Category Archives: Key problems

Postponing the Sprint Start?

Question: Can a PO postpone the start of a Sprint?  Does the PO have the power to do that? *** Answers: First, why would the PO want to do that? It is important to keep the Team and others (esp the Business Stakeholders) on a regular, consistent rhythm.  Do not let them get used to […]

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Webinar: The Link between Estimating and Successful Sprints

Webinar: All Invited.  Free Date: Monday, January 3 Time: 11am – noon ET, 1 hour A discussion with a leader. *** Problems: Some of you have problems estimating using the recommended Wide-Band Delphi Expert Estimation pattern, using the Fibonacci cards. Some of you have problems promising (or forecasting) the right number of stories or story […]

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Webinar: What should an Agile Manager do?

Webinar: What should an Agile Manager do? Let’s discuss what our current thoughts are. We will propose 8 actions, a small set, of things a manager might start by doing. They are: Set a Goal Check your financial situation Resolve that you want lasting stable Teams Identify the Work for the Team Resolve that you […]

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Iterative and Incremental at 3 Levels – #1 “the what”

THIS IS A DRAFT.  (Comments welcome.) I will try to express two big thoughts. Hopefully these are formed well enough that as I talk about them clearly, you can use them in your situation. * Background So, the two ideas are basically these questions: How do we coordinate at the 3 levels on “the what”.  […]

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Agile-Carolinas Mtg: Waterfall vs Agile – key discussion points

Agile started as a reaction to Waterfall (cf. definition of waterfall in Dr. Royce’s paper). Perhaps not so much a reaction to Royce’s Waterfall, but to how Waterfall was being played in the wild. The reaction was expressed many ways, but a simple short explanation is in the Agile Manifesto (4 lines) and the Agile […]

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The illusion of control

Daniel Mezick has a good post in LinkedIn today: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/danielmezick_the-command-and-control-military-gets-agile-activity-6761443011659370496-itMo About the illusion of control, and the idea that control is an emergent property.  (There’s that darn word emergent again.)  See the article he links to: “The ‘Command and Control’ Military Gets Agile.” https://www.infoq.com/news/2010/06/c2-military-gets-agile/ *** Some quick thoughts. Of course it is an illusion that […]

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Get them Climbing again

It is typical for a Scrum team to start Scrum, get some improvement, and then plateau. That is, find some comfortable level of productivity, and just flatline there. Which I guess is fine, if that level were as good as that Team could do. But the level isn’t, and as they say, anyone can see […]

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The Crisis and Agile:  What is it? — What do we do?

This is a talk or group discussion I want to have soon.  See what you think. My goals are two: To help in general, and to help get us all get back to work, which I think is very valuable about now.  (Reasonably safely, of course.)  But we have several impediments. You see above the […]

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Managers and Team Members: Transparency Needed NOW

With the current state of the Coronavirus and responses to it, most knowledge workers are WFH. Prior to this, many managers could see most of the state of things just by walking around the office and talking to people.  Information and status were fairly visible. (Yes, Agile/Scrum could make things even more visible, but even […]

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Autonomy

Do people have the right to be themselves? Do people have the right to tell the truth? Can people be themselves? Can we trust the Team to get the job done? *** Some people seem to believe that they give up their freedom as soon as they walk in the door of the company. Perhaps […]

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