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Agile Reading for Executives

A recent email I sent, slightly edited. ____________________________________ Dear Mike and Mark, You asked for something to give the executives and managers. I might send them “The New New Product Development Game” article (see below), with a short explanation. And then, offer these other things to review. Other options: “Software in 30 Days” by Ken […]

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Retrospectives and the role of the SM

A very bright and quick class attendee asked: Why don’t you talk in the class more about Retrospectives? And why so much about the PO? Why do you focus on the basics so much?  I want more advanced materials. *** First, I actually think we do these things, as explained below. We do talk about […]

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Refactoring the Release Plan

At the end of the last post, I had completed the initial release plan. What were the key outcomes? [This is one in a series of posts about release planning. Search (see right) on Release Planning to find many others.] We had a product backlog.  The plan had some sort of scope, date and budget.  […]

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Why our CSM (Scrum) course + Workshop is unique.

We believe our CSM (Scrum) course plus Workshop is unique.  And better.  For the following reasons. 1. We focus on results. We want you, your team and your customers to get real results in a big way.  In 3 words, more satisfaction, more money, more fun. 2. Therefore the teaching style is not toward remembering […]

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John Kotter Explains the 8 Steps to Create Successful Change

Here is a slide show and voice over by John Kotter (our best expert on change) talking about how to get organizations to change.  Watch and listen here.  [This was a link, and it is broken now.]  About 7 minutes. [We can send you now to the 8 steps page at Kotter International.] Here is […]

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Taking Ideas on a Test Drive

I am a strong proponent of “show me the money.” In other words, there are lots and lots of ideas that sound good. And only a relative few that are really worthwhile. And we only know which are which by …taking an idea for a test drive. But even this basic scientific idea is not […]

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A list summarizing Scrum

The list below is not self-explanatory, but it covers the key ideas one has to know and execute on to do Scrum professionally.  Of course, becoming proficient at doing them at the highest level (at the rugby World Cup level) is a lifetime’s work.  Rugby is a simple game with simple rules, but to reach […]

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Agile’s broad adoption and mediocrity – what to do

Ken Judy has an excellent, although blunt, blog post here: http://judykat.com/ken-judy/agilescrumlean-broad-adoption-mediocrity-faul/ His main point maybe is that we do not have enough truly professional scrum (or agile) implementations. And why? Because we have implemented too broadly too fast.  Is probably the main reason, in his opinion. Some good insights.  Read them. *** Here are my […]

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Release Planning: Business Value

[For those who have not been reading before, this is a continuation of a series that starts here.] Now we move on to Business Value in Release Planning. As Yogi Berra said: “You have to be very careful if you don’t know where you’re going, because you might not get there.” If you are in […]

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Release Planning: Product Backlog

[This post is one in a series on Release Planning, which starts here.] After we complete the Vision, we must develop the Product Backlog. There are two parts to this. First, we must define the Roles to use in the User Stories. Second, we must write User Stories.  I call this second part a User […]

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