TL; DR: Traumatic Agile, Absurd Design Sprints—Food for Agile Thought #229
Welcome to the 229th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 25,103 peers. This week, we ask whether ‘Agile’ is a reactionary movement; we delve into suitable metrics for experiments, and we learn from a bank how to become agile with 20-plus teams.
We also learn how Pinterest keeps ideas for experiments coming. Speaking of which, we gain insight into suitable experiments at Slack, and we reconsider the usefulness of Design Sprints.
Lastly, we finally have a reference to answer the obvious question: Does Google use Scrum?
TL; DR: Asking Good Questions, Trade-offs & Debts—Food for Agile Thought #228
Welcome to the 228th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 25,103 peers. This week, we delve into asking good questions, thus overcoming assumptions; we learn more about the cognitive science behind ‘Agile,’ and we cautiously check SAFe again.
We gain insight into how to handle product failures catastrophes; we reflect whether trade-offs are worth the costs. Also, we come back to defining what a product is, focusing on its two critical elements.
Lastly, we appreciate an excursion into psychological safety—from its origins to pioneering its application.
TL; DR: Agile Core Beliefs, Psychology of Feature Adoption—Food for Agile Thought #227
Welcome to the 227th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 25,021 peers. This week, we address agile core beliefs; we embrace the idea of a one-day Sprint, and we come back to agile coaching competencies.
We also learn how to move on as a product team, struggling with becoming data-informed; we explore cognitive biases in the adoption progress of new features, and we figure out how to speed up A/b tests without sacrificing accuracy.
Lastly, we appreciate the notion that we are not all designers—despite stickies, sharpie, and prototyping apps.
TL; DR: Agile Coaching, Swarming—Food for Agile Thought #226
Welcome to the 226th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 24,842 peers. This week, we address the state of agile coaching; we learn more about swarming for teams, and we go back in time to the origins of Scrum.
We also come back to the pitfalls of achieving product/market-fit; we declare backlog bankruptcy, and we check a mental model to assess whether a group of product managers is capable of handling their job.
Lastly, we embrace some unique cognitive human traits that will distinguish us from machines for all eternity. Hopefully.
TL; DR: Probabilistic Forecasting, HiPPO Training—Food for Agile Thought #225
Food for Agile Thought’s issue #225—shared with 24,837 peers—addresses the importance of pair programming; we seek to excel at predicting the future with probabilistic forecasting, and we appreciate an outsight view on Scrum by following sticky notes.
We also point at a crucial stakeholder management competence of Product Owners and Scrum Masters; we enjoy new games and exercises for ideation purposes, and we consider making our product worse for the sake of improving it.
Lastly, we embrace the coining of decaf resistance—it is good to know that a habitual behavior in so many organizations now has a name.
TL; DR: Descaling Manifesto, Cultivating Ownership, Release Planning, 5th Product Manager Report—Food for Agile Thought #224
Food for Agile Thought’s issue #224—shared with 24,821 peers—introduces the Descaling Manifesto; we address why great teams have the habit of ‘rule-breaking,’ and we analyze why great Scrum Masters are CEO-material.
We also revisit product releases; we download the 5th Product Manager Report, and we get back to output, outcome, input, effort, and how they are all related to each other.
Lastly, we enjoy a look behind the scenes at Netflix and talk about five levels of ownership.
