LiminalArc SoundNotes

Simply sending your people off to training, or bringing someone in to train isn’t going to automatically get you the value you want out of it.  In this quick podcast, Dave Prior and LeadingAgile’s Jeff Howey dig into five things you can do to ensure you get the most value out of Agile training in your organization.

This week’s SoundNotes features a question submitted by a student during a recent Certified Scrum Master class. The question was posted in the topic parking lot and we did not have time to address it during class, so I followed up with the student after class and we discussed it via phone. I also offered to do a podcast on it and Jeff Howey joins me this week to dig into the topic. Because I spoke...

What is DevOps? How does it tie into the LeadingAgile model? How do we deal with the complications it presents when we apply it at scale? In this week’s podcast, LeadingAgile Chief Transformation Officer Matt Van Vleet joins Dave to answer all of these questions along with a general primer on DevOps in Agile Transformation.

In this episode of SoundNotes, our guest Jeff Howey will help uncover the opportunities this challenging scenario can present—and offer ideas on how to change its foundational causes to prevent it from happening in the first place.

In this episode of SoundNotes, Matt Craig joins Dave for a discussion that centers around comparing the way biological systems and businesses function and respond to change. In a biological system, enzymes bring elements together that catalyze reactions and keep iterating until they find an effective response.

Dave Prior sits down for a conversation with LeadingAgile CEO Mike Cottmeyer and they explore Mike's Agile approach to personal development and dig into the details of how and why his approach to growth and development has evolved over time. If you’d like to contact Dave you can reach him at: LeadingAgile: https://www.leadingagile.com/guides/dave-prior/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrsung...

In this week's episode of SoundNotes, Ross Beurmann is back to talk about how to create a funding mechanism that's as adaptable as the governance model. Or, to put it more simply, how to allocate funds and pay for things when we're continually tuning the way we work, and what we're working on. As your organization moves further down the path toward Agility, you may experience some dissonance when...

You have to deeply understand how what you’re doing at all levels of the organization is going to drive quality. In this week’s podcast, LeadingAgile CEO Mike Cottmeyer joins us to dig into why increased quality should matter to you, and some actionable steps to take to enable more of it across your organization. If you’d like to contact Dave you can reach him at: LeadingAgile: https://www.leading...

When large organizations set out to take on Agile Transformation, it's never for Agile's sake. They're usually after one or more of these 6 things, Predictability, Quality, Cost Savings, Early ROI, Product Fit, or Innovation. In this week's episode of LeadingAgile’s SoundNotes, Dave Prior talks with Mike Cottmeyer to discuss the steps you can take to get more predictable and make and meet your com...

This week in LeadingAgile’s SoundNotes, Justin Polk is here to discuss the role that capitalization plays in helping an organization adopt an Agile approach to work. When the conversation turns to Agile Transformation, it often focuses on what changes you need to introduce, where, and when. But sometimes we get so caught up in those conversations that we neglect to include one very important aspec...

At the beginning of the pandemic, LeadingAgile published a white paper called Maintaining Momentum in a Remote Agile World . This episode of SoundNotes is a follow up to that whitepaper. In this interview, Jeff Howey and Dave Prior reflect on what they've learned about successful remote interaction since the whitepaper was released, how those lessons can impact a system of Transformation and remot...

This week in SoundNotes, Yaton Bowens joins Dave to talk about the role that trust plays in Agile Transformation. Building on Mike Cottmeyers’ Trust vs. Trustworthiness webinar, Yaton and Dave dig into some of the trust gaps that management and the Development Teams have to cross for an Agile Transformation to take root in an organization. Without a track record to demonstrate trustworthiness, how...

This week is all about Earned Value and Justin Polk is back, spending time with Dave discussing how Earned Value tools can be applied in an Agile Transformation. They explore what types of work you might want to consider using it for, how it can help, and what types of people might find the path to Agile just a little more possible when you show them how Earned Value metrics can be applied on an A...

Once you reach the point where you're ready to pursue a job in Agile, the next hurdle you'll often face is, “How?” Convincing someone to give you a job as a ScrumMaster or a Product Owner can be tough if you have no experience. And even if you do have experience, that doesn’t necessarily make it easier. The Pandemic has put a lot of people back into the applicant pool, and the competition is fierc...

Many organizations begin their journey toward becoming Agile by selecting a few initial teams or projects that are set up to test out how Agile will impact the organization and its ability to deliver work. LeadingAgile Senior Consultant Justin Polk joins Dave this week to discuss how to select and run an Agile pilot. In this episode, you’ll learn about some of the risks and challenges that come wi...

This week in LeadingAgile’s SoundNotes, we’re focusing on Objectives and Key Results (OKRs).  Andrew Young joins Dave to talk about this history of OKRs, why they have become such an important part of how we track and measure performance, why they matter to Executives, and why teaching Executives about OKRs requires a very specific approach. Want more on OKRs? Agile Unplugged - Episode 02 with Mik...

Getting a few teams up and running using Scrum, Kanban, or some other form of Agile is great. But that doesn’t necessarily mean your organization has become Agile. This week in SoundNotes, Dragos Dumitriu joins Dave for a conversation about the difference between spinning up a few teams and truly achieving business Agility. During the conversation Dragos shares details on some of the common patter...

Training is a vital piece of today’s business climate. It’s typically at the forefront of conversations around development or growth, but what is the correlation or connection between training and actual business transformation? The assumption has been that if my employees only had the knowledge, they would produce different outcomes. While training is an undoubtedly valuable piece of creating lar...

In this episode of SoundNotes, LeadingAgile Managing Consultant, Greg DePasquale explains what Outcome-Based Planning is, how it works, why it's so critical for enabling successful delivery, and how it works at different levels of the organization. In outcome-based planning, we focus on “a results-driven plan rather than plan-driven results." There is a focus on the Why as opposed to the How. We c...

When we are trying to figure out what products to build, we have to develop a deep understanding of the problem we are solving. To do that, we have to understand who we are solving problems for, what is important to them, and what offering would be most appealing to them or most likely to cause a change in behavior. Looking at the problem from different perspectives can enable it to be solved more...

Over the past few years, there has been an increasing push within organizations to move from a project-oriented mindset to a more product-focused approach. Creating that change in an organization can take considerable work and part of that is how you address funding the work being done. In this episode of SoundNotes, LeadingAgile’s Chief Methodologist, Dennis Stevens spends time with Dave talking...

In many organizations, the group responsible for procurement, and the processes they follow, were established under a traditional (waterfall) approach. The way in which goods and services are requested, contracted, approved and acquired can be an odd fit with an Agile approach. In the public sector, this can prove even more challenging due to oversight, bureaucracy, and a variety of other factors....

In this episode of SoundNotes, Ross Beurmann joins Dave to talk about the difference between Leadership and Management. Although many confuse the two and believe they are the same, they are actually very different things—and this can become extremely apparent during the transition to an Agile approach. During the interview, Ross explains why it is so important that we gain clarity on the differenc...

In this episode of SoundNotes Will Evans is back to discuss why behavior trumps empathy and the secret to building the right thing. During the interview, we explore the difference between traditional Personas and Behavioral Impact Personas. We also talk through how Impact Mapping can be used to move beyond Empathy Maps to deepen our understanding of what motivates people, what their needs are, wha...

One of the most critical, and unfortunately, neglected elements of ensuring your teams can deliver the most value possible, is making sure they can see a direct connection between the work they are being asked to execute on and that strategy that work is in service of. In this episode of SoundNotes, LeadingAgile Principal Consultant, Marty Bradley spends time with Dave discussing why we need to co...