Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

Once upon a time, Melissa Boggs worked for a company where their mission was central to everything they did. This podcast is a story about using mission, vision and values as a beacon for Agile transformation. Boggs is an agility culture and leadership coach with Agile42. As a Certified Enterprise Coach, she is fascinated with company cultures and how they inspire, or conversely demotivate, individuals to become amazing. In this episode, Boggs walks us through concrete steps for how to not only create a mission statement, but how to live and breathe the mission, vision and values every step going forward, and how to avoid the ghosts that sometimes get in the way of an Agile transformation. Our favorite quote is one that resonates with so many organizations:“They already had a mission statement, but quite literally the only person who could tell me who could tell me what it was, was the sweet lady in marketing who wrote it five years ago.” Hosted by Howard Sublett. This episode of Agile Amped is part of a series in partnership with the Business Agility Institute. Register for the Business Agility Conference in New York March 14-15 and use code solutionsiq-founding-member to save 25% off registration: www.businessagilityconf.com/ Contact Melissa Boggs via email: melissa.boggs@agile42.comOr follow her on Twitter: @HmngbirdAgilityAnd find our podcast host:@howardsublett Podcast library: www.agileamped.com Connect with us on social media: Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/

Many of the data warehousing problems of the world have been tackled and solved--yet data warehousing and business intelligence teams in Agile settings still struggle with technical practices that better enable Agile. One example is test automation. Lynn Winterboer discusses with Agile Amped at Mile High Agile 2016 in Denver, Colorado, her conference presentation and why she thinks it's hard for such teams to do test automation and how the industry's vendor focus contributes to the problem.  The bottom line? Don't wait for the right tool or vendor. Just jump right into test automation. Lynn Winterboer coaches DW/BI teams on applying agile principles to their work. She has filled many roles on data and agile teams for 20 years. Lynn understands the unique set of challenges faced by data teams who want to benefit from Agile project delivery. You can reach Lynn via her website: winterboeragileanalytics.com   SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series engages with industry thought leaders at Agile events across the country to bring valuable content to subscribers anytime, anywhere.   Podcast library: www.agileamped.comConnect with us on social media! Twitter: twitter.com/AgileAmpedFacebook: www.facebook.com/agileampedInstagram: www.instagram.com/agileamped/