Want to really mess up your adoption of agile methods in your organization? Here are 10 mistakes I’ve come across with teams that will ensure an utter failure, Dilbert style. Not Reading the Principles of the Agile Manifesto – Everyone likes to quote (and misquote) the Agile Manifesto. But the manifesto is more than just…
Tag: Process
Scrum Taught Us That We’re Doing Waterfall
Last week I spoke at the Pasco County .NET User’s Group here in Florida on Debugging .NET Applications with WinDBG and SOS. Afterwards we all met at a local restaurant and were talking about agile topics – the good, the bad, and the downright ugly. The leader of the group, Greg Leonardo then said a…
If You Want Feedback, You Need to Tell Your Customers
If you ask most any organization, they will tell you how much they value their customers. How much they want their feedback. And they show this by having events, or conferences, or demos and show off the latest widget, or plan, or feature to their customers. And then they wait. Wait for what, you might…
Facilitating High-Emotion Retrospectives
One of the more interesting things about facilitation is that you have to be prepared for just about anything. Retrospectives and exploratory sessions can generate very strong emotional responses – from yelling, to crying, to utter silence. However, most retrospectives are about improvement – part of the kaizen philosophy. At the end of the day,…
Scrum Alliance Community Organizer Update
Just a quick note – for those of you who were familiar with my role as the Community Liaison with the Scrum Alliance. Effective today, my role has been transition out due to some reorganization happening. There will be announcements in the near future, but for now if you need something related to the Scrum…
Reward Systems and Organizational Change
Most of us don’t give much thought into what happens if our house catches fire. We call 911, the firefighters come in their shiny red (or green, or yellow) trucks, pull some hoses, spray some water, and then we call our insurance agent and begin rebuilding. But there is a lot of training and preparation…
Change your organization, or change your organization
Dawn Cannan has a great post up called Change your organization, or change your organization. This is a phrase I use quite often to people, and something I struggled with because of this very thing: There are many techniques for pushing through resistance, but how can you tell a fight that isn’t winnable? Or, at…