tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79935752024-03-13T20:20:43.424-07:00Software Development and Human CapitalLeadership, Agile and StrengthsUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger160125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-9422707075894719442023-06-16T13:35:00.001-07:002023-06-16T13:57:49.340-07:00...Over Contract Negotiation<p> When you teach collaboration, openness, psychological safety, respect, commitment, and then get a lawyer to respond to your request to talk about a clear mismatch on expectations, something is wrong. </p><p>And Brett Palmer, as a Certified Scrum Trainer, represents the Scrum Alliance as an ambassador? He teaches the Certified Scrum Master workshop to people every month.</p><p>I did what I could - I filed an ethics complaint, with evidence from all of my team members. But the Scrum Alliance can't do anything unless court has decided in my favor. I contacted a lawyer and he said that would probably cost me $100,000. "And you still have no guarantee to collect on damages or loss. Pursuing that may cost an additional $100,000."</p><p>There's the "Agile community" and then there's cut-throat business. I used to believe the Agile community didn't have cut-throat people in it. I was warned about Brett Palmer </p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK9_d1Nj-N3ImfPfCtRpfPKN2cQekQ7BpHqm-JQi0Ue2h9E_alxdkbQMuYPq6PInLsX1SvWIlcCUqp4REIov9cqE_xNbpJ_wLeGNHTB4hISy7d4Rjjn5saKtb6gNm3d9gTorXHjGum5_1RG24ksO-WeT_n80zItdGf6x5goN81dmTbndfEvFo/s1126/Screen%20Shot%202023-06-16%20at%203.24.14%20PM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Brett Palmer" border="0" data-original-height="842" data-original-width="1126" height="479" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK9_d1Nj-N3ImfPfCtRpfPKN2cQekQ7BpHqm-JQi0Ue2h9E_alxdkbQMuYPq6PInLsX1SvWIlcCUqp4REIov9cqE_xNbpJ_wLeGNHTB4hISy7d4Rjjn5saKtb6gNm3d9gTorXHjGum5_1RG24ksO-WeT_n80zItdGf6x5goN81dmTbndfEvFo/w640-h479/Screen%20Shot%202023-06-16%20at%203.24.14%20PM.png" title="Letter from Brett Palmer Lawyer" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-43321648256097206042020-07-22T14:28:00.001-07:002023-06-16T13:58:23.555-07:00The Massive, Wasted Investment in Brett Palmer, CST<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The investment in Brett Palmer, Certified Scrum Trainer was significant. And lost. Well, lost to me - the investor. Others profited off of my investment. Handsomely. But that's a later story.<br />
<br />
The classes highlighted are actually from Brett's application to the Scrum Alliance Trainer Approval Committee (TAC). These critical, key co-trainings below where arranged, paid-time-off and sometimes actually paid classes and/or forfeited revenue to another co-trainer. The personal connections, relationships, trust, time and bottom line cost are incredibly high to become a CST. This is an example of that.<br />
<br />
This is the highest hurdle to clear for someone, like a Certified Scrum Professional (CSP-SM) who wants to become a CST because they need: willing co-trainers, time on each co-trainers schedule, a flexible job that lets them take the equivalent of six weeks of work off, and months of pay to cover that and travel expenses. Brett had the benefit of my classes to practice with (and my willingness to take the customer hit for lower quality training by him). If you don't have a local trainer who will do that, you'll be traveling every single class. Even with all that practice, Brett still failed to pass the TAC the first time. This happened to be a paid trip to Dublin, Ireland for over a week. At least he got to spend some time with Kate Megaw, of BrainTrust, who would later employ Brett as one of their busiest contract trainers just days after Brett quit the full-time job at my company.<br />
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All this co-training is a once-in-a-lifetime deal if you can have someone else pay for all of that, then you walk away and take all the profit for yourself.<br />
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It's like getting into Formula 1 racing, so you build a top-level car. Then someone takes the car and goes off to race and keep all the winnings. All the investment is lost.<br />
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Or perhaps going through all the production cost to make a movie, then someone takes the reel and goes to a theater and says, "If you'll play this movie, I'll split the profits with you."<br />
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Worse yet, there are other trainers and REPs with the Scrum Alliance who will take this stolen investment in and profit off the breach of contract! We will cover that more later.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6sf3wf-wVXc/XxitiFfsq2I/AAAAAAAACVw/XWjuHZ8ZlxEd--pkwY72NRbfnGJnkaTbwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2020-06-27%2Bat%2B2.45.03%2BPM.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Brett Palmer" border="0" data-original-height="1083" data-original-width="1600" height="432" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6sf3wf-wVXc/XxitiFfsq2I/AAAAAAAACVw/XWjuHZ8ZlxEd--pkwY72NRbfnGJnkaTbwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h432/Screen%2BShot%2B2020-06-27%2Bat%2B2.45.03%2BPM.png" title="Brett Palmer Scrum Training List" width="640" /></a></div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-4385187135424066642020-05-05T12:52:00.002-07:002023-06-16T14:07:14.295-07:00Brett Palmer's Journey to Become a Certified Scrum Trainer<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
March 21, 2017 - I send a job offer to Brett Palmer as full-time agile coach.<br />
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March 23,2017 - Brett declines the full-time offer, and requests a contract opportunity.<br />
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March 25, 2017 - I reply that any 1099 work will not include my investment and support for the CST. I wrote:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I'm going to think some more about what this means on the CST process, though, given the cost and investment and the network I bring for that. I'm not there yet if it's not full-time (which is what the Scrum Alliance was trying to help and address with the ECST program). </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>The CST is such a lure towards money that most would rather train full time rather than train and coach. Even if training & coaching, it's hard to find where to draw the line on train vs long term investment in the company, community, etc. </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>For example, train four times a month and coach the rest? Train twice, coach most and spend some time visiting clients, on free coaching calls, supporting a and running an other low-margin classes? </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I feel strongly the latter is best for individuals, teams and companies in our area long term. Results will take time, but I don't see any other way. </i></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I can't, in good conscience, expect an independent to give up a good income from training just for what I think is "best for the company and community." It doesn't make short term economic sense. That's why I made stock options/ownership part of the offer.</i></blockquote>
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April 6, 2017 - Brett accepts the initial full-time offer, stating among other things:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i><span style="color: #666666;">Your offer is really quite generous, and says a lot of your confidence in me...I will do everything possible in my capacity to help grow the R9 brand...my loyalty now is R9.</span></i></blockquote>
<br />
May 13, 2017 - Arranged co-train for Brett with CST #1. Two days off and direct cost of $15,552.00.<br />
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June 7, 2017 - Arranged co-train for Brett with CST #2. Three days off and travel costs.<br />
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July 16, 2017 - Arranged co-train for Brett with CST #3. Four days off and travel costs.<br />
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July 23, 2017 - Second co-train for Brett with CST #2. Three days off and travel costs.<br />
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July 30, 2017 - Second co-train for Brett with CST #3. Three days off and travel costs.<br />
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August 1, 2017 - Arranged co-train for Brett with CST #4. Five days off and travel costs.<br />
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August 21, 2017 - Arranged co-train for Brett with CST #5. Two days off and direct costs of $11,004.<br />
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Summer and Fall, 2017 - Brett had <b>over 7 weeks of training</b>, all of which helped to present him as the best candidate possible. This includes CSD, multiple CAL, Large Scale Scrum (LeSS), Lean Kanban University and ORSC certifications. Brett had over <b>40 days of co-training</b>, all paid for as an FTE. Brett is not billable for majority of the time.<br />
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October 24, 2017 - November 1, 2017 - Brett's trip to Dublin, Ireland for the Scrum Gathering. He does not pass the Trainer Approval Committee (TAC).<br />
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December, 2017 - Brett submits an expense report totaling over $30,000.<br />
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April 13 - 19, 2018 - Brett travels to Minneapolis Scrum Gathering, passes the TAC.<br />
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April 22, 2018 - Brett Palmer quits Rocket Nine Solutions.<br />
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Brett is now independent, doing business as "Brett Palmer & Associates" with two classes a week, including Orange County. He has a "code of conduct" that "anyone who violates this code of conduct may be sanctioned."</div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl1UBekPUnRuf_Slfrl67ypZ7nIU5RQlo-GvMmnHnZ7WHneT5PTuwUPwOf2mFXK9dDj6DTsJ_JKu_V2CqUo4PoLE6gn5jCmSnOuFuZub-YgUMZ2CRAOG45686YJjYEm4tY_rLk5yDmbovfJqXArQzrvgwmV5GteLu8p9jVuGNhG6JiswYqioM/s1612/Screen%20Shot%202023-06-16%20at%204.05.49%20PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Brett Palmer" border="0" data-original-height="404" data-original-width="1612" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl1UBekPUnRuf_Slfrl67ypZ7nIU5RQlo-GvMmnHnZ7WHneT5PTuwUPwOf2mFXK9dDj6DTsJ_JKu_V2CqUo4PoLE6gn5jCmSnOuFuZub-YgUMZ2CRAOG45686YJjYEm4tY_rLk5yDmbovfJqXArQzrvgwmV5GteLu8p9jVuGNhG6JiswYqioM/w640-h160/Screen%20Shot%202023-06-16%20at%204.05.49%20PM.png" title="Brett Palmer Agreement to Pay Back" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-2627196138993722562020-05-02T18:46:00.001-07:002020-05-02T18:46:55.762-07:00The Biggest Lesson of the Last Five Years<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Five years ago I was deep in a agile transformation at what would become Dell Technologies, kicking off another transformation that would be, in my opinion, one of the most successful, mature growth paths I've seen teams on, and beginning to dig into the paradigm shift of LeSS.<br />
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But those would pale in comparison to the larger, more painful lessons I would learn.<br />
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I would be lied to and betrayed by someone I knew in the agile community for years, someone I helped mentor. This cost me directly over $100,000, and a lost opportunity costs of another $100,000 - $200,000, as well as a business strategy delay of two years. I wish I could say I was strong enough to not have emotional costs as well.<br />
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This terrible experience lead me to change long-held beliefs. Based on it, I no longer believe in:<br />
- Theory Y. This person had self-interest over team or company and planned and executed on it over a long time. As soon as he had his Certified Scrum Trainer credential, he quit within within weeks.<br />
- The Retrospective Prime Directive. To still believe this would mean that he "did his very best" over the course of over a year being invested in, given numerous certifications (CAL, CSD, LKU and more), over $30,000 of direct expenses including travel to the Dublin Scrum Gathering and several other cities across the US, and then give notice right after becoming a CST...THAT is very best? If so, I would hate to see his worst, or even his average. Now, it might be that it was his "best" performance, pretending to be a team-player, loyal employee and that he would pay back this trust and investment, but I don't think that's what is meant.<br />
- Self-organization and self-management. Although I still believe in these, it is now only within the boundaries of ethical people of sound mind. Do you really believe self-management works towards society's best with criminals? Or with people that are mentally unstable? It just amplifies the bad.<br />
- Teal and Green Organizations. If someone is manipulative, nefarious, scheming, then they use those to bend others to their will, either through persuasion, guilt, pressure, lying or other negative approaches for their own benefit and the detriment of their team and organization. It would only be, sadly, through traditional controlling tools of signed contracts, layers on retainer, and other threatening tools with repercussions that would stop a selfish person from taking everything they can.<br />
- Community that sticks up for each other. One of my first surprises what that another small agile training company began using this new CST right after he left my company. "An obvious oversight, for sure. I'll call to let them know about the situation, and they'll correct it right away, letting him know its not right." Nope. Their President will say that she won't "get involved." Ummmm...you're already involved because you're profiting off of someone that I've spent all the time and money to become a CST, apparently for your classes in Birmingham, Los Angeles and Salt Lake City. Nice.<br />
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I'll share the other, less painful, lessons learned later this week, including losing several hundred thousand dollars. Yes, less painful. Losing that much money wasn't as painful as what my ex-employee, and his new primary training company, did to me.<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-54362067993067398292015-05-02T07:03:00.001-07:002015-05-04T22:41:50.112-07:00We are Creating Agile Orphans<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i>This is a draft, but I wanted to share it with others before the Scrum Gathering. </i><br />
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It is my premise that the invisible hand of self-interest is undermining our work in the marketplace.<br />
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While that statement may be true in a Capitalistic economy in general (Enron, Pharmaceutical sales, Big Tobacco, oil spills), it should not be acceptable in the agile community.<br />
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We are values driven.<br />
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The full value stream for agile adoptions is not just CSM training. It is the successful transformation of the companies in our world.<br />
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Those who only train and/or staff, leave agile orphans - those who don’t know enough, have no support, no community and no covering.<br />
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We are obligated to act on the full value stream if we want to change the world of work.<br />
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As a profession, our entry level number of Certified ScrumMasters moving to the next level of growth and maturity (the CSP) drops over 99%.... 99%!<br />
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Those making it to becoming a coach (CSC) - 0.02%<br />
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Yet we incentivize this. Trainers, for the most part, make money per student. So, more students = more money. We don't limit the number of classes. We don't even limit the class size, though most agree that 20 is the limit, and the most credible study of class size found the ideal to be 13 - 17. Even if not, we are smart enough to know that self-interest doesn’t give good, long-term results. And shouldn’t we, as management consultants, know and expect that?<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
We value humanity and the human condition.<br />
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And we have, although are losing, the place of influence and leadership.<br />
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As the current holders of that leadership, we are beholden to do something about it.<br />
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And, we need to be models of what we teach and coach. To do otherwise would be unacceptable hypocrisy.<br />
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My wrestling match with this topic began on March 29, 2010 sitting in Orange County’s John Wayne Airport (which has valet parking, in case you need that). Someone had offered to “help” with the local agile user group that I had started in October, a year and a half earlier (at an upscale mall, which also has valet parking, in case you need that).<br />
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We always assume, we always think what we think is right, none of us knows what he or she doesn’t know. But the differences of the approach of this person confused me - making the attendees register, the effort in changing over to a tool to do that, not letting me have full access to that tool. That was my first exposure to actions and motivations in self-interest, though I didn’t recognize it at the time (I make terrible assumptions on the innate goodness of people founded solely on medieval fables and tales of Irish monks).<br />
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Part of the problem is that I had been imprinted on by the goodness of my first encounters with people in the agile community - Phil Scott, Diana Larsen and the CRN crew, and Lyssa Adkins.<br />
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Although there’s long since been significant erosion of this initial monument to goodness, the welcoming, inviting, openness, helpfulness, appreciation and other amazing attributes of that initial group spoiled me into thinking that EVERYONE in the agile community was like this. Needless to say, I was wrong (else I wouldn’t be writing this and you could be doing something else instead of reading this, like having someone valet park your car).<br />
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It’s one thing to recognize a difference, or an issue. Still another to actually plant a flag into the ground and say “There are differences, and there is a right and there is a wrong.” We don’t have to wait for the government to come in and make rules as they do with pharmaceutical sales, making it black and white what is right and wrong. But it is a completely different thing to then go and do something about it.<br />
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Well, I’m doing something about it.<br />
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In late 2013, a subsidiary of PMStudy, out of VC-backed VMEdu, created a program called ScrumStudy. They created certifications that sounded a lot like Certified ScrumMaster (Scrum Master Certified), put together a 300+ book of Scrum and trademarked it the SBOK (as in Scrum Body of Knowledge), and promoted themselves as the good guys who had a Scrum standard and gave it away, didn’t lock out trainers. I wrote about it on my blog, in case you want more gory details.<br />
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Most agree this is wrong. But why? Sure, the trademark issue is the actual lawsuit filed against them, but most of the complaints that I heard were about the overdone standards book, and certain lack of quality in trainers, as well as the deception of what a student thinks he is getting. But don’t we have the same type of problems?<br />
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It seems generally accepted that ScrumStudy is doing something bad, at least enough to warrant a lawsuit. But does it have to be egregiously wrong to be wrong?<br />
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Not all trainers were qualified the same way. Currently, it is expected that one co-train, and have recommendations by, at least five trainers. As far as I understand, those that did not co-train, still have not. If the co-training was meant to validate them, and we did not, shouldn’t we still validate them? Another option to validate trainers was to request student reviews and make those public, just like Google Reviews or Yelp, but this was resisted by a number of the trainers.<br />
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The problem is, in essence, that we are, or are allowing, people to pursue money over value for our customers. Don’t we want to provide the best service to customers that we can? Don’t we want to help them make the best choices that they can?<br />
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Money aside, is it wrong to teach principles and values that we don’t live? We teach sustainable pace, yet there are trainers teaching 18 days out of the month, including international travel. If you subtract the weekends (10), that leaves 2 non-training days. Those are gone with international travel - 0. Now subtract a travel day for the travel between four states and four major cities of the large foreign country, and you have - 8, or a 40% overrun on work load. Even aside from the absurd display of behavior counter to what we teach, what quality are you giving your paying students who get you on the 6 day of straight back-to-back-to-back classes?<br />
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When I raised this to other trainers, they said that everyone has different motivations and tolerances. Fair enough. But are all motivations good and beneficial, yielding great results? How would we measure it? We don’t.<br />
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Here’s my standard - what would you do if you were a full-time employee and the money was the same whether you did 18 days of training or eight? Well, the standard I’ve seen is three to four classes a month. So, in this case, the load would be one third of what this trainer was doing.<br />
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Just a thought - what if we listed all how many classes the trainer had done the last two weeks? I remember, growing up, people would say to check the day of the week that a car was built, knowing that they were getting less quality with cars built on Fridays. In the same way as trainers, coaches, especially consultants, can be overworking when at a client five days a week, and traveling on top of that.<br />
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Is it wrong, as coaches, trainers and consultants to live contrary to recommended practices? Besides our own beloved Scrum and agile values, what about what’s taught in the larger community? For instance, Daniel Pink, in his book Drive, talks about the importance of purpose in the work that we do. But shouldn’t we aspire to even higher, noble goals? If these are noble goals, isn’t it wrong to not strive towards them?<br />
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Shouldn’t we, as servant leaders, put our community first?<br />
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Shouldn’t we think long term over short term?<br />
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If we value sustainable pace, do we work at a sustainable pace?<br />
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If we value quality, do we deliver the highest quality work?<br />
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If we teach the important of coaching do we coach? Do we at least make sure our students are connected with coaches, even if that doesn’t benefit us directly?<br />
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If we teach about transparency and openness, are we open about all of our class feedback scores, how often we cancel classes? Do we ask for and support the Scrum Alliance in this transparency?<br />
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If we value respect, do we recognize those in our community whom we respect? Can the world see who we point to as a model of what we respect? Do we do anything about those in our community who have not earned, but lost, our respect?<br />
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Even if not, we are smart enough to know that self-interest doesn’t give good, long-term results. And shouldn’t we, as management consultants, know and expect that?<br />
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In the end, we teach a version of truth. We wouldn’t teach wrong, bad or broken ideas. In fact, a large part of what we do is trying to go out there and dislodge the broken ideas that aren’t working. So, if being ethical and not self-serving is proven to work, shouldn’t we also embrace that? Aren’t those generally accepted recommended business practices, just like user stories or relative sizing?<br />
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We value humanity and the human condition.<br />
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We model overworking, travel, lack of quality.<br />
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And we have, although are losing, the place of influence and leadership.</div>
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Someone wrote last asking if I would co-train with them to help them get their CST. </div>
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This person has done nothing in the agile community. </div>
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Not gone to agile events to get connected in the agile community.</div>
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Not spoken at events to share knowledge.</div>
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Not helped organize events that would connect others.</div>
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Not helped review talks to ensure quality speakers for events.</div>
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Not pursued the higher-level of learning with a CSC. </div>
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Since those things are about serving others, and this person hasn’t done any of them, I’m left to assume that the CST is about serving themselves. Since self-interest is dangerous, what if we helped protect the potential trainer and their customers by taking away the profit-first motive. </div>
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Would they still want to be a trainer if they could only train one class of 20 a quarter?</div>
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My filter:</div>
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They’ve done most of the above. </div>
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They’re willing to take a limit on attendees, or mix of CSD/CSM/CSPO, or have a CSC. </div>
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They’re willing to have student reviews offered and publicized by the Scrum Alliance, just like any other service provider.</div>
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They co-train with others that do not directly benefit them. </div>
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They do one act of service. </div>
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A CST said “All’s fair in love and Scrum.”</div>
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Is it really?</div>
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Is it okay for people to do things that not only skirt the rules, finding loopholes?</div>
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Shouldn't it matter if one company wins out who uses their profit to pay for a local Scrum conference, give away books, or help other needy people in the world? I think we are avoiding a values debate that would show us not only what the right thing is, but that it’s better for image, marketing, impact, and financially. In the end, your vision/value/ROI to…the community & world is the only justification that you’re better.</div>
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If you think you're better, add transparency for all customer feedback. Add the history of class cancellations.</div>
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Obligated to work differently</div>
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- Visibility</div>
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- Local</div>
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- Better the community</div>
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- Work Manifesto</div>
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- Additional growth depends on verification of doing good</div>
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- AMP</div>
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- Avoidance of non-value add (marketing, sales)</div>
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Problems if focus is money first</div>
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- Most ROI (training) means</div>
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- no coaching</div>
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- travelling </div>
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- simpler classes to allow easier travelling </div>
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- spamming and other poor reflection. </div>
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- no refactoring the class (just like poor coders)</div>
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- working for marketing companies, even more removed & you not personally connected, to allow less additional work</div>
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- not offering other helpful classes because they’d aren’t as popular</div>
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We are obligated</div>
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- As leaders</div>
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- Servant Leaders</div>
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- Openness</div>
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- Transparency</div>
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- Equality & Respect</div>
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- As coaches and mentors</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-72306910710456283642014-11-24T06:49:00.000-08:002015-05-04T22:40:48.954-07:00Scrum - Three Strikes and You're Out!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
My rule for adopting Scrum at your organization is three strikes and you're out.<br />
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That is, if you say you're doing Scrum, but not following one of the core assumptions, you can get by, and you'll probably get very good results that help gain support to address and fix the comprimises.<br />
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If you're breaking two core rules of Scrum, that's definitely not good, but perhaps you can still get some value for the compromises that you are making. And with some value and time, maybe you'll get support to address these shortcomings.<br />
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<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
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But if you are breaking three, stop. Ask your leadership, your management if the company is really ready for Scrum. Why? Because you will get marginal results for a LOT if change and disruption. And if you are the one advocating Scrum, your neck is on the line, too.<br />
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Here are the most common strikes (could also be any other of the rules of Scrum):<br />
<br />
- Team not co-located<br />
- Team matrixed on multiple projects<br />
- Team too big<br />
<br />
It could also include<br />
- ScrumMaster not dedicated<br />
- PO not available, too busy<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I've mentioned this in my classes, and old students have been referencing it, so I thought I'd share it here. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Our best to you on finding and taking your next step - for you, your team and your company.</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-82428478663349300462014-08-16T10:11:00.002-07:002015-05-04T22:43:16.099-07:00Career Kaizen #7 - The Scrum Values<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This week we'll explore the Scrum values a bit.<br />
<h3>
Monday - Courage</h3>
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<span style="text-align: center;">I share a story in my classes about courage. Some years ago, I and my family were visiting Yellowstone National Park. There are bears in Yellowstone, and when we first saw them, I was a bit nervous. I checked to make sure the car doors were securely locked and all windows were up. We were safe. But, just a few weeks later, an old couple came across a bear while on a hike in Yellowstone. It was a mother bear, and in between the couple and the bear was the cub. From 100 yards away, the bear charged. Now, some say that courage is the absence of fear, but I think you <i>should</i> be fearful of a charging bear. It's the appropriate response. I heard another definition of courage from Erwin McManus that resonated much more deeply - "courage is the absence of <i>self</i> for the sake of <i>others</i>". In that moment when the bear was charging, the man turned to his wife and said "Run!", but he stayed put. The husband was killed by the bear, but the wife had enough time to hide behind a log and play dead. The bear still found her. Actually picked her up by her backpack, but then dropped her, and walked off. The husband, in my opinion, was the perfect example of courage - absence of self for the sake of others.</span><br />
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<br />
<a name='more'></a><br /><br />
We face lots of challenges in the workplace. It often takes this kind of courage to do what's best for the team. Instead of looking out for ourselves and our careers, the team members are looking for the type of individuals who are willing to deliver the hard messages, have the crucial conversations, with problem team members, expectant management, and demanding stakeholders.<br />
<h4>
Homework - Write down the top three items on your mind that make you feel scared, anxious, or give you pause. Why is that? For each of those, write down the worst thing that could happen.</h4>
<h3>
Tuesday - Openness</h3>
<br />
Scrum has a core value of openness. Pause and reflect on this fact - we actually <i>stop</i> work and take time to just think and talk as a team. Well, we can have a scheduled meeting that says were supposed to do that, but whether people are open and honest with each other is another thing. How can we help cultivate that ourselves?<br />
<br />
One great piece of advice I received a long time ago is to tell people what we're thinking. Sounds obvious, right? But I don't mean "what we're thinking" in the sense of giving a well thought out response. I mean literally what we are thinking. If you are talking with someone and they ask you something that sounds like a big commitment, you might pause and then say, "Well, I don't have a solid response now. I'm just thinking out loud here, and I'm feeling like that's big commitment for me because…" At times if there is expectation or time pressure, I might even only share my feelings and nothing else, but still trying to add to the conversation or the "pool of shared meaning" that everyone is around. For example, "I just feel a real hesitation about this, almost an anxiety or sense that 'yes, but what if…'" I'm being open, even though I don't have an actual response or statement on something.<br />
<br />
Also, cultivate openness by affirming what others share, whether you agree or not. Joe says, "I think you're idea is doomed to failure!" You reply, "Thank you for sharing. Can you tell me more about that?" In the end, we all benefit by being more open - getting more ideas, getting to the root cause of issues and problems, vetting options through everyone's opinions, more buy-in from teams. My experience has been that most people don't need to be <i>right</i>, they just need to be <i>heard</i>.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Take a look at <a href="http://www.highcapacityleader.com/home/listening-boot-camp/" target="_blank">Powerful Questions and active listening</a>. </h4>
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<h3>
Wednesday - Focus</h3>
<br />
Scrum has a high value on focus. The framework gives us a structure that helps us to always know: what's the most important thing for me to work on today, what's the immediate goals of our team, how are we doing on those goals, how do we know if we're done or not, is there anything getting in our way, what are the biggest issues and problems plaguing the team?<br />
<br />
Great stuff. And we can apply a lot of this in our own lives as well. For you, what are <i>your</i> immediate goals (not specific to the team's goals - just your own, or for your life)? How are you doing on these? Personally, I've had a lot of help moving the needle on these by using Scrum and kanban for my personal life.<br />
<br />
Where do you keep your personal goals? I've used Agile Zen and KanbanFlow to list anything that I "should" do, including big goals and small tasks. I (try to) pull only one of these in to work at a time. Okay, Openness, I have 11 in progress right now! But I'm working at it.<br />
<br />
I also use a pomodoro to do my work in time boxes, helping me stay focused.<br />
<h4>
Homework: If you don't already have a place to keep your goals and priorities, check out <a href="http://www.agilezen.com/" target="_blank">Agile Zen</a>, <a href="https://kanbanflow.com/" target="_blank">kanban flow</a> (or any number of the web and mobile apps out there).</h4>
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<h3>
Thursday - Respect</h3>
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Scrum has a value around respect because we value all team members equally. I don't value one person's opinion more because they are more senior, have been there longer, have a certain title. This shows itself in some teams by only leads and seniors being invited to meetings to "save time." While the numbers may show that we're saving money by having 3 people in a meeting instead of 7, we miss out on insights and ideas from others, and these don't depend on rank or position. Also, we sometimes inadvertently alienate others, so that even when we do invite them at other times, they don't feel as important or cared about, and therefore don't participate as much, if at all. It can become a downward spiral.<br />
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For me, respect is a way of looking for what someone does or is that is estimable. Even if they frustrate or irritate me in some way, many times there can be something that's good about that very trait. For example, if someone is abrasive and brash, the great thing about this is that she will always tell you what she's thinking (which is a welcome and refreshing change from the political phrasing and positioning that goes on in much of corporate America).<br />
<h4>
Homework: Think of someone that you know whom you don't respect, or perhaps like. Write down three positive qualities of that person. Extra credit: In regards to their bad qualities, in what ways do you do the same thing? :-)</h4>
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<h3>
Friday - Commitment</h3>
Commitment is scary because we don't know what's going to happen in the future. Yet commitment is a powerful, and often required, part of achieving great things.<br />
<br />
But if I'm going to invest my blood, sweat and tears in something with someone else, I want to know they're all in. No matter what the circumstances, what comes up. It's a bit like what they call a fair-weather friend or fan. Might as well make it explicit and say, "Well, if it doesn't go perfectly, if anything new comes up at all, or changes, there's a chance I'll bail."<br />
<br />
Think of marriage - it's a commitment. "For better or for worse," not "let's see how this goes." The challenging times that working through tough circumstances to keep a commitment fuel our resolve to fix things - it changes <i>us</i>.<br />
<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="220" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" src="https://www.frontrowagile.com/videos/298/embed?video_id=298" width="360"></iframe>
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Take one of your goals and make it public. Tell a friend, tell the team. Post it on Facebook. Even better, make a progress bar and post that as well, and a print out on your cube wall.</h4>
<br />
<b>Weekend Warrior</b><br />
Decide which of the five values you want to extend in your life and do something practical to grow in that area this weekend. Keep it in front of you. Mark the month on your calendar, such as "Commitment August" or "Focus December." Share this in your next retrospective. </div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Orange County, CA, USA33.7174708 -117.8311428000000132.8717023 -119.1220363 34.5632393 -116.54024930000001tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-34564847083806869752014-05-15T07:56:00.001-07:002015-05-05T21:40:43.350-07:00The One Thing I'd Add to the Agile Manifesto<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
In class yesterday, someone asked if the Agile Manifesto was still considered enough. This was an unusually advanced group of Scrum Product Owners, so we spent some time on it.<br />
<br />
My first answer was "No," and that I haven't seen anything needed to do excellent work that wasn't a part of it.<br />
<br />
But then, I made the mistake of continuing to think about it over lunch. Thinking...such a bad idea. :-)<br />
<br />
I recalled how I had written my <a href="http://scottdunn.blogspot.com/2010/03/my-work-manifesto.html" target="_blank">Work Manifesto</a> many years earlier. Why?<br />
<br />
I thought of how my Scrum Master classes often watches <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc" target="_blank">Daniel Pink's TED talk on what motivates employees</a>. Why? Partly to say that Scrum takes care of two of the three things Pink says are needed, but that not this one thing.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
<br />
And this one thing is <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesleadershipforum/2012/07/03/what-millennials-want-most-a-career-that-actually-matters/" target="_blank">what Millenials want most of all</a> in their work.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Purpose</b></i>. That it matters what they do. That this work is making a difference. To answer the question, "Why are we doing this, and why should anyone care?"<br />
<br />
As the ScrumMaster, Product Owner, or even a team member, help bring purpose to your work any means of creating a noble vision. This can be anything that pulls the team forward to something bigger, brighter, better. I've seen consistently with healthy teams that the common purpose and values pulls them together into working in a healthy, productive way that makes work fun and fulfilling.<br />
<br />
To paraphrase Leo Tolstoy -<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
“Happy teams resemble one another, but each unhappy team is unhappy in its own tragic way.”</h4>
Something that I've come across recently that have inspired me - <a href="http://blog.crisp.se/2010/05/08/henrikkniberg/1273272420000" target="_blank">Crisp's vision and strategy</a>. This is so refreshing in out scarcity-mindset, competitive world. Yes, Dorothy, even among agile training and coaching companies (and you know who you are ;-)<br />
<br />
On a related note, check out the <a href="http://www.brepettis.com/blog/2009/3/3/the-cult-of-done-manifesto.html" target="_blank">Cult of Done Manifesto</a> and the <a href="http://manifesto.softwarecraftsmanship.org/" target="_blank">Software Craftsmanship Manifesto</a>.<br />
<br />
And thank you, Mehul, for asking the question...</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-4263386706758904282014-05-02T12:58:00.000-07:002014-05-15T22:04:12.432-07:00Career Kaizen #6 - 5 Agile Sayings to Empower Your Team's Success<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This week we'll walk through some common sayings in agile and explore their meaning a bit.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Monday - The Wisdom of And</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZJWIov545sg/U1WXza4fHxI/AAAAAAAAACo/HRc2OWQ3EEI/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+55.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZJWIov545sg/U1WXza4fHxI/AAAAAAAAACo/HRc2OWQ3EEI/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+55.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Even if you are an expert, you'll benefit from hearing<br />
and getting input from others.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
When I worked at BigVisible, one of their coach's conference themes was "The Wisdom of And." This is drawn from Jim Collins work when he talks about the wisdom of "and" and the tyranny of the "or". The point is that there are often more choices available to just either/or choices, sometimes called "sucker's choices" or "false polarity," if neither option in its entirety or alone gives everyone what they're wanting. For example, "Well, we can either go over budget to build X, or we can lose all our best customers to the competition." That's a fool's choice. There's something in the middle.<br />
<br />
If a group is sitting around a table, the best option doesn't lie with one person. It more likely lies somewhere in the middle of the table. Even if you are an expert, you'll benefit from hearing and getting input from others.<br />
<br />
To get more input from a quiet group, ask questions such as "Anything else on this to consider?" "Are there other options?" "Any unanswered questions?" "What are we overlooking?" "What assumptions does this depend on?" "Is there another approach?" "How could this fail?" "Let's get at least two options on the board for this issue."<br />
<br />
And you can control difficult people by replying to their solution with, "I'm sure that's a great option, I just want to hear what others have to say." or "Yes, and I'd like to just gather additional information and input."<br />
<h4>
Homework: Practice replying to positions and opinions with "Yes, and…" instead of "Yes, but…"</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday - Art of the Possible</h3>
We often think things are impossible, but in actuality are possible and likely take a lot of hard work and a long time.<br />
<br />
For example, for many of you, running a marathon might seem impossible. It might be if it were this weekend, but if it were six months away, and you started getting up in the morning and lacing up the shoes...given enough time and effort, you could do it. And if you did, what a sesnse of accomplishment that would be. It's a big deal. That's why people put the sticker on the back of their cars with 26.2. They don't put stickers that say "I walked around the block today." That's no big deal.<br />
<br />
Most anything important, that's of value, takes some investment of time and effort. And that journey is actually part of what changes you, grows your character, and gives you a story worth telling, a story that others want to hear.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Watch the amazing transformation of a man who commits to running the Boston marathon:</h4>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Ja9BFx5Mhqo?rel=0" width="480"></iframe><br />
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<h3>
Wednesday - No one of us is as smart as all of us.</h3>
Scrum depends on team. If the team isn't all in, if they're not involved in estimating the work, collaborating with the Product Owner on what, why and options in the requirements, and if they're not committing to the work, then we are missing a lot of the magic. When it comes to ideas, options on approaches, the architecture and more, no one person has all the answers. No one person is as smart as everyone else put together. One person might have more knowledge in a particular area, but others can learn that, too. I've been amazed at how many times the new person on the team has had the best idea.<br />
<br />
The same is true for us. On our own personal journey, on our own goals or challenges, we'll always benefit from hearing ideas from others, getting feedback, hearing their stories. We're built for community. Help yourself by getting connected in the local or online agile communities or coaching circles.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Do a quick search for local meetings or meet-ups for agile, Scrum, project or product managers, lean start-up or business sector you're in, and do the same for groups on LinkedIn, Yahoo, Facebook and other social sites. See anything interesting?</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Thursday - Create your own Reality</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We need to empower our teams, our team members, and<br />
ourselves that we can create the reality we want</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
When I worked at Rally, this was one of their core values and sayings. And they lived it. If you felt that you needed something to do your job, if you wanted to grow into another role, they supported you in creating that reality.<br />
<br />
I see my wife doing something similar with our two younger kids. When they say, "I'm thirsty," she replies, "So what are you going to do about that?" When they say they can't get ready because they don't have their shoes, she answers with "You can solve that problem."<br />
<br />
We need to empower our teams, team members and ourselves that we can create the reality we want, we can solve our problems. I'm often met with the opposite in companies, a response of "Management won't let us do ____," but when I ask if they have actually asked for it, it's usually "No, but they know this is a problem." A particular training exercise I do highlights this. I do the ball point game, and the vast majority of the time, the participants don't move around to where the spacing works best for them. They just accept the circumstances or constraints without even asking me.<br />
<h4>
Homework - Think of the team, a team member, or yourself, and ask "What if..." and see what comes.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Video Fridays - What's the simplest thing that will work?</h3>
<br />
Breaking down life into what moves it forward today, not what's the best, comprehensive solution. A little like the debt snowball or weighted short job first.<br />
<br />
To look at the entirety of the mountain to be climbed may seem overwhelming, but there is truth both in the saying that the journey of a 1,000 miles begins with one step and that the joy is in the journey.<br />
<br />
About the big challenge or goal in front of you, what's one part of it that you can do today? Even better, what's something on it that you can do before noon? You might say that that one thing isn't the most important or highest priority. True, but also perhaps not true. It is a priority in the sense that you getting a "less important" task done actually gets the motivation and confidence going to tackle, and succeed, at the big thing.<br />
<br />
Often our risk aversion, all the unknowns, take us out of the game of tackling big and challenging goals. But the very fact that the goals are big and scary are what make them worth doing, noble even. And through that challenge of tackling what is too much for us, we are transformed from someone who could not, before, into someone who can, afterwards.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Watch the amazing transformation of a man with a broken neck learning to walk again.</h4>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/kvGltSZbHi0?rel=0" width="480"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Weekend Warrior</b><br />
Check out <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/081298160X" target="_blank">the story at the beginning of Habit</a>. Read up on <a href="http://www.jimcollins.com/search-results.html?cx=002799923458309121383%3Afo7-jpzdzfu&cof=FORID%3A11%3BNB%3A1&ie=UTF-8&q=Big+Hairy+Audacious+Goals&sa=Search" target="_blank">Jim Collins "Big Hairy Audacious Goals</a>" and <a href="http://www.daveramsey.com/article/get-out-of-debt-with-the-debt-snowball-plan/" target="_blank">Dave Ramsey's Debt Snowball</a>.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-69143358162154404962014-04-19T08:35:00.001-07:002015-06-09T16:35:33.823-07:00Career Kaizen #5 - 5 Days of Leadership<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3>
Monday - Level 5 Leadership</h3>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Leaders help team members <br />
solve their own problems.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Most agree leadership is important, but there are many definitions out there. Are you a leader? Do you have leadership in you? The ScrumMaster role is often described as a servant leader, so it's worth some focused time on it.<br />
<br />
One of the classic business books is Good to Great. In the book, Jim Collins talks about Level 5 Leadership, the highest of all and a level few CEO's attain. There are good metaphors that describe that type of leader.<br />
<br />
First, these leaders look out the window to assign credit, and look in the mirror to assign blame. Always try to deflect to the team when someone looks at the results and says "You've done a great job leading the team," especially if it's in a public situation, like a meeting. There are many ways to do this, for example, "It's not me. It's the team. Anyone could have done it if they had a team like this," or "Thank you, but really, the team is the one responsible. They have really put in a lot of time, effort and heart into this, " or even just point to some specific positive aspect of the team (perhaps from one of their retros), "The team really feels that _______ has been the key ingredient to the success we've had."<br />
<br />
Second, these leaders want to make clock-builders, not be time-tellers. Rather than always have the answer, or be quick to solve someone's problem, Level 5 Leaders help team members solve their own problems or find their own answers. This builds their own abilities, ownership of the solution, empowers self-organization and makes teams faster. Many times making a clock-builder can be started by responding to a question with "What do you think?" I've been surprised how many times they already have an idea, they're just looking for feedback, support, or political covering. You can answer with, "Well, try that out and let me know how it goes," and watch as the team begins to solve more and more of their own problems.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Ask yourself: Does it feel good to solve people's problems? To be needed? Or to be able to help? Is your value based in part on how critical you are for things to get done? Are you okay with them figuring out everything by themselves?</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday, Common Team Needs</h3>
Marcus Buckingham said that the difference between management and leadership is that management looks at what is unique among people, and capitalizes on it, while leadership looks at what is common among people and capitalizes on that.<br />
<br />
Knowing what the common concerns are, or addressing a common need, is important. Vision, a key leadership trait, is pointing to a common goal or destination that enables a group to rally around and towards that - a common goal or challenge as they struggle, fail, win and journey together.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Look at <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140327053227-64275548-the-top-10-things-employees-want-from-their-job" target="_blank">the common felt needs of employees compared to what management thinks they need</a>. What do you think the top three for your team members are? List them in the next retro and have the team dot vote them.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Wednesday - Positional or Influential Leadership</h3>
The challenge, and the blessing, of leadership in the ScrumMaster role is that you do not have authority over the team. You can't tell them or force them to do anything. Yet, traditional, authoritative leadership is actually the lowest form of leadership. People aren't as likely to truly be following you as a positional leader (for example, a manager). They are doing what you say, whether they like it or not, because they have to. In those situations, they're not giving the positional leader their best, but only the minimum required. Just enough to not get in trouble or fired or noticed.<br />
<br />
Having people listen to you, follow you, as a servant leader means you must learn and grow in the powerful area of influential leadership. Forming relationships, understanding their needs and concerns, fighting on their behalf, protecting them, taking hits for them.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Looking back over history, who do you admire? Any heroes or people that you respect the work they did, the impact they had, or the challenges that they overcame? If so, in what ways can you apply lessons from them for your life and work now? What would they tell you?</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Thursday - People Development Wins Championships</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9FSbg-BMtU0/U08bQnMsMzI/AAAAAAAAACM/RMOjBRaQElA/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+59.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="210" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9FSbg-BMtU0/U08bQnMsMzI/AAAAAAAAACM/RMOjBRaQElA/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+59.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You must develop team members to win championships</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
John Maxwell wrote a very popular book on leadership. A few quotes from him:<br />
"You can't lead people without liking them."<br />
"At one level, you focus on becoming a change agent - focusing on productivity."<br />
"Productivity wins games. People development wins championships."<br />
"Besides the obvious competence, effort and skill, leadership also depends on intentionality."<br />
"To succeed as a leader, you must help others move forward."<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Pick one of the quotes you like (or another quote from the web page), print it out large to post on your wall at work, and small to put on your bathroom mirror or car dashboard. Keep it in front of you for a week. Don't start your computer or end your day without looking at it (even better to say it to yourself) or start your car or brush your teeth without the same.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Video Fridays</h3>
Stanton Complex - face the brutal facts, but don't let go of hope. In 1965, Captain Stanton was shot down and in a POW camp in Vietnam. While others kept believing any day that they'd be released, the reality was they weren't. These people ended up giving up, or worse. Stanton was hopeful, but not unrealistically so, and faced the reality that, also, they may never be released.<br />
<br />
On your team, in your company, it may look grim. It doesn't help to believe things will magically change based on nothing other than your wishful thinking. And yet, we have to hope and believe that there is a chance, a chance worth fighting for, that they someday could.<br />
<br />
Always respond positively. Don't join others in their complaining. Focus on solutions - what can you change, what experiment, what can you ask for, that might help. If you're not sure, ask yourself, "Is this noble or excellent?"<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Watch the <a href="http://www.jimcollins.com/media_topics/hedgehog-concept.html#audio=85" target="_blank">video of Jim Collins</a> (or listen to his audio clips), or Patrick Lencioni.</h4>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/BZvnQj1Y_20?rel=0" width="480"></iframe> <br />
<b>Weekend Warrior: </b>Review all of <a href="http://www.jimcollins.com/media_topics/hedgehog-concept.html#audio=85" target="_blank">Jim Collins Hedgehog Concept items</a>. List out the <a href="http://hbr.org/2005/07/level-5-leadership-the-triumph-of-humility-and-fierce-resolve/ar/1" target="_blank">five levels of leadership</a>.<br />
<div>
<br />
<br /></div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-78969860341078688292014-04-12T08:00:00.000-07:002014-04-12T08:00:01.000-07:00Career Kaizen #4 - 5 Ways to Make Real Change Happen<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3>
Monday, It wasn't easy - I had to change a LOT</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WZZ27ntTVwM/Uz8yAJwql3I/AAAAAAAAABc/xpaQtaIviwY/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+51.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WZZ27ntTVwM/Uz8yAJwql3I/AAAAAAAAABc/xpaQtaIviwY/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+51.jpg" height="304" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The challenges you face are what make you better</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Difficult days are rewarding. The challenges you face are what make you better, more than what you were last week or last year.<br />
<br />
Imagine that you are observing some amazing team, better than any you've ever been around. You ask the ScrumMaster, "Wow - how did you help them get to this place?". He replies, "Nothing, they were like this when I showed up." What kind of inspiration is that?<br />
<br />
Yet, when you feel challenged, maybe even too much at times, these are exactly the points that push you into responding in new ways, trying things you haven't before, becoming someone, perhaps, that you weren't before. So when someone asks, "Wow - how did you help them get to this place?" you smile, laugh and say, "It wasn't easy - I had to change a LOT. This is where it started…" and they will be all ears.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Do your own speedboat exercise. Draw a boat on a sheet of paper (yes, really - drawing connects with a different part of your brain). Now, draw three or so anchors off the boat that are slowing you down. For each anchor, write three actions that might help with each area. Now, choose three, and either add them to your personal kanban board, or calendar them.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday, If Nothing Changes, Nothing Changes</h3>
Yes, you really can change. I've wanted to learn to play guitar for years. In fact, I have one. I've had it for 16 years. Up until several weeks ago, I hadn't played more than a song within any given season for at least 8 years. Maybe picked it up once in a month or two.<br />
<br />
But now I've played it every day for weeks. I've caught up to where I was a decade ago and passed it. I've learned new songs and notes. I have callouses on my fingertips again. Not only am I playing, but my family is often joining in singing as they walk in and out of the room. Wonderful repercussions.<br />
<br />
Why the change? It's something that I really wanted for a long time, so not a lack of desire. Well, it's habit. I added it to one of several daily check-off items on an app I use. Just wanting to flip it to green - done - has made me stop and do it. And now that I've gotten used to just finding a moment to do so, I'm finding more moments and connecting that decision with the reward of the feeling while I'm playing.<br />
<br />
It may or may not work for you. It actually took me a couple of weeks, and some tweaking (I had to set a goal of having at least one day where I did ALL items on the check list). But, do something, and inspect and adapt. Because, if nothing changes, nothing changes.<br />
<h4>
Homework: If you have a smart phone, check out some of the habit-building apps. Start with one positive habit you'd like to build. If you don't have a smart phone, try an online version, or try adding it to your calendar or daily to-do's via Outlook or even good old paper.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Wednesday, Help the Elephant</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DHVZHj7nbGg/Uz8yYcNwcvI/AAAAAAAAABk/E6KPrC2mTcA/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+52.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DHVZHj7nbGg/Uz8yYcNwcvI/AAAAAAAAABk/E6KPrC2mTcA/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+52.jpg" height="246" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What specifically needs to happen to turn the elephant? <br />
What is an intermediate achievable turn for the elephant?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The elephant and the rider. You may already be familiar with the story. Elephants can be guided by a rider down a path, but if the elephant really wants to go somewhere, it's going to go there. Same with us and our desires and goals. We may want to go somewhere, but we're often taken somewhere else by the elephant - our emotions. I may want to lose weight, but on a stressful day, I'm much more likely to eat chocolate (true). Or I can want to go running in the morning, and so set the alarm, but once it goes off at 5:30 AM, I don't feel like getting up very much. It could be the same for wanting to speak, get into training, go back to school or a certification program.<br />
<br />
Help turn one of your goals into a reality by helping the rider. Look for bright spots - times or situations that things did go well, or you did have some progress. What was happening in that? Script the critical moves - don't inundate yourself with too many choices. What, specifically, needs to happen? Point to the destination - is there an end goal that the habit lines up with or supports?<br />
<br />
And help the elephant, too. Shrink the change by lowering the bar so that you can get some success. One habit I had was popping my knuckles. Rather than trying to go all day, my first goal was just not to do it before 10 AM. Then it was 1 PM. Now it is all day. Studies were done that showed that people were 40% more likely to return to a car wash if they were given a 10 punch card with two punches already done, versus an 8 punch card with none.<br />
<h4>
Homework: How can you help the rider? What are the critical moves to successfully achieve the task? How can you help the elephant? What is a small starter goal to incrementally move toward success?<br />
Share your ideas in the comments below...</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Thursday, The Growth Mindset, or the Fixed Mindset</h3>
People generally fall into one of those two categories. The fixed mindset believes that we have a certain amount of abilities and that if we do or don't do well at things - subjects, jobs, life, it's because we don't have what others have. If we did, we'd do well, naturally. The growth mindset believes that we can learn, grow and change in these.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Answer the questions:<br />
1. People are born with a certain intelligence that stays fixed throughout life. True or False?<br />
2. Choose one: Do you demonstrate your ability or increase your ability?<br />
3. When you fail, what does it tell you?</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Video Friday:</h3>
Watch the TEDx video The Power of Belief<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/pN34FNbOKXc?rel=0" width="480"></iframe><br />
<br />
<b>Weekend Warrior</b>:<br />
Check out Linda Risings YouTube videos on the Agile Mindset<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/W47rcJowx7k" width="480"></iframe><br />
<br />
Watch Carol Dweck's Mindset video or check out the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Mindset-The-New-Psychology-Success/dp/0345472322/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1396650185&sr=8-1&keywords=carol+dweck+growth+mindset" target="_blank">book or audio book</a>.<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/QGvR_0mNpWM?rel=0" width="480"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-63486923213835381692014-04-07T08:00:00.000-07:002014-04-07T08:00:00.528-07:00Career Kaizen #3 - Your Culture<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3>
Monday - Your Cultural Context</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F-tBrGSXhZY/UzneQ7LqiUI/AAAAAAAAABI/_RHoPs9iFUM/s1600/bigstock-Businesswoman-Addressing-Multi-59300408.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="team meeting in circle" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F-tBrGSXhZY/UzneQ7LqiUI/AAAAAAAAABI/_RHoPs9iFUM/s1600/bigstock-Businesswoman-Addressing-Multi-59300408.jpg" height="213" title="" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Culture eats strategy for breakfast.<br />
What is your company culture?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
This week we'll be looking at your cultural context. A mentor once told me "People trump process, but politics trumps people", and for the business, "culture eats strategy for breakfast." So, what is your company culture? And what does that mean to you?<br />
<br />
The technology innovation adoption curve is a model adapted by Geoffrey Moore that plots the relative number of people who fall across a continuum of their response to new technology. There are innovators, early adopters, early and late majority, and laggards.<br />
<br />
This matters for you because agile is, in the same way, new. IT changes how many people in the organization work, aspects of their roles, what's expected of them, and even deeper and more importantly, it changes what's expected of people's mindsets and what the values are.<br />
<br />
An agile survey showed that the number one reported problem with agile adoptions was management resistance.<br />
<h4>
Homework: <a href="http://www.chasminstitute.com/METHODOLOGY/TechnologyAdoptionLifeCycle/tabid/89/Default.aspx" target="_blank">Read up on the curve</a>, plot where you are, where your team is and where you think your company is.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday - Lead with Vulnerability and Transparency</h3>
You are part of a team. Even more so with agile, we can't find our success outside of that. Like a relay race, you may claim a fast time for your segment, but if the baton is dropped, you still lose the race.<br />
<br />
Patrick Lencioni wrote about what makes teams healthy, and what holds them back. The common problems are absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, and inattention to results. Many teams asking for help are stuck at the first two levels, so let's focus on how you can help with those.<br />
<br />
To help with the absence of trust, first, lead with vulnerability and transparency. Tell them how you blew it (they usually already know anyways), when you were stressed or worried. Affirm them for what they do that you can't do so well. Be the first one to share, ask the difficult question or talk about the elephant in the room. Model transparency. Affirm them when they do it.<br />
<br />
Second, look for conflict, don't avoid it. We should cultivate environments where it's okay to disagree, and passion is okay. No personal attacks, of course, but freedom to speak your mind and have opinions.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Look at the documents on <a href="http://www.tablegroup.com/dysfunctions/?tab=books" target="_blank">Five Dysfunctions of a Team</a>.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Wednesday - Get your Team's Perspective</h3>
What does the team think? Schedule a meeting, or include it in the next retrospective, to have them say what they think they have, both on the curve, and with dysfunctions.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Schedule the meeting (unless it will be part of the next retro) and review the documents with the team.</h4>
<div>
<br /></div>
<h3>
Thursday - The Change Agent</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5FfgOs_CV3A/UzneT8v4OWI/AAAAAAAAABQ/a2gg8kpgYuQ/s1600/bigstock-One-plant-in-female-hands-on-w-18867338.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5FfgOs_CV3A/UzneT8v4OWI/AAAAAAAAABQ/a2gg8kpgYuQ/s1600/bigstock-One-plant-in-female-hands-on-w-18867338.jpg" height="222" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Healthy things grow. Growing things change.<br />
Lead by embracing change.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
How and why do people change? What motivates them? What motivates you?<br />
<br />
There's a saying - healthy things grow, and growing things change. But we can't make people change. Just look at corrective institutions, rehabilitation centers or many marriages.<br />
<br />
But we can lead by embracing, and living out, change. Although I may teach and coach about change, I'm surprised how often I'm actually resisting it. For each of us, this is true for many reasons, but the point is to be mindful that we all struggle with it, not just others. Is there a habit you haven't broken, a goal you haven't attained?<br />
<br />
Two reasons that change is hard are emotion and habit. <br />
<h4>
Homework: Look at the summaries for <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Switch-Change-Things-When-Hard/dp/0385528752" target="_blank">Switch</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/081298160X" target="_blank">Habit</a>. Note three points or items that stuck out to you.</h4>
<div>
<br /></div>
<h3>
Friday - You, Your Team, and Your Response to Change</h3>
By now I hope you have some feel for both the culture around you, your team and your own response to change.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Watch these Switch and Habit videos on YouTube. </h4>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/RpiDWeRN4UA?rel=0" width="480"></iframe> <iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/4H0fTwtPLfo?rel=0" width="480"></iframe> <br />
<br />
<b>Weekend Warrior: </b>Do a <a href="http://literacy.kent.edu/eureka/strategies/force_field_analysis.pdf" target="_blank">force field analysis</a> of what changes are supposedly wanted by the company and what is hindering them.<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-11715296583782469112014-03-29T10:10:00.002-07:002014-03-29T10:10:17.392-07:00Career Kaizen #2 - Your Story Matters - Storyline<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3>
Monday - Where do You Want to Go?</h3>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0TAC7WJkl-M/UzMLnW8ukxI/AAAAAAAAAAs/LfjbBrqAL94/s1600/bigstock-Byway-20754521.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="rural road through fields next to fence" border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0TAC7WJkl-M/UzMLnW8ukxI/AAAAAAAAAAs/LfjbBrqAL94/s1600/bigstock-Byway-20754521.jpg" height="210" title="Path to your Future" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: start;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Everyone is on a path. Paths take us somewhere. <br />
Is yours taking you somewhere that you want to go?</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Some say that if you don't know where you're going, it doesn't matter where you are. What are your goals? Where do you want to be, and what do you want to be doing in 6 months, a year, 5 years?<br />
<br />
The ScrumMaster role opens up many opportunities. I've seen people thrust in this leadership role suddenly realize that they have leadership in them. I've seen people fall in love with the coaching aspect, and others grab onto the educator and trainer pieces.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Ask three people if they have, or have had, any goals. What are or were they?</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday - Your Strengths, ScrumMaster Roles, and Goals</h3>
The ScrumMaster job has many roles: Servant Leader, Impediment Remover, Coach, Educator, Organizational Change Agent, Evangelist, Chief Mechanic, Shepherd and Guardian of the Process, Facilitator.<br />
<br />
Some of these might leap out at you, or perhaps are what you're already doing and especially love.<br />
<br />
Your strengths might shed some light on why that is. Perhaps you love coaching because you're someone who loves building deep relationships or like watching and helping people develop and grow. Or perhaps you love the mechanic role or trying out some experiment and seeing what happens because you love making things great (just being average bugs you). Or you might love being the impediment remover because it's always a clear checklist that means you've had a good day when all those things are checked-off.<br />
<br />
When you combine the insights and fuel of your natural strengths and passions coupled with goals that move you forward and motivate you, you'll have a powerful catalyst for change and growth. Not just for you, but a better you to serve and help the team.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: On a sheet of paper, list your strengths in a column on the left, and on a column on the right, list at least five roles of the ScrumMaster, preferably the ones that appeal to you. Draw a line from each of the strengths to a role to which it relates, is a part of, or might help. You might have a strength that relates to several roles, and a role that is related to more than one strength.<br />
Pick one of these roles, or the ScrumMaster job as a whole, and use it to help determine some goals. Extend one goal for 3 months, 6 months, 9 months and 18 months.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Wednesday - What's Your Story?</h3>
We, as humans, are story-driven. We love movies because they tell stories of someone who wants something and overcomes some conflict to get it. We learn best as our brains web new information much stronger via stories.<br />
<br />
You already have part of your story - you want something. You have a goal. Now, the reality is that life can be difficult. What challenge, opposition, conflict can you anticipate that might get in the way of you achieving that goal? Is it finding the time? Getting the money? Getting approval from someone? Keep in mind that overcoming these challenges is part of what makes it all worthwhile - you come out better for it, and it makes it a better story to tell others (perhaps even inspiring). Sometimes it takes practicing on overcoming smaller challenges as part of smaller goals.<br />
<br />
Leverage inciting incidents as a tool to move forward. These are decisions or actions that catapult you forward, partly because there's no way back. It's the signing up for the 5K race, the email to the boss asking for approval for training, submitting a proposal to speak at a conference, showing up at that local code camp or user group, emailing that famous expert to ask for advice. Not sure what happens next, but something will, and it will be different from all the nothing that happened the weeks and months before.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Create a Storyline account on <a href="http://mysubplot.com/" target="_blank">mySubPlot.com</a> and enter your goal and whatever other information you can. Take a look at some of the other goals in the community.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Thursday - Make Your Goal and Progress Big and Visible</h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zFV00zZFnhc/UzMLnbRgaZI/AAAAAAAAAA0/XtCt8VwW9F0/s1600/bigstock-Bull-s-eye-archery--36141307.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zFV00zZFnhc/UzMLnbRgaZI/AAAAAAAAAA0/XtCt8VwW9F0/s1600/bigstock-Bull-s-eye-archery--36141307.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: start;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Just like agile, make your goal a priority<br />
and the progress towards it big, prominent, and visible.</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Well, you now have a goal. Perhaps you've had some before, as well. Many people have. New Year's Resolutions are very common. Approximately half of Americans make them. But less than 10% succeed. Why is that, and what can you do about that?<br />
<br />
One of the best things that you can do to help yourself is to tell others about your goals, preferably people that you're close to and care about their opinions. Next, just like agile, make these priorities and the progress towards them big, prominent, and visible.<br />
<br />
Movement on some goals needs to become part of your daily routine, a habit, and therefore also have a low effort or barriers to see and update them. You might use post-its or index cards on a wall, a goal or habit tracker app on your phone or computer, scheduled reminders or appointments with yourself, or a chart that you print out and pin to the wall.<br />
<br />
<h4>
Homework: Choose at least one way that you add working on your goal as part of your daily or weekly routine. Choose a way to make the goal and progress big and visible. You could add yours as a comment on this post as one step.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Friday - You're One of the Few...</h3>
Congratulations - you're one of the few that has a goal that's known by others, has clear next steps, and has built-in support via schedule and visibility.<br />
<br />
This is very significant, not just for you and these goals, but in other ways, too. At the meta level, you're dealing with how to change, how to improve, clarity on goals, the value of making progress. These all relate to your team and the business. And, in addition, as a servant leader, you're being a model to others on how to improve, how to grow, dealing with challenges, ambiguity, inertia, and perhaps bad history.<br />
<br />
Well done.<br />
<br />
<b>Video Fridays: </b>Watch the <a href="http://storylineblog.com/do-storyline-now/" target="_blank">Storyline video by Don Miller</a><br />
<br />
<b>Weekend Warrior: </b>Take a look at some of the posts on the Storyline blog. If this has really resonated with you, take a look at the books and audiobooks on the topic, such as the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/081298160X" target="_blank">Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business</a> , <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Principle-Path-How-Where-Want/dp/0849946360/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1396112845&sr=1-4" target="_blank">Principle of the Path: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be</a>, and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Giver-Bruce-Wilkinson/dp/159052201X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1396112912&sr=1-1" target="_blank">The Dream Giver</a> (a little corny, but simple and powerful metaphor), and grab one.<br />
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-24545248050485073352014-03-22T08:00:00.000-07:002014-07-28T05:51:44.754-07:00Career Kaizen #1 - Who Are You?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3>
Monday - What should I do next?</h3>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZEVOG_0uQYU/U3WJ0-FZe9I/AAAAAAAAAC0/EsnUG7uk470/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+56.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZEVOG_0uQYU/U3WJ0-FZe9I/AAAAAAAAAC0/EsnUG7uk470/s1600/Scott+Dunn+-+56.jpg" height="199" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Scrum class was great!<br />
But what now?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Many of my students come out of the class excited, encouraged, inspired, and ready for action and to change the world. But besides the obvious basics of implementing Scrum, which we'll get to, what else should you do?<br />
<br />
Well, that depends on who you are, where you want to go, and your cultural context. So, let's start with who you are. If you're not already familiar with personality tests and have not taken one, here is some information on three popular ones, <a href="http://www.teamscience.com/" target="_blank">Team Science</a> (from an agile training and coaching company), <a href="http://www.teamtechnology.co.uk/tt/t-articl/mb-simpl.htm" target="_blank">Myers Briggs</a> and <a href="http://scottdunn.blogspot.com/2010/05/introduction-to-strengths-based-teams.html" target="_blank">StrengthsFinder</a>.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Review the different types of tests.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Tuesday - What did you think of the tests? </h3>
More importantly, what will you do think the results will show you? What are the most significant aspects of YOU?<br />
<br />
But be warned - The vast majority of people who have taken these types of tests forget the results. They never do anything with them. It doesn't change them or their work. But for every 10 of those, there's a Li.<br />
<br />
Li, a manager, had taken the test. She loved what it showed her and had her entire team take the test. When they all got together to look at the results, she told me that was the most that team had talked in four years.<br />
<h4>
Homework: Take one of the tests.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Wednesday - Who are you? </h3>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yNe8EIxcUCY/U3WMK67bjtI/AAAAAAAAADA/_AZ57PCzcoY/s1600/bigstock-Portrait-of-a-businessman-look-45239626.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yNe8EIxcUCY/U3WMK67bjtI/AAAAAAAAADA/_AZ57PCzcoY/s1600/bigstock-Portrait-of-a-businessman-look-45239626.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: 13px;">ID and work in your areas of strength for maximum results!</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
What do you love doing? Where will I see the best out of you? And where will I need to manage around or have team members cover you a bit?<br />
<br />
What thoughts or insights have you had about your own strengths?<br />
<br />
Most of our feedback comes in the once a year performance review, and the majority of that is spent on our "areas of opportunity" to improve. But if that's where we're weakest, there's perhaps not much that can be done to ever make that great. We get the most by leveraging where we seem to have endless interest and energy, and a history of performance and delivering results. It might be research and learning, or really getting to know people, rallying people, or fixing things.<br />
<br />
You want to grow, get better, do your best? Than starting with leveraging specifically how you're wired is precisely the best place.<br />
<br />
"You will grow the most where you already know most."<br />
<h4>
Homework: Post your results in the comments and look at some of the other comments, topics and conversations.</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Thursday - How did it feel to be vulnerable?</h3>
What did you find interesting on the site? How did it feel to be open and share this personal aspect of yourself?<br />
<br />
There is an aspect of leadership that is about vulnerability. Your people, your teams, can trust you and get behind you if they feel like they know you, that you're human. It's a little scary, I know, but you're better afterwards.<br />
<br />
To dispel, perhaps, some concerns, I don't see that people are good or not good at certain roles because of their strengths. But I do see that people don't look at their work through the lens of their strengths. Don't feel like you should be pigeon-holed, labeled, or judged based on your strengths. There are no 'bad' or lesser strengths. People may still try, but this is often just a lack of understanding on their part (and if so, a great opportunity for you to educate them).<br />
<h4>
Homework: Post the results on your cube in the most (or at least a very) prominent place. Courage!</h4>
<br />
<h3>
Friday - What are your strengths?</h3>
So, we're wrapping up the week. Of all of your personality aspects or strengths, which one in particular stood out the most to you?<br />
<br />
You've taken a step to know yourself, to share, and to be transparent with others. You've led. It's good stuff that we'll want to do with our team and others, but that will come later.<br />
<br />
<b>Video Fridays:</b> For now, watch the video The Business Case for Strengths<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/2n9eWIKBkyM?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
<b>Weekend Warrior:</b> Take a look at the <a href="http://scottdunn.blogspot.com/search/label/strengths" target="_blank">other posts that I’ve written under the Strengths tag</a>. If this has really resonated with you, take a look at the books and audiobooks on the topic and grab one. <!-- Begin MailChimp Signup Form --> <link href="//cdn-images.mailchimp.com/embedcode/classic-081711.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"></link> <style type="text/css">
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-56028484450376084612014-03-19T12:18:00.005-07:002014-03-19T12:18:58.939-07:00The Time We All Heard Crickets in the Boardroom<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
There was conflict between the CTO and some leaders in IT, and you could feel the impact on the mission critical project. The CEO called everyone involved, included the CTO, into the executive conference room and told us all how frustrated he was with what he was hearing about.<br />
<br />
Then he sternly asked, "So, does anyone want to say something now about the CTO?"<br />
<br />
Not surprisingly, no one offered up anything.<br />
<br />
"That's what I thought - crickets!"<br />
<br />
And the meeting was over.<br />
<br />
But was the problem solved? No. Were ideas or input even shared? Nope.<br />
<br />
Now, this might be an extreme case, but in general, asking your team "What do you think of the idea?" often nets you less than 100% honest engagement, feedback and healthy conflict. Especially if you work with people in IT, who are often introverts.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-iBOLioIkzsU/UynrriEmYCI/AAAAAAAABIw/J0RkbR7Ioso/s1600/Introvert+Hamster+Ball.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-iBOLioIkzsU/UynrriEmYCI/AAAAAAAABIw/J0RkbR7Ioso/s1600/Introvert+Hamster+Ball.png" height="188" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dr-Carmellas-Guide-Understanding-Introverted-ebook/dp/B00HYG4IM4/ref=sr_1_47?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395256429&sr=1-47&keywords=Introverts+Guide" target="_blank">Dr. Carmella's Guide to Understanding the Introverted ($2.99!)</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
Yet project management, managers and leaders often lean toward vocal, extroverted ways of collaborating. You might ask what people think, hear positive things from the other extroverts in the room, and then walk out the door thinking that everyone's on board. But they're NOT on board, they just have a harder time collaborating verbally, especially in public or high stakes situations. Yet these often detailed, thoughtful, less-emotion-based people might be <i>precisely</i> who you want to hear most before making a critical decision.<br />
<br />
My preferred way of collaborating on quick yes/no group decisions is with something called the "Fist of Five." Especially in agile, team-based work, you often have to make group decisions, such as:<br />
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Is this date realistic (confidence vote)?</li>
<li>Is this the most feasible approach?</li>
<li>Team, do you want to change how the team is working based on the retrospective feedback?</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
The most common practice is with the "Fist of Five. To take the vote or get the feedback, simply have everyone hold up fingers representing where they stand, as follows:<br />
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>5 - They love the idea. They'll even volunteer time, or to lead or champion it. Passionate. </li>
<li>4 - They like the idea. Positive.</li>
<li>3 - They're not that happy or thrilled, but they won't get in the way. Meh.</li>
<li>2 - They have some questions or concerns. If those are answered or addressed, they can get onboard. </li>
<li>1 - No way. Ever. When pigs fly. Not on my watch, etc. </li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
Fist of five is a great way to hear everyones voice and quickly see who's not in agreement and why (and then work to get them in agreement).<br />
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For more on the introversion topic, check out the two great books <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Power-Introverts-World-Talking/dp/0307352153/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395256617&sr=1-1&keywords=Introverts+quiet" target="_blank">Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Influence-Introverts-Making-Difference/dp/160994562X/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395256647&sr=1-4&keywords=Introverts+quiet" target="_blank">Quiet Influence: The Introvert's Guide to Making a Difference</a>.<br />
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-80011788122181631562014-03-04T01:00:00.002-08:002014-06-18T18:04:00.031-07:00Newcomer's Bad Ethics in the Agile Community<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
These are not the kind of blogs I like to write, but are ones I feel I <i>must</i> write.<br />
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There are times in the agile community when it's so good that I forget that there is an aggressive, amoral marketplace surrounding us.<br />
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ScrumStudy is a semi-truck-in-the-face reminder.<br />
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Not sure of the trademark issues, but the obvious one seems that ScrumStudy is offering the "Scrum Master Certified" class, while the Scrum Alliance offers the Certified ScrumMaster class. Sounds like people might get confused. I had one student who took their Phoenix class and didn't realize it wasn't the "real" (his words) Scrum class. This has happened to other trainers as well.<br />
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How would PMI, of whom SCRUMStudy's parent company is a Registered Education Provider, feel if PMStudy created a Professional Project Manager credential to compete with PMI's Project Management Professional designation?<br />
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The Scrum Alliance was founded in 12 years ago and has trained and certified over 250,000 Certified ScrumMasters.<br />
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ScrumStudy launched it's classes in December of 2012. Yet in that, apparently monumental, one year, it has become "the global certification body for Scrum and Agile certifications."<br />
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Really?<br />
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The Scrum Alliance features trainers such as respected and world-renowned authors and speakers Mike Cohn, Lyssa Adkins, Pete Behrens, Ron Jeffries, Clinton Keith, Henrik Kniberg, Mitch Lacey, Craig Larman, Tobias Mayer, Roman Pichler, Ken Rubin, Peter Saddington, Michelle Sliger, Chris Sims and over 100 others worldwide.<br />
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ScrumStudy trainers include...well, that's hard to tell since they don't list the trainers, only a company. And that company isn't even a link so that you can find out. Why is that? Why make it hard to find out about your ScrumStudy trainer? A little research might show why.<br />
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Update 6/18/14: I had Ruth's husband's name and info listed below because he had the matching last name, but I was told that he's not actually doing the training. My mistake, but there's no way to know who the trainer is since ScrumStudy doesn't list the trainers. This is the only specific item raised by representatives of ScrumStudy. There was an anonymous threat of a lawsuit, but I don't know whom that was from.<br />
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Here's the correct information on Moebes, LLC -<br />
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And the trainer (not shown) is fine, if you want to learn about...</div>
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Another is a trainer/HR "position description" writer, among many other things...</div>
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I personally think Scrum or Agile should be in the Top 25 skills for a Scrum trainer.<br />
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Maybe these don't attract students, despite the massive spend on AdWords. There have been lots of cancelled classes, and registrants are offered a discount if the person takes a course the same week 300 miles or more away. Ouch.</div>
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Well, perhaps ScrumStudy trainers aren't on the same level as Mike Cohn, but they do offer "the most definitive and comprehensive guide for Scrum available in the market." Their Guide to the Scrum Body of Knowledge (SBOK™ Guide) was just trademarked in September of 2013. Smart marketing, taking after the naming pattern of PMBOK, but certainly not a book filling any gap, given that there are already over 70 agile and Scrum books on Amazon. But <i>their</i> book isn't offered on Amazon. My guess is the complaints of paid positive comments. </div>
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This book received approximately 26 5-star reviews within 3 weeks of publication. That's about <b>20x</b> faster than the 5-star reviews for Elements of Scrum, one of the top 10 agile books on Amazon.</div>
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Finally, the event that pushed me to write this was seeing all the blog comments that I would report as spam (Lisbeth's link goes to ScrumStudy's site). </div>
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(Update 6/18/14 - I've since had another 14+ spam comments going back to ScrumStudy.)</div>
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Normally, I would have marked them as spam and done nothing else. But I realized that if I am to be the change I want to see, I shouldn't just get mad and say, "Why doesn't somebody do something about this?" I should do something about it. Others had - <a href="http://abrachan.wordpress.com/2013/11/04/agile-cheating-stories-see-how-the-founders-comment-about-scrum-got-blocked-on-amazon/" target="_blank">Agile Cheating Stories</a> and <a href="http://www.projectmanagement.com/blog/Agility-and-Project-Leadership/7084/" target="_blank">SBOK? Looks Like Anyone Can Create a PM Standard These Days</a>. </div>
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So, I wrote this. And reported them to PMI, because SCRUMStudy's parent company VMEdu is a Registered Education Provider with PMI, who has a very strong ethics policy. If SCRUMStudy, and it's parent company, were to lose the ability to grant PDU's for PMI credit, it would quite likely have a significant financial impact. </div>
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Secondly, I'm asking you to be the change that you want to see, as well - take action! Help keep the agile community free from questionable practices. Click the links below to let PMI know how you feel.</div>
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Leave a comment here for others to see. Share a comment on post on Twitter, Facebook and Google+ for PMI to see - <a href="http://twitter.com/home?status=@PMInstitute,%20I'm%20concerned%20with%20ethics%20of%20your%20REP%20VMEdu.%20http://goo.gl/HtBteJ%20#pmi" target="_blank">Click to view and edit your tweet.</a> post this on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http://bit.ly/1fDYJm8" target="_blank">Facebook</a> or engage with <a href="https://www.facebook.com/PMInstitute" target="_blank">PMI's Facebook page</a>.</div>
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Thanks,</div>
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Scott</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-48491258760812078612014-02-05T08:30:00.000-08:002014-02-05T08:30:00.658-08:00Upcoming Scaled Agile Certification Training<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I will be facilitating the first ever <a href="http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/upcoming-training-classes/" target="_blank">Scaled Agile Framework SAFe Agilist certification training for Los Angeles and Orange County</a> at the end of this month. <div>
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For those who aren't familiar, the Scaled Agile Framework is a set of practices and additional roles that sit on top of Scrum that allow scaling to the program and portfolio levels. </div>
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Personally, I have seen it address issues in aligning multiple (5+) teams, provide clear guidance and real support for architecture and UX needs, transform culture and deliver astonishing results. </div>
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On the practical side, my view is that we are in the Late Adopter stage of agile adoption, and that group is typically quite risk averse and prefers a plan. Compare this with typical agile coaching that I have done where the plan is almost 100% contextual (figure it out). Not that that's bad, only that it really needs several things to be successful - a culture that is comfortable with a lot of unknowns and loose plan, support from mid-management and departmental leads, and dedicated coaching.</div>
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"The SAFe Agilist certification program is for executives, managers and Agile change agents responsible for leading a Lean|Agile change initiative in a large software enterprise. It validates their knowledge in applying the Scaled Agile Framework, lean, and product development flow principles in an enterprise context so they can lead the adoption of the Scaled Agile Framework."</blockquote>
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Hope to see you there!</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-68625215980228499142013-12-17T06:56:00.001-08:002013-12-17T06:56:17.308-08:00Learn from Project (and Life) Mistakes Using the 5 Whys<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
You don't have to be using Scrum to have regular lessons-learned sessions on your project. I think these meetings, called Retrospectives in Scrum, are more helpful when you've gone through the entire Define-Build-Test-Acceptance cycle, but they were all too infrequent when at the end of my traditional projects.<br />
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When journaling this morning, I found myself doing the 5 Whys for root cause analysis on something that happened yesterday, and I thought it might make a good (although somewhat painful and embarrassing) example.<br />
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Problem: I went the wrong way on Interstate 10 yesterday and it changed my 1.5 hr drive (left early) to 3.5 hours. Why?<br />
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1. I didn't put the map directions on my phone to navigation mode. Why?<br />
A. I didn’t because the battery was too low. Why?<br />
1) It was low because I didn’t charge it at the client. Why?<br />
a. I didn’t charge it at the client because I didn’t have a charger in my backpack. Why?<br />
I. I didn’t have one in my backpack because we don’t have a spare at home.<br />
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Solution: Buy one and keep it in the backpack for client use only.<br />
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How would this look on your project? Here's another real example.</div>
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Problem: Requirements keep changing (sorry if none of you can relate...). Why?</div>
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1. The team makes assumptions that are later found to be wrong. Why?</div>
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A. The Product Owner doesn't put in enough detail. Why?</div>
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1) He doesn't have much time since he's on the road visiting clients. </div>
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Solution: Long term - Find another Product Owner who can dedicate more time. Short term - have a Business Analyst flag and clarify the product backlog item requirements that are thin. </div>
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Although great for projects, these are also great for life (and when's the last time you took time out to work on your life?) Here's some for you to try:</div>
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<li>I, or significant others, feel like my work-life balance is way out of balance.</li>
<li>I'm not motivated, much less inspired, with my current job and workplace.</li>
<li>My job/this project is too chaotic.</li>
<li>I don't feel like my team is close or acts like a real team (unity, group decisions, comfortable with each other, clear purpose). </li>
<li>I/we keep repeating the same mistakes.</li>
<li>I don't feel that I'm growing in my career and/or personally.</li>
<li>I don't feel I've done anything significant (worth mentioning in my Christmas letter) this last year, and next year looks like it will be no different.</li>
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If some of those resonate with you, try the 5 Whys on them, and look at resources such as the <a href="http://storylineblog.com/conferences/" target="_blank">Storyline conference</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-War-Art-Through-Creative/dp/1936891026" target="_blank">The War of Art</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Drive-Surprising-Truth-About-Motivates/dp/1594484805/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1387291671&sr=1-1&keywords=drive" target="_blank">Drive</a>, <a href="http://www.willowcreek.com/events/leadership/vidhub.asp" target="_blank">The Leadership Summit</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Love-Does-Discover-Secretly-Incredible/dp/1400203759/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1387291698&sr=1-1&keywords=love+does" target="_blank">Love Does</a>, or your personality and strengths with <a href="http://www.personalitypage.com/html/home.shtml" target="_blank">Myers-Briggs</a> (free), <a href="http://www.amazon.com/StrengthsFinder-2-0-Tom-Rath/dp/159562015X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1387291830&sr=8-1&keywords=the+strengths+finder" target="_blank">StrengthsFinder</a> or <a href="http://myai.org/" target="_blank">Action & Influence</a>. </div>
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If you're a ScrumMaster and wanting to grow, I'll be having a something out soon that provides small, actionable steps, day by day. Reach out to me and stay posted. </div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-44917427287818475782013-12-03T08:00:00.000-08:002013-12-03T08:00:02.242-08:00Great Product Owner Resources - Primer, One-Pagers & Posters<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Just yesterday someone asked if I could clarify the role of the Product Owner in Scrum. The engineering team was saying the the Product Owner has to be the Business Systems Analyst. Not necessarily. I replied and included my favorite Product Owner references. Enjoy - <div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iMs7zNp5BCg/Upz8gw9OeFI/AAAAAAAABC0/weZL04r4jmE/s1600/Product+Owner+Poster.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iMs7zNp5BCg/Upz8gw9OeFI/AAAAAAAABC0/weZL04r4jmE/s320/Product+Owner+Poster.png" width="228" /></a></div>
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My favorite primer is What Every Product Owner Should Know from ScrumSense - http://www.scrumsense.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Product-Owners-Manual.pdf</div>
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Great one-pagers from Agile Learning Labs - http://www.agilelearninglabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/what-is-a-scrum-po.pdf and http://www.agilelearninglabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/as-a-spo-you.pdf</div>
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And my favorite poster by William Gill, shared by a Product Owner at ServiceNow - <a href="http://williamgill.de/2012/10/01/the-product-owner-the-poster/">http://williamgill.de/2012/10/01/the-product-owner-the-poster/</a></div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-46505318308375474282013-11-20T08:38:00.001-08:002013-11-20T08:38:11.094-08:00Product Owners Caught in the MiddleIn my Certified Scrum Product Owner class yesterday, the top question on people's minds - agile adoption. The PO's want to know what's expected of them because often it's IT or top leadership dictating (but not always leading) the agile efforts, not the product group. And Irvine, Anaheim or all Orange County is not that different from most of the US. We're in the Late Majority segment of adoptees and its just harder. <div><br></div><div>Perhaps the Scrum Alliance needs a class on just adopting and scaling, like the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) or other proven patterns. In the meantime, I reply with "Its hard. It takes a long time. There's options. You'll needing coaching. And there are very, very few good coaches. Good luck to you."</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Ayres Hotel Anaheim 2550 East Katella Avenue, Anaheim33.805773 -117.879522tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-89465393987563020242013-11-01T17:36:00.002-07:002013-11-01T17:36:32.924-07:00The Unanswered Offshore Question, Pt 2<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
So, how do you know if your offshore team is as productive on onshore, and therefore saving money (as is typically the primary reason for offshoring)?<br />
<br />
Work from one backlog (combine backlogs if working from more than one). Without specifying which team would do which story, have both onshore and offshore teams participate in sizing, or estimating, from one larger pool of user stories. You may do it together, or start by doing a few together and the rest separately. In the end, sample enough of the stories that both teams agree on how many story points various stories are.<br />
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At or before the planning meeting(s), randomize the stories or alternate each team getting whatever story is the next one pulled. At the end of the planning meeting, you'll have an estimated amount of work for each team, which gives you an idea. At the end of the sprint, you'll know for sure. Even with various issues (no product owner, newer/smaller/etc team), you'll have a number. <br />
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If you can't have both teams estimate and pull work without upfront planning or designating due to resource, knowledge, or other silos or barriers, I think you have other problems that Scrum will fix (if you want it and let it).<br />
<br />
Thanks for all the great feedback from the first offshore post (and all the spam comments for offshoring ;-)</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-47776532837533217432013-09-20T16:04:00.001-07:002013-09-20T16:04:31.713-07:00Business Wolves in Agile Clothing<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Sorry if this upsets anyone, but I'm going to be transparent about something I've been wrestling with ever since I've gotten into agile coaching and training. These are just my thoughts as I'm processing them. I don't have a concise summary, and certainly not an answer, for it. But I'm hopeful it will resonate with like-minded people in the community, and perhaps, together, we can change the world of business.<br />
<br />
I understand that most of the world behaves in ways that are not transparent, open, respectful. They used processes and tools, such as $100 Billion in ads or commissioning sales forces (odd, because we don't give <i>programmers</i> commissions for doing more work) to do get more business. And most business grows their business for no other purpose than to make <i>more</i> money and grow <i>more</i>.<br />
<br />
Yet we know it shouldn't be this way. Seth Godin makes fun of the Revlon and Betty Crocker model. Daniel Pink warns of when the profit motive gets unmoored from purpose (which we all need).<br />
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And as agilists, I always felt it was going to be different because our work was values-based. We'd be freed from the profit-driven model, and we'd show the marketplace how it <i>could</i> be.<br />
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I mean, how do you teach about collaboration over contracts and then ask someone to sign a large contract? How could you work intimately with others while not having the openness or respect to let them know any of the business agreement details - the dollar value put on your service by the customer vs. the value from your business partner? What about teaching about the importance of sustainable pace, while putting three times the standard working hours? Where is courage to tell a client that there are others who could provide the same services you provide and letting the client choose what they think is the best for them?<br />
<br />
Below is a fictional conversation stitched together from many that I and others have had.<br />
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A customer needs help and asks ACME for coaching. ACME doesn't have a coach, they hire on a contract basis. ACME doesn't tell the customer this, but says "We should have one available in about two weeks." "Great!" says Customer.</div>
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ACME then calls up Joe Coach. "Hey Joe, this is Don. Are you available for a coaching contract? We have an excellent opportunity. You're the best one out there, and we'd love for you to be part of our team on this." </div>
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"Sure." </div>
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"Okay, let me send over some documents and set-up your email account real quick. "</div>
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"Email account? Why?"</div>
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"Because you're doing it under our brand."</div>
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"Okay, but why as ACME and not just me, a trusted partner brought in via your valuable network?"</div>
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"Because we found the client. It's our opportunity."</div>
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"Yes, but I'm known for [X], and that might be confusing when you guys are known more for [Y]. I'm happy with the rate you're offering, and that is monetary compensation for the lead, but I'm confused why you want them to think I'm ACME, when I'm not. I'm not right now, haven't been, and even when I'm there, I'll only be introduced by the ACME sales rep and handed off. You don't offer anything in the way of supporting me on the engagement, do you?"</div>
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"Ummm..well, no."</div>
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"So I'm not really ACME, am I? I'm a subcontractor. Since we both teach about transparency, shouldn't we model it ourselves and be transparent about the arrangement?"</div>
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"Well that's different. This is business."</div>
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"Aren't we helping businesses become agile? This might be an opportunity to help your business be more agile, too."</div>
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<br /></div>
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"Look, we landed the deal. It gets arranged according to how we want it set up. The name it's under matters because that's what we use for further lead generation."</div>
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"Uh-huh. To get more opportunities that you can't staff. I see. It's your deal, but aren't we partnering on it? You said I'd be part of your 'team', so doesn't that mean collaboration over contracts? </div>
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"Look, I want to grow the business. It's that simple. Same as everyone else."</div>
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"Why?"</div>
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"What do mean why?!"</div>
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"I mean what's the purpose in more business? We both know the importance in purpose in work, the big vision. What is it for ACME?"</div>
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"Our mission is to be the market leader."</div>
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"So that you can…what? Let's say you became the market leader tomorrow. How is the customer, the market, the world any better?"</div>
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"Look, it doesn't sound like this is going to work out, and we're not really getting anywhere with this interesting conversation."</div>
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"It seems to me that you need to wrestle with some tough questions. It's just my observation, but it appears that you might be teaching principles that you don't fully practice, or perhaps even fully believe yourself. The short term goal of immediate gain overshadows any core values. It seems like the same problem we're trying to help business <i>avoid</i>. We're all on a path that is taking us somewhere. Where will we be in one, two or five years? Is it success, or significance? I understand we're not on the same page now, but I hope we can keep this dialog going. I appreciate the offer, nonetheless."</div>
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Don gets back to say inform them there's a delay on getting the coach in there due to some reason other than the real reason. </div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-36201961368286000362013-09-18T07:00:00.000-07:002013-09-18T07:00:10.013-07:00The Unanswered Offshore Question<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Student: "But how does agile work with offshore team members?"<div>
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Me: "Well, let's start by asking another question - 'Why are you offshoring?'"</div>
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Student: "It was a management initiative."</div>
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Me: "Why?"</div>
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Student: "To save money. The hourly rate is lower."</div>
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Me: "But agile depends on high team interaction and collaboration. This change in how work is done might have changed the economics of the decision. How do you measure how productive those offshore teams are? That is, how do you confirm that you are indeed saving money?"</div>
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Student: "Ummmm…I don't know."</div>
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I've asked this question dozens of times. Always the same answer.</div>
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<div>
When I am coaching clients, and ask management about this, and most of the replies are essentially "It was the VP's decision, and it's not to be questioned or challenged." Considering that the VP lobbied for it as a good decision, it may not be something most would like to look into and find that they were actually wrong about that $6,000,000 decision (multi-year deal given the resources I've seen). </div>
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<br /></div>
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The only hard numbers we traditionally had to make a ROI decision on offshoring was the hourly rate, typically somewhere from $40 - $60 for developers, and I've seen as low as $20 for testers. Seems like we're saving money, given the typical $100 - $120 rates I've seen for US developers. But what if those developers don't get as much done due to the fact they can't talk to the subject matter experts and other team members in the U.S. (at least not much of the time, and not without delays, and rarely face to face)? If agile depends on that kind of collaboration, aren't we setting the offshore team member up for frustration and failure? </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Add to this the aging of the decision data. A senior manager in India recently told me, "Those CEO's in the U.S. made the decision to offshore based on very old data." Ten years ago, he told me, you could get a ridiculously brilliant 5 Star engineer in India for 1/10 the cost of the same in the U.S. Many companies rushed into India to take advantage of this - taking all the 5 Star/One Tenth engineers (Such a deal!!), then moving quickly to the 4 Star/Three Tenths engineers (Pretty good business decision). Then large outsourcing shops and system integrators rose up to take advantage of the great staffing and consulting business opportunity. By bundling long term, large team deals, they smoothed out the bumps that they were starting to run into with 3 Star engineers and a moderately lower rate. Now, my friend said, it is very hard to find good to great engineers, so the U.S. is being offered 2 Star (and sometimes even 1 Star!) engineers for a rate that might look like a deal on paper, but these engineers are often not as good as most U.S. company's own developers, AND we using agile. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
A year or two ago, I was coaching a team that was waiting to start their project after they go the resources from the offshore partner. But there weren't any. We waited several weeks before they got one potential to be interviewed. The interviewee didn't pass the technical interview. Not even close. Nor the second, third or fourth. Finally, nearly three months into the original project schedule, the team compromised for fear of either having the reschedule or cancel the project.</div>
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<br /></div>
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If don't get the benefit from the cost/benefit analysis, is this truly best for the company? If we extend the team to realize the value for a project, because it takes 50% - 100% longer due to communication exchanges, the value itself is diminished. And the hidden cost of the quality of resources is certainly higher than the information and stories based on 5 - 10 year old projects. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
And if a company is saying that going agile is a strategic decision, we have to look at the offshoring decision to see if that is best for the teams and therefore the success of agile.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
My next post will be on how to objectively, quantitatively and qualitatively evaluate the productivity and cost effectiveness of the offshore teams.</div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-25455752781929577922013-09-05T11:59:00.000-07:002013-09-05T11:59:03.479-07:00Most Popular Event Ever? Free September Lunch on the Scaled Agile Framework<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
There's a <a href="http://forms.rallydev.com/FY3Q14-SW-AgileRoadshow-081613-RegPage?utm_source=eloqua&utm_medium=email&utm_content=swagileroadshow_fy3q14firstinviteB&utm_campaign=swagileroadshow" target="_blank">September</a> lunchtime event in Los Angeles (El Segundo) put on by Rally that will give a good enough overview to understand the basics of scaling agile including Vision, Strategy, Roadmaps and using the Scaled Agile Framework, and how it incorporates agile portfolio and program management.<br />
<br />
I've been mentioning in my ScrumMaster and Product Owner classes that I really believe SAFe is the next wave, especially for large, Late Majority (risk averse) Scrum and agile adopters. My opinion was validated when a recent enterprise tool vendor said that their recent webinar on SAFe was<i> the most popular EVER!</i><br />
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I recommended taking a look if you either:<br />
<br />
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>Aren't familiar with the SAFe, </li>
<li>Have more than 50 people involved in one project or program, or </li>
<li>Don't have your program or portfolio management tooling directly connected to your agile team's data or </li>
<li>Aren't currently using rolling wave planning via strategic portfolio allocation.</li>
</ol>
<br />
I covered part of this at the Orange County PMI event in July on <a href="http://www.pmi-oc.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=411&Itemid=0" target="_blank">Agile Portfolio Management and the Scaled Agile Framework</a>.<br />
<br />
If you are interested in becoming certified as a SAFe Agilist, or using the 15 credits from the class towards becoming a Certified Scrum Professional, take a look at my <a href="http://www.scrumalliance.org/certifications/practitioners/csp-certification" target="_blank">Leading SAFe</a> class in November.<br />
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7993575.post-35543813035638674162013-08-27T07:30:00.000-07:002013-08-27T07:30:03.688-07:00Scaled Agile Framework - Is it Agile?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I was observing Mike Cohn's Certified ScrumMaster class today and noticed that when he listed everything under the agile umbrella (covered by the Agile Manifesto), he mentioned the <a href="http://scaledagileframework.com/" target="_blank">Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe)</a>, as well as XP, lean, kanban, Disciplined Agile Delivery, and others. I agree, but not everyone does.<br />
<br />
I'm including a great <a href="http://scaledagileframework.com/safe-sound-and-fud/" target="_blank">post on supporting points for the Scaled Agile Framework</a> from author, popular speaker and originator of SAFe Dean Leffingwell. The post also includes links to articles on InfoQ and NetObjectives.<br />
<br />
Personally, I appreciate what tooling can now do to support real-time decision making from portfolio through program management to teams. See <a href="http://www.rallydev.com/toolkits/scale-agile-safely-rally" target="_blank">Rally's support for SAFe</a> and a nice post <a href="http://www.rallydev.com/community/agile/scaled-agile-framework%C2%AE-41-things-you-need-know-about-safe" target="_blank">41 Things You Need to Know about the Scaled Agile Framework</a>.</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">http://rocketninesolutions.com/index.php/blog-archive/wp-rss2.php</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1