Yearly Archives: 2013

Key Impediments – Toronto

I am a big advocate of a public impediment list.  (Yes, for some of you, I am saying this again.  I think in general it bears repeating and repeating in a company.) It requires discussion to explain to skeptics WHY we recommend this. I will not attempt that discussion here ( maybe I should in […]

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Culture: Some steps to improve it (for Scrum)

I have been thinking a lot about corporate culture lately, and what we can do to change it. For example, to enable Scrum to get better results. Here is one article by John Kotter.  Pretty good I think. So, what can we do.  Here’s my advice to myself: 1. “Whether you think you can or […]

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The ScrumButt Test (5): A prioritized Product Backlog is essential

We started a series on The ScrumButt Test some time ago. This is the fifth explanatory post about the test. To find the others, search above (right). Here is the original post. The second item in the second section of the ScrumButt Test is this: “There is a product backlog prioritized by business value” Seem […]

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Squirrel!!

The movie Up! is pretty good. A cartoon, with bits adults can enjoy. My kids were watching and I was also, out of the corner of my eye. There was one scene: the ‘bad dogs’ are in airplanes chasing the good guys. And someone yells: “Squirrel!” The bad dogs wreck their airplanes going after the […]

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Changing culture

I am giving a presentation at Southern Fried Agile on Oct 18th, 2013. On “Culture & Agile & Change”. Here is the presentation slide deck so far.  To me, it is mainly a reference and a take-away.  It does highlight some of the key things I will say (and many things I am sure I […]

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What is culture? When do we start to change it?

Some of us in the Agile community think:  an organization’s culture needs to change before agile can be fully adopted. This certainly seems to be true. Let’s define this more precisely.  The idea is this: Before a company can realize the full and extreme benefits of lean-agile-scrum, it must change its corporate culture to be […]

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Scaling: How about the “Don’t do it!” option?

There is a lot of talk lately about scaling. And, to some degree, scaling is necessary and good. They say only truly professional Teams try complicated plays.  Or should try complicated plays.  Most ‘lesser’ Teams do well to stick to basic blocking and tackling.  I think this is wise advice for most teams. Scaling by […]

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Deliver Faster

Why do we want to deliver fast, and then faster? Well, the first reason is…that’s what the customer wants. The customer is thirsty. They want a drink now. She does not want to wait for 3 months to get a major delivery of 200 water bottles. A drink now, please. The second reason: time to […]

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4 Announcements

We are happy to announce 4 things. 1. New LeanPub Book: Agile Release Planning. Some of you may have seen a prior draft. It is revised now. And published. I expect to have some further revisions.  I seek your feedback. You can see it here. 2. New Workshop: Story Splitting (Feature Decomposition) This is a […]

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More success with Scrum – How to get it

Fernando Cuenca has an excellent blog post, here.  He discusses what he learned at Agile 2013. I will summarize his teachings in my words. The ultimate question is: how to have a better life for yourself, your Team, and your Customers.  Specifically at work, using Scrum. Measure velocity.  Look for increases in velocity. Otherwise known […]

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