Agile Amped Podcast - Inspiring Conversations

Eric Willeke shares an account of his experience working with CA Technologies (formally Rally) where he discovered that limiting team WIP is only so useful when feature and strategy WIP aren't also coordinated. After working hard to figure out how to help his teams manage their WIP and deliver near-perfectly, Eric found that there was almost no change in the system; the same problems existed. Looking at a burndown chart of work performed by 47 teams, Eric thought it looked almost perfect--and yet the features delivered and accepted were flat. He found that while focus at the story level was great, focus at the feature level was terrible, and found the same case at the strategy level (which features to build). Eric's session at Agile2016 "WIP: The Tragedy Continues" centered around his experiences. SolutionsIQ's Alan Dayley hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Pete Behrens from Trail Ridge Consulting is bringing his passion for Agile to leadership. He recognizes that, while the ScrumMaster is responsible for identifying and removing impediments, it's so often the case that the SM doesn't have the power to actually remove the impediments: only leadership can do it. Leadership is a key factor in the success of any organization but, when the teams have a desire to be Agile and the C suite want to transform to Agile, it's the leadership and management in the middle that have the least direction. One thing that's important to Peter: replacing bad habits with good ones. "We've got to give leaders the positive message... These are the behaviors you should be doing, not just what to stop doing." He also wants to create an Agile standard for leaders: "The Scrum Alliance has created the gold standard for [being] a certified ScrumMaster or Product Owner. We're trying to create that same standard for leaders." SolutionsIQ's Alan Dayley hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Microservices are all the rage now, and monolithic applications ("monoliths") are old school. So it makes perfect sense to ditch the monoliths completely and go straight for microservices, right? Not to Mike Gehard, it doesn't, especially for new projects. A software engineer at Pivotal, Mike says that for startups who don't yet know what their business is, microservices may box them in unnecessarily. He advocates for starting with a monolith before moving to microservices--in three easy steps (at least MIke makes them seem easy). The assumption going into the monolith, however, is that it's structured in such a way that moving over to microservices in the future is feasible and easy. SolutionsIQ's Alan Dayley hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Markus Silpala is all about bringing the learning and growth that Agile dev teams have experienced over the past decade into the IT and infrastructure part of the equation. His session at Agile2016 was called "Making Infrastructure as Awesome as Agile Software". Markus experienced first hand why bringing the infrastructure into the Agile development workflow is so difficult. When the team he was working with got a taste of the Ops side of the release, they decided they didn't want any part of it and was hoping another team could do it. In other words, this Agile team wanted to re-instantiate a silo--but for legitimate reasons, some of which Markus covered: DevOps tooling isn't as developed and the domain of skill for DevOps adds a whole new level of complexity to developing. Markus goes on to touch on the 3 types of Agile: Process Agile, Technical Agile and Mindset Agile. Process is just the entry point and naturally arises when you grok Technical and Mindset Agile well. But people tend to get stuck on Process Agile because it's easier to walk through the paces and doesn't really require any internalization. SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

In this in depth audio only podcast, we get to visit with Jeff Lopez-Stuit.  Jeff coaches in far away places and with companies that build products on a global scale.   Jeff helps bust a few of the myths we have about coaching in other cultures, the adoption of agile in very hierarchical societies, and shares technics to coaching approaches with people from different backgrounds.  He even shares some tips for those coaches that may be taking their very first assignment to coach in a foreign land.   Hint: We are all very much the same.  About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Product Owners can prepare for the business world by getting education in business and economics, software engineers can similarly prepare for a career in development--but how do you prepare for a career as a ScrumMaster or Agile coach? Andreas Schliep wants to provide them a path. "If [young people] want to become ScrumMasters or Agile coaches, there should be something at the university or college that just leads them there."  If you asked Andreas how long he thinks the ScrumMaster's education would last, it wouldn't be three days (which is longer than the typical two-day CSM course), but three years. That's because many ScrumMasters lack the soft skills required to perform a servant leadership role for a Scrum team. To this end, Andreas and others have created an open-source curriculum to help individuals learn how to be better ScrumMasters and coaches. When it comes down to it, Andreas believes that the ScrumMaster is an Agile coach for the team. As he says, "It's about helping people achieve their goals, helping people become better." SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

CEO and co-founder of Retrium David Horowitz left his gig as an Agile coach to focus on a growing problem: retrospective fails. David says, "If you ask me, 'How would you describe Agile in just two words?' it would be, 'Continuous Improvement.'" Retrospectives are the vehicle for continuous improvement. Yet across the industry, David sees many teams who treat retrospectives like a chore or a checklist item--or, even worse, they skip the retrospective altogether. It gets even worse if the teams are distributed. David decided to quit being an Agile coach and founded Retrium, whose SaaS product makes retrospectives much more effective and engaging. The biggest pitfall in retrospectives, in David's opinion: "lack of follow-through." As for pitfalls during live retrospective, the lack of a level playing field may keep teams from getting value. Seniority, personality and physical location can all contribute to--or detract from--a participant's ability to actively participate and gain value. In other words, just because someone is junior, introverted and/or remote doesn't mean they don't want to contribute to the team's growth.  David also touches on the Retrospective Facilitators Gathering, which he participates in. Mandy Ross from Sococo, SolutionsIQ partner, hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Chet Hendrickson & Ron Jeffries (briefly) take over Agile Amped after (briefly) breaking Howard Sublett. Then the duo reminisce on 20 years of collaboration since the beginning of Extreme Programming (which, you'll remember, is well before the onset of Agile). With decades of experiences in Agile (and its predecessor methodologies), Chet and Ron have lots to say about the state of Agile and aren't above saying it. Of interest: the fact that so many Agile companies focus on the tools for doing Agile and few focus on actually being Agile. On this point, Chet advocates for "more Jenkins, less Jira." Ron says it may be time to return to the roots of Agile and XP and do the unthinkable to get the desired results: change the name. SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Boris Gloger says it's time to reimagine Scrum. Or rather to take Scrum back to its roots, before Scrum 1.0, whose original picture, Boris contends, is wrong. Scrum originated in "The New New Product Development Game" by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka, and Boris revisits it to point out the ways that Scrum and current Agile practices need an overhaul. Here's a taste of some of Boris' thoughts on Scrum 3.0: - The team interacts directly with the customer or end-user and write user stories, not the Product Owner. - If, in Lean thinking, every type of inventory is waste, then the Product Backlog is also waste. - Sprints can begin as soon as one user story or task is ready for the team to consume. - Daily Scrum need to be rethought too, rather than daily, every 90 minutes. - Many more (very short) demos, perhaps every 90 minutes... Boris also shares some experiences using Scrum 3.0 at a client.  (There's also a lot of dishes clanging in the background--sorry! But people gotta eat... :)) SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Earlier this year Anu Smalley and Kate Megaw co-chaired the Global Scrum Gathering in Orlando, FL, and are here with Agile Amped in Atlanta to talk about how to make training fun and women in Agile. For many people, training is nothing but death by PowerPoint, but Anu and Kate use Sharon Bowman's "Training From the Back of the Room" approach to ensure that students learn through short spurts of learning interspersed with hands-on exercises, discussion and debriefs on learning objectives.  Meanwhile, both Anu and Kate are also passionate about the Women in Agile movement. In Anu's experience, "even though women come into the Agile industry, they don't stay." Now, along with many other women in the industry, the duo are working to create a group of people who are willing to mentor women in Agile.  SolutionsIQ's Howard Sublett hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Throughout Diana Larsen's Agile career, there has been a common thread: she has a strong desire to understand how people learn. Lifelong learner and champion for learning, Diana knows it's impossible to learn everything. "But if I know that you have some skills that I don't have, I can either come to you and ask you to help me learn them, or I can turn to you when I need them. And you can turn to me for the things you'd like to learn more about." Inherent in the learning process is trust and vulnerability. In team retrospectives, each team member has to trust others with their vulnerability in order to open the door to learning. Without that trust and vulnerability, no one learns--and then how do you build anything? Mandy Ross from Sococo, SolutionsIQ partner, hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Dan Attfield and Paul Hammond discovered that the rules of improv comedy are the polar opposite of Patrick Lencioni's "Five Dysfunctions of a Team."  For example, the first dysfunction is Absense of Trust, but in an effective team, you encourage the Presence of Trust. The duo walked Agile Amped through a series of exercises that they used in their session "The Five Dysfunctions of an Improvised Comedy Group"--which started out right with a blackout disco with Beyonce blaring on the speakers. In the end, Dan and Paul have one goal: getting people to change their egocentric views to one that focuses on making others look awesome. Mandy Ross from Sococo, SolutionsIQ partner, hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

As CEO of Sococo Cliff Pollan knows a thing or two about telecommuting. His first experience with it was back in 1980 when he worked in Minnesota out of the First Bank Produce building, right across the street from where Prince shot Purple Rain. At the time, the only technology that was available was the telephone, and there was no voicemail or email. Cliff spent a lot of time on airplanes "commuting" between home and work to maintain strong ties and get work done. Cliff's telecommuting experiences made it clear how important interpersonal connections are to effective work. Now as the CEO of Sococo, an online office platform, Cliff is able to realize the value of Agile by enabling more face-to-(virtual)face interactions, so that distributed teams can be more productive without devoting so much time to telecommuting. Mandy Ross from Sococo, SolutionsIQ partner, hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

David J. Bland's session "Introduction to Assumption Mapping" walked participants through how to "facilitate a conversation with your team and enable them to focus on what matters". Some of the questions the team can tackle: 1. Does anybody want this? 2. Do we have any viability risks? 3. Can we feasibly built it? Then the team maps the answers. The goal is to elucidate the gaps in understanding of the problem space and the associated risks. Assumption mapping allows you to clear the air so they can talk about the problem openly and decide where to focus their efforts. SolutionsIQ's Alan Dayley hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook

Troy Magennis has two sessions at Agile2016: "Forecasting Using Data: Quickly Answering How Big, How Long and How Likely" and "Data Driven Coaching: Safely Turning Team Data Into Coaching Insights". About the first session he shares that the workshop tries to eliminate the fear of statistics and demonstrate how to forecast software projects using historical data or range estimates and dice, of all things. Troy emphasizes using sample historical data to extrapolate probabilities. He also says that people "don't need as much data as they think"; if you focus on one data type like date of completion, you can do "basically any type of forecasting using just that data." As for the second session, Troy shares that data collection should serve three purposes: 1. To tell a story, not to build people up 2. To glean insights from the story 3. To see whether the insights had an impact at some later time Seen this way, data can be a powerful aid to coaches. SolutionsIQ's Alan Dayley hosts at Agile2016 in Atlanta, GA. About Agile Amped The Agile Amped podcast series connects the community through compelling stories, passionate people, shared knowledge, and innovative ideas. Fueled by inspiring conversations with industry thoughtleaders, Agile Amped offers valuable content – anytime, anywhere. To receive real-time updates, subscribe at YouTube, iTunes or SolutionsIQ.com. Subscribe: http://bit.ly/SIQYouTube, http://bit.ly/SIQiTunes, http://www.solutionsiq.com/agile-amped/ Follow: http://bit.ly/SIQTwitter  Like: http://bit.ly/SIQFacebook