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Food for Agile Thought #359: UX & Engineering, Product for Truly Agile Teams, 4 Major Issues w/ Lean Startup, Discovery’s Toughest Questions

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-09-09 News

TL; DR: UX & Engineering, AI in Product — Food for Agile Thought #359

Welcome to the 359th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,852 peers. This week, we delve into UX & engineering, detailing how product discovery benefits from including engineers early in the process, from timely feasibility discussions to designing minimum viable experiments (MVE). Also, we reflect on the many aspects of velocity, “if you are planning for a stable team with high morale that can consistently deliver,” and explore a vital character trait of any trainer, coach, entrepreneur, or artist — tenacity — with Jerry Colonna and Jules Pieri.

Then, Allan Holub explores the importance of product management for agile teams, from C-level buy-in to empowering people w/o leaving them to JIRA’s perils, while dissing Scrum. Moreover, Ryan J. Salva shares the success story of Copilot, GitHub’s OpenAI’s ML engine, while Martin Spinnangr asks: Continue, pivot, kill, or charge ahead?

Finally, Sachin Rekhi points to four Lean Startup issues, from agnostic experimentation to over-focusing on MVPs to incrementalism, and we dig into the benefits of journaling for decision-making. Also, we explore the effects of limiting beliefs on change, from anchoring to selection bias. PS: Can I interest you in Dr. Laurence J. Peter explaining some of the observations leading to his theory?

Food for Agile Thought #359: UX & Engineering, Product for Truly Agile Teams, 4 Major Issues w/ Lean Startup, Discovery’s Toughest Questions — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #358: Scaling Innovation, #NoBacklogs, Studies on Cross-Functional Teams, Product Health Check

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-09-02 News

TL; DR: Agility: Scaling Innovation, #NoBacklogs — Food for Agile Thought #358

Welcome to the 358th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,833 peers. This week, Steven Sinofsky analyzes the challenges of scaling innovation, delving into concepts, tools, culture, and change. Also, Allan “Nuke the backlog” Kelly delves into the current discussion regarding the Product Backlog’s usefulness. Furthermore, we analyze research papers on cross-functionality from Google Scholar and point to the moment when deteriorating software quality insects with a higher demand for new features.

Then, Wes Kao and Lenny Rachitsky cover how to engage your audience and improve your communication for product success. Moreover, we dissect aspects of product leadership, from strategic thinkers to the get-it-done thinkers, and we explain the negative consequences of employing SAFe® for product management, for example, its obsession with process.

Finally, we share Brad Dunn’s new approach to product management: replace the product manager role with a value manager and a discovery engineer. Additionally, we provide a concept of gathering health indicators to support better product decisions, plus a canvas to help you “avoid creating the right solution to the wrong problem.”

Food for Agile Thought #358: Scaling Innovation, #NoBacklogs, Studies on Cross-Functional Teams, Product Health Check — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #357: Agility—a Timeless Way of Thinking, Team Dynamics, Difficult Product People, A New Dependency Game

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-08-26 News

TL; DR: Agility: Timeless, Team Dynamics — Food for Agile Thought #357

Welcome to the 357th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,789 peers. This week, we celebrate the Agile 2022 keynote of Joshua Kerievsky, where he reflects on why “Agility isn’t a formula, a framework, nor a set of roles and rituals to follow” but a timeless way of thinking. Also, Linda Rising, Diana Larsen, and James Shore delve into the dynamics that make and break Agile teams, from the importance of trust to the Tuckman model. Moreover, we suggest six ways of encouraging feedback from team members, from creating psychological safety to leading by example, and we close with a rant about mission statements.

Then, we listen to Mary Cagan, sharing his learnings after more than 20 years at the forefront of product management, from Steve Jobs to building product teams to which trends to ignore. Additionally, we analyze the four most significant threats to building great products and how to deal with them, from difficult developers to executive bullies, and we tackle product roadmaps from a pragmatic angle.

Finally, we share a new game to “find a golden path to delivering maximum business value by benefiting from collaboration vs. getting stuck in dependencies” and a “primer on what you need to know to leverage VSM to chart your lean journey.” Lastly, inspired by Kurt Vonnegut’s lecture on “the simple shapes of stories,” Ash Maurya shows that JTBD’s customer stories also have archetypical shapes.

Food for Agile Thought #357: Agility—a Timeless Way of Thinking, Team Dynamics, Difficult Product People, A New Dependency Game — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #356: Decision-Making 2.0, Empathy in Product, Tesla’s Agile Success, North Star Framework Template

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-08-19 News

TL; DR: Decision-Making 2.0, Diamond of Participation — Food for Agile Thought #356

Welcome to the 356th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,752 peers. This week, we will learn from psychologist Gary Klein how to improve decision-making, particularly as a team, from the benefits of pre-mortems and anonymous voting to the perils of consensus. Also, we detail Tesla’s approach to agility; we explain Sam Kaner et al.’s Diamond of Participation graphic for facilitators, and we encourage you to participate in the survey for the 16th State of Agile report.

Then, we delve into empathy as the superpower of successful product people, enabling the understanding of seemingly tricky stakeholders. Moreover, we suggest to stop “using ‘product market fit’ and instead focus on delivering value to your first ten customers,” and we applaud John Cutler for sharing the template & activity library for the North Star Framework. Following up on the interview with Gary Klein, we also suggest starting your product discovery journey with a pre-mortem: Imagine it is six months later and your product went south; what caused its failure?

Finally, we analyze commonalities and differences in product teams of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google, only to return to a classic session from 2012: Marty Cagan shares lessons learned on building products that customers love.

Food for Agile Thought #356: Decision-Making 2.0, Empathy in Product, Tesla’s Agile Success, North Star Framework Template — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #355: Novelty Uncertainty, Data & Storytelling for Strategic Alignment, The Adoption of Innovation, How to Wardley Map

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-08-12 News

TL; DR: Novelty Uncertainty — Food for Agile Thought #355

Welcome to the 355th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,721 peers. This week, we delve into dealing with novelty uncertainty by acquiring knowledge as we move forward in a process at the heart of all agile practices. Moreover, we analyze the mechanics of how innovation moves from the fringes to the core of an organization, and we explain Richard Feynman’s seven “tricks for evaluating information.” Also, we lay out the challenges and opportunities of distributed teams, from ‘management by talk around’ to tools and practices.

Then, we explore ways of “how to go from charts and numbers to a story that will move your stakeholders” and share the principles of how engineering and product collaborate at Intercom for the benefit of customers, for example, by involving the engineers from the start. Additionally, we explore the general relationship between engineering and product management and share lessons learned, for instance, earn respect first as a product manager before you become technical.

Finally, we thank IT Revolution Press for attempting to explain the practice of creating Wardley Maps. Noorisingh Saini leads us through calculating, interpreting, and improving the lifetime value of your SaaS customers, while Natalie Rothfels, Ely Lerner, and Behzod Sirjani bust customer churn myths, from its supposed unavoidability to wrong assumptions. Lastly, Greg Satell points to a typical disadvantage of large organizations regarding innovation: “it’s often just easier to fall in line than to engage in vigorous debate.”

Food for Agile Thought #355: Novelty Uncertainty, Data & Storytelling for Strategic Alignment, The Adoption of Innovation, How to Wardley Map — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #354: Agile Forecasting, Winning Product Strategies, Measuring Trust, What Product Market Fit Feels Like

by Stefan Wolpers | 2022-08-05 News

TL; DR: Agile Forecasting, Winning Product Strategies — Food for Agile Thought #354

Welcome to the 354th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 35,689 peers. This week, we analyze agile forecasting challenges in epic breadth, from avoiding story points to rolling wave forecasts. Also, we illustrate and quantify the impact of unfinished work to help you convince your team to ‘stop starting and start finishing,’ and we delve into decision-making practices as a group, from reversible to expensive or irreversible decisions.

Then, we listen to Lenny Rachitsky interviewing Melissa Perri on what to do when your strategy is not working: what are the signs, and how can you change direction? Moreover, we point out that ‘most strategies are a collection of assumptions,’ from certainty levels to competitor behavior. Also, we enjoy ten video clips expressing precisely that product/market-fit feeling Marc Andreessen described years ago.

Finally, we share strategies to identify and work through design and engineering conflicts and a more innovative framework to apply the ‘rocks, pebbles, and sand’ lesson. Lastly, McKinsey claims to have identified ‘four types of behavior that account for 89 percent of leadership effectiveness.’ This brings us to Deloitte Insights, exploring whether you can measure a ‘hidden—yet increasingly critical—key performance indicator:’ trust.