Blog: Agile & Business

Release Planning & the Early Warning System

September 4, 2010

Building complex innovative products is, of course, hard. In that context, what is the purpose of Release Planning in Scrum/Agile? I will not provide a complete explanation here, but will give a few key ideas. A consensus view of the ‘same’ elephant. I want all the team members to see the whole product and to […]

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Respect

August 19, 2010

I just led a course in Charleston mostly for people working in/on government or military projects. I was asked many good questions, and I was not able, in the time allotted (two days) to answer them all as well as the questions deserved. I have other clients who also have very difficult situations to deal […]

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King of Anything

August 8, 2010

Sara Bareilles, whose music I have enjoyed, has a new song: King of Anything. I think you will like it. You might be asking: Why is he talking about this song here? And the answer: In work, we must recognize the importance of freedom and self-organization. For their own sake (these are human rights, after […]

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Little’s Second Law

August 6, 2010

Little’s Law is a nice idea that tells us we want small batches of work. Smaller, always smaller. See here for a start. This is from a John Little at Case Western Reserve, and it’s fairly old. Unrelated: One day the following phrase came to me: “People are remarkably good at doing what they want […]

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Freedom and Responsibility

July 19, 2010

Now I want to start talking explicitly about freedom and responsibility — the twins. For most normal people, freedom and responsibility come together. That is, we are only free when we accept responsibility. This may seem like a paradox, like saying, “We are only free when we become a slave,” but it is not. If […]

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Thank You!

July 18, 2010

I am back from a visit to Lima, Peru. And from New York, Newark and Sarratoga Springs. Freud said that life is about arbeitung und lieben — work and love. To me, these words have started to intermingle. At a deep level, I think we wish that those we love know we have tried to […]

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Happy Independence Day!

July 4, 2010

First, a word about happiness. I am sure I don’t know everything about happiness, but I am still quite sure it is important. Mr. Jefferson included in his draft, “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Jeff Sutherland says, “If they aren’t having fun [with Scrum], they aren’t doing it right.” Serious fun, fun that […]

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An Intro to Business Value Engineering

July 2, 2010

On June 30, 2010, while I was in Montreal giving a CSM course, I joined the Scrum User Group and gave a new, somewhat different, presentation on BV engineering. The group seemed to like it, so I am making the point in a more practical, concrete way. Click here to see my presentation.

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Courage

June 18, 2010

I have suggested in other posts that a tremendous amount of improvement can be made in five areas: ScrumMaster leading the removal of impediments Product owner executing the 85 percent to 33 percent rule (like the 80 to 20 rule) Team having more fun! Team reducing technical debt all of the time Continuously better business […]

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Suggestions for a better Daily Scrum

May 24, 2010

It is my view that the main problem with doing Scrum is that we don’t “feel the music” while we do the dance. That is to say: we don’t understand the values and principles underlying the practices we are doing. In general, this is true of all of us. Saying, “I get Scrum better than […]

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