LiminalArc SoundNotes

This week Devin Hedge joins Dave Prior for another student question. This time about architecture and if the complexity of it would be better served by a waterfall approach: The Question: "How to plan for the Architecture effectively. With waterfall, we try to figure out all aspects of the business and the technical solution in advance before we start development. In Agile, we discover as we go. I...

One of the challenges many organizations face with Agile is how to handle long term strategic planning in a way that creates visibility all the way through to the execution level. TIES is an approach to Agile planning that can help the business engage in long term planning, understand their organization’s capacity to actually execute on the work, and then see how that work can be broken down into...

Successfully completing a CSM or CSPO class doesn't impact everyone the same way. For some, it is like a lightbulb went off and everything about Agile just makes sense. For others (like me), some of the ideas and values from waterfall persist for a time. Questioning agile and trying to reconcile this new way of thinking with the old way is part of the personal journey of moving from a traditional...

This week Dave received a request for advice from a student in one of LeadingAgile’s Certified Scrum Product Owner classes: How to effectively work with a distributed scrum team (both time and distance). We have an IT Software project in which PO is in the US, Development is in Ukraine and Testing is in Vietnam. ShowNotes A summary of the suggestions Dave and Derek offer during the podcast: - Reor...

Note: This is an audio only version of a video podcast that can be found here: http://bit.ly/2qiC2C5 Dave Prior and Derek Huether respond to a student question: What is wrong with management wanting to normalize points across teams and use them as time. Tools mentioned in the video Focused Objective - Troy Magennis has a wide variety of tools he makes available for free that will help you understa...

Note: This is the audio only version of the video podcast which can be found here -> https://vimeo.com/217951635 This is a short version of the HOA + Personal Agility Canvas session led by Dave Prior at the 2017 Heart of Agile Conference in Pittsburgh. During this video Dave provides a walk through of the Personal Agility Canvas with a focus on the expanded Heart of Agile. If you are new to this t...

As the 2017 Scrum Gathering in San Diego would down to a close a few weeks ago, Dave Prior and Chris Li began a debate: Is it okay for a Scrum Team to leave the Sprint Planning Meeting with individual work assignments? This is a question that often comes up for both Dave and Chris when they are teaching CSM and CSPO classes. In this podcast you’ll hear them each explain how they respond to this qu...

In our third podcast focusing on Cost of Delay, LeadingAgile’s Dean Steven explains how he has used Cost of Delay with management working on defining priority for items at the portfolio level. Dean also explains why the problem Cost of Delay helps you solve is not a math problem, but a collaboration problem. SHOW NOTES 00:08 Interview Begins 00:56 Some background on the work Dean does day to day f...

This is an audio only version of a video podcast that can be found here: https://www.leadingagile.com/podcast/can-product-vision-without-company-mission-derek-huether/ In this podcast, Derek Huether and Dave Prior take on a question asked by a student in one of Dave’s classes. Can you have a Product Vision Statement if you do not have a Company Mission Statement? Contacting Derek You can reach Der...

Last week at the 2017 Scrum Gathering in San Diego, Dave Prior had a chance to sit down with Maria Matarelli and Alistair Cockburn to discuss the 2017 Heart of Agile Conference in Pittsburgh on April 27-28, Guest Leadership, the importance of dancing at conferences, Maria’s budding career as a DJ, her upcoming humanitarian work in New Zealand as well as her Agile Lifestyles event that will be live...

The original video version of this file can be found here: https://vimeo.com/213030252 The Heart of Agile 2017 is being held on April 27-28 in Pittsburgh. It is the 2nd annual HOA conference and it will also be the first Agile Conference held in Pittsburgh. Derek Huether and Dave Prior will both be speaking at the event. In this short video Derek and Dave each provide an overview of the sessions t...

In this episode of LeadingAgile’s SoundNotes we focus on a question submitted by a student from one of our recent classes. Jennifer, the student, asked about what to do when the Chief Product Owner is defining the Release Plan without input from the Product Owner or the Stakeholders. During the podcast, LeadingAgile’s Jim Hayden and Dave Prior dig into reasons why that might be happening, and how...

The 2017 Heart of Agile Conference will be held in Pittsburgh on April 27 and 28. This is the second annual conference dedicated to helping Agile practitioners let go of some of the dogma and ornamentation that has been glommed on to Agile and get back to the core principles and the Heart of Agility. In this interview, Rob Lingle, one of the conference organizers took some time to speak with Dave...

In this episode of SoundNotes, LeadingAgile’s Derek Huether and Dave Prior tackle a student question about how Scrum works with Marketing. In a recent class, a student names Cherie explained that in the work her Marketing Team does, it isn’t possible to achieve “potentially shippable” at the end of a Sprint. The Team may finish the work and the Product Owner may accept it, but nothing can actually...

In this episode of SoundNotes, LeadingAgile’s Chief Cultural Office, Rachel Howard, joins Dave Prior to answer some of the “getting a job” related questions that are frequently asked during the CSM and CSPO classes Dave teaches for LeadingAgile. The topics covered in the interview include: How to get a job if you have little (or no) experience in Scrum, How to make the move from being a team membe...

This is the second interview in a series we are doing on Cost of Delay. The first interview, where Jim Hayden provided an overview of Cost of Delay can be found here: http://bit.ly/2lUDWFR In Part 2 of the series, Marty Bradley explains how Cost of Delay actually works. During the interview we discuss things like Weighted Shorted Job First (WSJF), how to determine relative Business Value of differ...

This episode of LeadingAgile’s SoundNotes offers a case study of how the technology teams at NewSpring church have been using Agile practices to develop innovative products that will enable their members to stay engaged with NewSpring throughout the whole week. Jon Horton is the Web Director at NewSpring. A few weeks ago he and several members of his team attended a LeadingAgile CSM class. In the...

This podcast is the first in a series we intend to do on Cost of Delay. This podcast features LeadingAgile Enterprise Transformation Consultant, Jim Hayden, and Dave Prior discussing the ideas behind Cost of Delay at a fairly high level. If you are new to the subject, or are struggling with understanding it, this may help provide clarity on what Cost of Delay is and how it works. In a future podca...

In Andrew Fuqua’s blog post “Slack and the Agile Manager’s Role: Be the Slack” https://www.leadingagile.com/2017/01/slack-agile-managers-role/ he shared his thoughts on the need for management to make space and time for teams and individuals to be creative and innovative. In this podcast Andrew and Dave Prior dig deeper on the topic, how and why organizations resist it, and how managers can get st...

This episode of SoundNotes features two questions that were submitted recently by students. 2:11 Question 1 - Design and Cross Functional Teams Submitted by Sergey via Email : “Every time I hear you speak about cross-functional team I am not sure who these teams comprise of exactly. In my world the confusion here is most often related to design inputs. Any digital product will have a visual UI and...

The Project Management Office (PMO) has traditionally been responsible for providing governance over projects, programs and portfolios; ensuring projects are managed according the standards set forth by the PMO; and to provide reporting on progress to leadership. When Agile is introduced into an organization, along with new ways of tracking work, self-organizing teams and new ways of understanding...

2017 is here and Mike Cottmeyer is ready. In this episode of SoundNotes, the CEO of LeadingAgile shares his thoughts on the primary issues facing organizations as they continue working to transform. There are many who claim culture is the main issue, but is that really the impediment to Organizational Agility? ShowNotes 00:08 Interview Starts 00:47 How do you lead change in large organizations? 02...

A Retrospective on Vacations If you love your work and are very driven, the idea of “vacation” can be a daunting thing. In this episode of SoundNotes, Derek Huether and Dave Prior hold a retrospective on how they each coped with the challenge of taking time-off from work over the holiday. If you count yourself among the vacation challenged, this conversation may provide insight into why you need t...

LeadingAgile’s Derek Huether and Dave Prior take on two questions from someone who attended a workshop Dave ran on Redefining Your PMO for Agile: Should I change Sprint length to account reduced capacity during the holidays? Is it okay to performance at the individual team member level? During the podcast Derek and Dave respond to both questions and offer different ways of coping with reduced capa...

MLB Advanced Media has been growing very rapidly over the past few years and even if you aren’t a fan of baseball, you’ve probably been the beneficiary of their work. Michael Daly and Matt Volpe have been managing teams and providing internal Agile coaching at MLB every step of the way. For anyone working at an organization that is struggling to get it’s legs with Agile, these guys have a story fu...