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

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

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🏆 The Tip of the Week: Decision-Making 2.0

Gary Klein and Shane Parrish (via Farnam Street): 🎙 Insights For Making Better Decisions #144

Shane Parrish interviews psychologist Gary Klein on how to improve decision-making, particularly as a team. They cover many issues, from the benefits of pre-mortems and anonymous voting to the perils of consensus.

➿ Agile & Scrum

Joe Justice: Tesla Agile Success

Arnaud Viguié and Joe Justice detail Tesla’s approach to agility.

Chris Corrigan: The Diamond of Participation

Chris Corrigan explains Sam Kaner et al.’s Diamond of Participation graphic to help you facilitate and improve your teams’ ways of decision making.

(via Digital.ai): 📈 16th State of Agile: Survey Closes on August 26th 2022

Hurry up; the survey for the 16th State of Agile report is still available for another few days.

🎓 🖥 🇬🇧 Advanced Professional Scrum Master Online Training w/ PSM II Certificate — September 6-9, 2022

Discover Scrum’s four success principles in this official Scrum.org Advanced Scrum Master training class including the industry-recognized PSM II certification. The PSM II training class is designed as a live virtual class and will be offered in English.

Enjoy the benefits of an immersive class of four sessions with like-minded agile peers in the morning hours from 09:00 – 13:00 o’clock CEST.

🎓 🖥 🇬🇧 Advanced Professional Scrum Master Online Training w/ PSM II Certificate — September 6-9, 2022 — Berlin Product People GmbH

Learn more: 🖥 💯 🇩🇪 Advanced Professional Scrum Master Online Training w/ PSM II Certificate — September 6-9, 2022.

“Very hands-on class with lots of concrete takeaways to help in real world scenarios. Reinforced practices and highlighted things that helped in passing the PSM II exam but that was merely a bonus as the content of the class is so useful – certifications or not. Stefan Wolpers is an excellent trainer with broad practical and theoretical knowledge on the subject and his classes seem to have very good working atmosphere (this was a second class by him that I have taken).”
(Link.)

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🎯 Product

Roman Pichler: Empathy in Product Management

Roman Pichler delves into empathy as the superpower of successful product people, enabling the understanding of seemingly tricky stakeholders.

Daniel Elizalde: The Problem with Product Market Fit (and What to Use Instead)

Daniel Elizalde suggests to stop “using ‘product market fit’ and instead focus on delivering value to your first ten customers.”

Rich Mironov: 📺 Customers are more forgiving about roadmaps than sales teams

In this podcast, Rich Mironov covers a broad spectrum of product roadmap-relates topics, from purpose to perspectives to product strategy.

📯 Jeff Gothelf: Outcome-Based Product Planning — Hands-on Agile 43

In this energizing 43rd Hands-on Agile session on outcome-based product planning, Jeff Gothelf clarified one thing: “Roadmapping is a flawed concept in the age of Agile. Maps, by their definition, are linear, and we don’t build linear products and services anymore. We build continuous systems.” Learn more about what he considers product roadmap flaws and what you can do about them.

Jeff Gothelf: Outcome-Based Product Planning — Hands-on Agile 43 — Age-of-Product.com

📺 Watch the video now: Jeff Gothelf: Outcome-Based Product Planning — Hands-on Agile 43.

🛠 Concepts, Tools & Measuring

John Cutler (via Amplitude): North Star Framework Template & Activity Library

John Cutler shares the template & activity library for the North Star Framework.

Marcus Castenfors (via Crisp): This might just be the highest leverage Product Discovery activity that your team can do

Marcus Castenfors 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?

🎶 Encore

Itamar Gilad: Should We Work Like FAANG?

Itamar Gilad analyses commonalities and differences in product teams of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google.

Marty Cagan (via Mind The Product): 📺 Learnings from London: Marty Cagan on making products customers love

In this classic from 2012, Marty Cagan shares lessons learned on building products that customers love.


📅 Scrum Training & Event Schedule

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Date Class and Language City Price
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 April 2-30, 2024 GUARANTEED: Product Backlog Management Cohort Class (English; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €499 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 April 9, 2024 GUARANTEED: Hands-on Agile #60: A Q&A on Dynamic Reteaming with Heidi Helfand (English) Live Virtual Meetup FREE
🖥 💯 🇩🇪 April 10-11, 2024 GUARANTEED: Professional Scrum Product Owner Training (PSPO I; German; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €1,299 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 April 23-24, 2024 GUARANTEED: Professional Scrum Master (Advanced) Training (PSM II; English; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €1,299 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 May 7, 2024 GUARANTEED: Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills Training (PSFS; English; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €749 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 May 7, 2024 GUARANTEED: Hands-on Agile #61: Toyota Kata Coaching for Agile Teams & Transformations with Fortune Buchholtz (English) Live Virtual Meetup FREE
🖥 🇩🇪 May 14-15, 2024 Professional Scrum Product Owner Training (PSPO I; German; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €1,299 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 🇬🇧 May 28-29, 2024 Professional Scrum Master (Advanced) Training (PSM II; English; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €1,189 incl. 19% VAT
🖥 💯 🇬🇧 June 6, 2024 GUARANTEED: Hands-on Agile #62: From Backlog Manager to Product Manager: From Outputs to Outcomes w/ David Pereira (English) Live Virtual Meetup FREE
🖥 🇩🇪 June 25-26, 2024 Professional Scrum Product Owner Training (PSPO I; German; Live Virtual Class) Live Virtual Class €1,299 incl. 19% VAT

See all upcoming classes here.

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🗞️ Last Week’s Food for Agile Thought Edition

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

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