Mik + One: The Official Project to Product Podcast by Dr. Mik Kersten

We're back! And what an episode we have to kick things off. Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Felipe Castro, renowned author, speaker and trainer on objectives and key results (OKRs). In this episode, Mik and Felipe talk about how Felipe helps organizations transform how they use goals by adopting OKRs, and other key topics such as: How Felipe became an early adopter of OKRs Common mista...

In this special episode of Mik + One, Mik summarizes some of his favorite episodes from the last 18 months and provides insight into some of his key takeaways including: Interesting insights on scaling Agile and helping digital transformation succeed The importance of equity, diversity and inclusion on value streams The pivotal role of leadership’s responsibility on improving daily work Flow Metri...

In this episode, Mik is joined by Christian Idiodi, Partner at Silicon Valley Product Group. Mik and Christian talk about how to establish product management disciplines and other key topics including: Fascinating insights into how Christian got into product management, how he landed within Silicon Valley Product Group and insights about his own career Establishing product management disciplines a...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Courtney Kissler, Chief Technology Officer at online retailer, Zulily. In this episode, Mik and Courtney talk about Courtney's experience in driving technological transformations and cover many key topics such as: Courtney’s journey within DevOps and how her experience leading transformations at large enterprises including Nordstrom, Starbucks and Nike l...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Scott Prugh, Chief Technology Officer at CSG. In this episode, Mik and Scott talk about Scott’s experience and learnings from within the DevOps community, as well as many other key topics including: The three domains in DevOps portfolio management and how to think about them independently, as well as how they reinforce each other Flow Load and Work in Pr...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Carmen DeArdo, Principal Flow Advisor and VSM Practice Lead at Tasktop, and co-author of the award-winning book, Standing on Shoulders: A Leader’s Guide to Digital Transformation. This episode covers: Insight into Carmen’s early experience at Nationwide and Bell Labs, and how he has applied his experience and learnings to help other organizations today C...

In this episode of Mik + One, Mik sits down with Gene Kim, best-selling author of The Phoenix Project and The Unicorn Project, as well as co-author of The DevOps Handbook. In this episode, Gene chats to Mik about the next book that he’s working on, and provides many insights into: The journey of the Unicorn Project, the effect it had on technology leaders and how it changed their perspectives A de...

It’s episode 30 and what a guest we’ve got! Mik welcomes Brian Solis, Global Innovation Evangelist at Salesforce and world-renowned keynote speaker and an award-winning author of eight bestselling books. In this episode, Mik and Brian cover a lot of ground and discuss many key topics including: How people should think about their digital transformations in order to change their thinking in 2021 an...

In this episode, Mik is joined by two IT leaders from American Airlines: Maya Leibman, Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer, and Ross Clanton, Managing Director of Technology Transformation. Mik, Maya and Ross delve into American Airlines shift to digital innovation, including insights into: Changing and influencing leaderships approach to IT, innovation and software Working with...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Pieter Jordaan, Group CTO at TUI, the world’s leading integrated tourism group operating in more than a hundred destinations worldwide. In this episode, Mik and Pieter discuss Pieter’s contribution to TUI’s successful transformation to cloud and product value streams, as well as other key discussion points including: Pieter’s background and how he came t...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Robin Yeman, Senior Fellow and Agile DevSecOps Enterprise coach at Lockheed Martin. In this episode, Mik and Robin discuss how Robin approaches leadership with complex systems of systems and other key discussion points including: Insight into Robin’s journey and PhD thesis, examining how to deploy complex system of systems using Agile and DevSecOps The n...

In this episode of Mik + One, Mik is joined by Eric Willeke, Co-Founder and Principal of Elevate.to. In this episode, Mik and Eric touch on many key points around simplicity and flow to drive successful digital transformations, including: Lean-agile techniques and helping organizations to understand agility, progress and reorganize around it How inherent simplicity relates to flow and how to rever...

In this episode of Mik + One,  Mik is joined by Rene Te-Strote, Senior IT Project Lead for the BMW Group. In this episode, Mik and Rene discuss Rene’s contributions to innovate the BMW Group by mixing hardware and software development and other key discussion points including: How Rene started his career in BMW, first working in a production plant and then moving to the IT department Some of the f...

Kicking off the first episode of 2021, Mik is joined by Adrian Cockcroft, VP of Cloud Architecture Strategy at Amazon Web Services. In this episode, Mik and Adrian discuss Adrian’s predictions for application architecture in 2021, what’s happening with microservices architecture and other key discussion points including: Serverless services and why the time is now to use the fastest way to deliver...

In the final Mik + One episode of 2020, Mik is joined by Gail Murphy, Tasktop Co-Founder, and Professor of Computer Science and VP of Research and Innovation at the University of British Columbia. This episode with Mik and Gail includes discussion points around: Insights into some of the cutting edge research projects Gail has led on productivity, tooling and development teams Measuring individual...

Joining Mik on this episode of Mik + One is “sage and poet of product thinking” John Cutler, Head of Product Research & Education at Amplitude. In this episode, Mik and John discuss: Defining what a product is Rethinking how to apply product thinking to force multipliers and change steps The “sixth sense” required to understand the challenges of software design and technology What traditional ente...

Joining Mik on this episode of Mik + One is David Anderson, Director of Technology, Liberty IT. In this episode, Mik and David discuss: Liberty IT’s journey into a serverless-first world A customer over cost-centric approach to cloud Removing “undifferentiated heavy lifting” from the work environment Creating “two-way door” architecture for flexibility and flow Using “lego blocks” to help engineer...

Joining Mik on this episode of Mik + One is Justin Watts, Director of Agile Change at Lloyd Banking Group one of the UK’s Big Four banks. In this episode, Mik and Justin discuss: Redesigning software systems around flow to the customer instead of process Respecting the laws of physics when accelerating flow across value streams Importance of doing the right things wrong, rather than wrong things r...

Joining Mik on this episode of Mik + One is Peter D. Moore, a business and digital technology strategy advisor specializing in helping companies manage exponential revenue, margin and net income growth. In this episode, Mik and Peter discuss: In the influence of the Zone Management Model on Project to Product The role of different cultures and leadership in specific zones The need for specific met...

On this episode of Mik + One, Mik is joined by Bryon Kroger, Founder and CEO of Rise8, and former co-founder and COO of the USAF's Kessel Run. In this episode, Mik and Bryon’s conversation includes discussions around: The remarkable story of Project Kessel Run at the U.S. Airforce Driving change at large bureaucracies Adopting a “think big, start small” strategy to software transformation Paying a...

Joining Mik on this episode of Mik + One is John Willis, Senior Director of the Global Transformation Office at Red Hat. In this episode, Mik and John discuss: Embracing failure for continual learning Flow Metrics as the next evolution of software delivery measurement Where most waste and wait times are found How team happiness is a leading indicator of value stream health The right structure and...

In this episode, Mik is joined by two guests: Dr. Nicole Forsgren, VP of Research & Strategy at GitHub, and Dr. Denae Ford Robinson, Senior Researcher in the SAINTes group at Microsoft Research. Mik, Nicole and Denae had an energetic and insightful conversation about many topics, including: Measuring productivity, and how leaders can utilize these insights to build diverse systems and measures to...

Joining Mik in this episode of Mik + One is Adrian Cockcroft, VP of Cloud Architecture Strategy at Amazon Web Services. In this episode, Mik and Adrian provide concrete advice on moving ahead in the digital world and cover many key discussion points including: Insight into Adrian’s experiences establishing technical practices in organizations like eBay, Netflix and AWS The importance of product-ce...

In this episode of Mik + One, Mik’s guest is Heather Munoz, Head of Retail Brokerage Practice, E*TRADE. In this episode, Mik and Heather discuss many topics including: The importance of an effective tool network and how it supports an organization’s value streams Using visualization and data to get people to understand systems thinking approach in order to deliver more value to the customer Thinki...

In this episode of Mik + One, Mik continues the conversation with Don Reinertsen, President of Reinertsen & Associates, a product development consulting firm located in Redondo Beach, CA, and author of three best-selling books on product development: Developing Products in Half the Time; Managing the Design Factory: A Product Developer’s Toolkit; and The Principles of Product Development Flow: Sec...