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Food for Agile Thought #399: Winnable (Strategy) Games, Rapid Experimentation, Selling Agile to the C-Suite

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-30 News

TL; DR: Winnable Games — Food for Agile Thought #399

Welcome to the 399th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 47,711 peers. This week, John Cutler suggests considering your way of working as an enticing, challenging, and winnable game, and we dig into how to get bosses on board with Agile with trust-building tactics, busting fears around big shake-ups. Also, we flip the ADHD narrative, revealing its potential strengths for teams. Moreover, Fred Hebert argues that complexity is inevitable in life and systems, and efforts to control it overly can backfire. The goal, then, is to delay chaos by carefully steering complex systems.

Then, Aatir Abdul Rauf shares insights on what Product Managers can learn from Product Marketing Managers and vice versa, given Airbnb’s decision to eliminate the PM role and merge PM & PMM functions. Jason Cohen breaks down the essence of ‘leverage,’ achieving big impacts with little effort, while we explore the power of rapid experimentation in tackling uncertainties.

Finally, we use the Sydney Opera House’s infamous miscalculation to explain why we are rubbish at estimating and delve into probabilistic forecasting in Agile, analyzing data from 25 ASOS teams to test this forecasting method’s accuracy. Additionally, we learn more about FAST agile, a practice that remarkably enhances the scaling of super-sized teams and self-organization within organizations. We also share a cheat sheet for understanding tech debt.

Food for Agile Thought #399: Winnable (Strategy) Games, Rapid Experimentation, Selling Agile to the C-Suite — Age-of-Product.com

Useless Agile Metrics

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-26 Agile and ScrumAgile Transition

TL; DR: Useless Agile Metrics

Ideally, a metric is a leading indicator for a pattern change, allowing your Scrum team to analyze the cause in time and take countermeasures. However, what if you picked the wrong metrics? What if these useless agile metrics lead you in the wrong direction while providing you with the illusion that you know where your team is heading?

Learn more about useless agile metrics, from individual velocity to estimation accuracy to utilization rates.

Useless Agile Metrics — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #398: Agile Laggards, Building Trust and Influence, Moving From Output to Outcome, Engineers Product People Like

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-23 News

TL; DR: Agile Laggards — Food for Agile Thought #398

Welcome to the 398th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 47,569 peers. This week, we challenge pessimism around agile laggards, arguing that they are potentially more advantaged than their precursors. Also, we explore the benefits of Continuous Delivery and advocate that high-performing teams do not stop at the ‘run‘ level. Instead, the real magic happens with full ownership. Speaking of owning your process: if you take Scrum seriously, employing agile coaches next to Scrum Masters is unnecessary.

Then, we uncover a profound challenge faced by Product Owners: fitting into their organizations and double down on the issue with Leah Tharin, Teresa Torres, and Hope Gurion analyzing how to move organizations and teams from output to outcome. Moreover, we ask regarding strategy and competitors: should we pay attention to them? Also, Anthony Murphy explores the critical components of trust in stakeholder management, offering actionable strategies to establish and foster it.

Finally, Ash Maurya discusses entrepreneurs’ challenges in juggling big-picture vision and immediate action, suggesting skipping product roadmaps in favor of traction roadmaps. John Cutler explores a theory about companies stuck in a ‘doing OK’ basin, neither thriving nor failing, slowly drifting towards obscurity. At the same time, Seth Godin reflects on projects which are promises involving coordination for future value delivery.

Food for Agile Thought #398: Agile Laggards, Building Trust and Influence, Moving From Output to Outcome, Engineers Product People Like — Age-of-Product.com

Why Employing Agile Coaches next to Scrum Masters Is Unnecessary

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-19 Agile and ScrumAgile Transition

TL; DR: Employing Agile Coaches next to Scrum Masters?

Often, when organizations employ agile coaches and Scrum Masters, we can observe that agile coaches work at an organizational level. In contrast, Scrum Masters work in a tactical role at the team level in a “delivery manager capacity,” which defies the Scrum Guide’s concept of accountabilities.

However, if you take Scrum seriously, this approach has no upside. Here are eight reasons for empowering your Scrum Masters to work with the organization.

Disclaimer: I acknowledge, though, that “agile coach” is a helpful keyword for positioning yourself as an agile practitioner; potential employers and clients search for this term.

Why Employing Agile Coaches next to Scrum Masters Is Unnecessary — Age-of-Product.com

Food for Agile Thought #397: From Tech Debt to Tech Health, Avoiding Lousy Experiments, The Drama Triangle, Including Users in UX Workshops

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-16 News

TL; DR: From Tech Debt to Tech Health — Food for Agile Thought #397

Welcome to the 397th edition of the Food for Agile Thought newsletter, shared with 47,417 peers.This week, we demystify technical debt, offering a tangible way to achieve tech health instead. Moreover, according to Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk’s actions at Twitter prompted industry reflection on the potential benefits of “firing hordes of middle managers,” reports Yahoo Finance. Also, Ken Norton describes Stephen Karpman’s model from the 1960s, identifying three roles people tend to assume when reacting to their environment, and we learn about fixing agile transformations in an interview with Peter Lam.

Then, Peter Yang discusses effective experimentation with Eric Metelka from Eppo, and we delve into how to build in public without revealing too much. In an epic article, Marty Cagan explores how generative AI could reshape product development, stressing the importance of embracing disruptive technologies. Also, we explore inviting users to participate directly in UX workshops and analyze into the “free to paid” conversion, often considered an indicator of business opportunities and product appeal.

Finally, Eric Chima and John Nevins Most advocate that most teams can benefit from eliminating estimations, supposedly an easy win in Agile. Moreover, we address that concerns rise over AI training on AI-created content instead of human-generated content and examine why some content engrosses us and others fail to pique our interest. We are closing this week’s edition with a simple question: How do you know your team’s Scrum Master is successful?

Food for Agile Thought #397: From Tech Debt to Tech Health, Avoiding Lousy Experiments, The Drama Triangle, Including Users in UX Workshops — Age-of-Product.com

Scrum Master Success Indicators — How Do You Compare?

by Stefan Wolpers | 2023-06-11 Agile and Scrum

TL; DR: Scrum Master Success Indicators

How do you know your team’s Scrum Master is successful? I identified ten Scrum Master success indicators from a team perspective, from self-sufficiency to delivering valuable Increments to embracing self-management. How Do You Compare?

Scrum Master Success Indicators — How Do You Compare? Age-of-Product.com