TL; DR: State of Agile 2022, ChatGPT on Agile and Scrum — Food for Agile Thought #372
Welcome to the 372nd edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 36,387 peers. This week, we share the State of Agile 2022 Report and probe ChatGPT on Agile and Scrum. Moreover, we dissect a common corporate anti-pattern while transforming into an agile organization: They continue incentivizing individuals. Also, we discuss the concept of technical debt—a ‘metaphor for communicating the long-term implications of architectural decisions and trade-offs to stakeholders’—and its limitations.
Then, we offer advice on how to lead stakeholders and developers, guide individuals, and create value together without having the authority to tell them what to do. Next, Lenny Rachitsky interviews Madhavan Ramanujam, author of ‘Monetizing Innovation,’ about all the elements that go into your pricing strategy. Of course, getting pricing right requires experiments. Fortunately, we also share a hypothesis for supporting an organizational culture of experimentation by applying a pattern language to cover that part.
Finally, First Round Capital compiled six ‘unique approaches to end-of-year planning,’ covering fresh tactics, different perspectives, and tested frameworks. Moreover, the Concepts & Tools section would not be complete this week without this comprehensive guide to decision-making, from the benefits of including others to games, exercises, tools, and how to avoid premature convergence. Lastly, Andy Cleff analyzes the context and options of saying ‘no’ gracefully, and Ben Thompson also explores ChatGPT by asking, ‘Did Thomas Hobbes believe in the separation of powers?’
Did you miss the previous Food for Agile Thought’s issue 371?
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🏆 The Tip of the Week: State of Agile 2022
(via Digital.ai): 📖 📈 The 16th Annual State of Agile Report is here!
In 2022, the 16th Annual State of Agile Report is based on the experiences of over 3,000 IT and business professionals worldwide. The report is free.
➿ Agile & Scrum
: Agile Bonuses – The Damage They Do
Mark Levison dissects a common corporate anti-pattern while transforming into an agile organization: They continue incentivizing individuals.
(via InfoQ): What Does Technical Debt Tell You?
Kurt Bittner, Pierre Pureur, and Thomas Betts discuss the concept of technical debt—a ‘metaphor for communicating the long-term implications of architectural decisions and trade-offs to stakeholders’—and its limitations.
(via Medium): Our Way of Working and our Agile Board
Anders Jönsson details the way his team came up with to handle their work, including a sophisticated Trello design.
🎓 🖥 🇺🇸 Professional Scrum Product Owner Training w/ PSPO I Certificate — January 23-26, 2023
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Enjoy the benefits of a live immersive class with like-minded agile peers in the morning hours from 9 am – 1 pm EST.
Learn more: 🖥 🇺🇸 Professional Scrum Product Owner Training w/ PSPO I Certificate — January 23-26, 2023.
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🎯 Product
(via Medium): Leading without Being the Boss: Tips for Product People
Roman Pichler offers advice on how to lead stakeholders and developers, guide individuals, and create value together without having the authority to tell them what to do.
and : 🎙 The art and science of pricing
Lenny Rachitsky interviews Madhavan Ramanujam, author of ‘Monetizing Innovation,’ about all the elements that go into your pricing strategy.
: My Philosophy of Product Building
Nathan Baschez, creator of and contributor to several successful products, from Product Hunt to Substack, details nine components of his approach to creating products, from coming up with ideas to shaping the idea into a simple v1 to launching.
(via Medium): Pattern Language for Experiment Writing
Carl J Rogers shares his hypothesis for supporting an organizational culture of experimentation by applying a pattern language to experiments, resulting in a greater appreciation of the effort.
📯 Agility and Scrum According to OpenAI’s ChatGPT
There has been a lot of talking about generative AI recently, mainly fueled by excellent work results in the text and graphics area. A few days ago, OpenAI made a new model available that “interacts in a conversational way. The dialogue format makes it possible for ChatGPT to answer follow-up questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests.” (Source.)
I thought it might be fun to ask ChatGPT a few questions about business agility in general and Scrum in particular.
👉 Learn more: Agility and Scrum According to OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
🛠 Concepts, Tools & Measuring
(via First Round Capital): Annual Planning in Uncertain Times: 6 Tactics for Rethinking Your Company’s End-of-Year Exercise
First Round Capital compiled six ‘unique approaches to end-of-year planning,’ covering fresh tactics, different perspectives, and tested frameworks.
(via SessionLab): 27 Decision-making Techniques and Activities to Improve How You Take Decisions Together
Deborah Rim Moiso shares a comprehensive guide to decision-making, from the benefits of including others to games, exercises, tools, and how to avoid premature convergence.
: Doing ‘No’ Better
Andy Cleff analyzes the context and options of saying ‘no’ gracefully.
🎶 Encore
(via The Stratechery): AI Homework
Ben Thompson analyzes ChatGPT by asking, ‘Did Thomas Hobbes believe in the separation of powers?’
This is a confident answer, complete with supporting evidence and a citation to Hobbes work, and it is completely wrong. Hobbes was a proponent of absolutism, the belief that the only workable alternative to anarchy — the natural state of human affairs — was to vest absolute power in a monarch; checks and balances was the argument put forth by Hobbes’ younger contemporary John Locke, who believed that power should be split between an executive and legislative branch.
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Now available on the Age-of-Product Youtube channel to improve learning, for example, about the user story concept:
- 🆕 Hands-on Agile 46: The Agile Fluency Model ® with Diana Larsen.
- 🆕 Hands-on Agile 45: FAST: An Innovative Way to Scale with James Shore.
- Hands-on Agile 44: Honey, I Shrunk the Backlog with Allan Kelly.
- Hands-on Agile 43: Outcome-Based Product Planning with Jeff Gothelf.
- Hands-on Agile 42: Lean Roadmapping and OKRs with Janna Bastow.
- Hands-on Agile 38: The Product Owner with Roman Pichler.
✋ Do Not Miss Out and Learn more about the State of Agile 2022 — Join the 12,000-plus Strong ‘Hands-on Agile’ Slack Community
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Help your team to interpret the State of Agile 2022 report by pointing them to the free Scrum Anti-Patterns Guide: