The Humanizing Work Show

In this episode, Richard and Peter dig into how to have an effective Sprint Review meeting. Great Sprint Reviews, achieve 3 goals and answer 3 key questions. Learn how do accomplish this on your team. (And discover why “Sprint Demo” is too limited a name for this meeting.) While this is explicitly Scrum-focused, it’s really about how to have a meeting to review a body of work as a team, whether yo...

In this episode, Richard and Peter give 3 quick tips you can use to have a more effective Daily Scrum right away. Too many teams waste this important meeting on a boring status report instead of using it to create team alignment and make every day matter. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/daily-scrum-episode/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitt...

In this episode, Richard and Peter dig into the 3 conditions for an effective Sprint Planning meeting. While this is explicitly Scrum-focused, it’s really about how to have a good team planning meeting, whether you’re using Scrum or not. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/effective-sprint-planning-episode/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.c...

Peter and Richard are often asked: “Why do you guys like Scrum so much? It seems like a lot of meetings, and I see a lot of teams struggling with it. But you recommend it for a lot of situations, and it seems like you’ve thought a lot about it.” In this episode, they explain why Scrum works when it works and why it’s still their favorite approach for product development, including outside of softw...

In organizations where teams and individuals are empowered to own and direct their own work, what do managers do? Is there even a role for a manager in an empowered org? In this episode, Richard and Peter introduce the Humanizing Work Three Jobs of Management model, showing how skillful managers can add significant value in their role. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/three-jobs-of-man...

In this episode, Richard and Peter take on the challenge of so-called “technical stories,” backlog items that emerge from a development team and that don’t represent a clear slice of customer value. How should a product owner handle these? Are “technical stories” even a thing? Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/technical-stories/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/Humanizi...

Making clear commitments and having regular discussions about accountability is a hallmark of every successful organization and, outside of work, every successful relationship. In this episode, Peter covers how to make a commitment with integrity, how to honorably break or renegotiate a commitment when necessary, and how to have effective conversations about accountability. Episode page: https://w...

In this episode, Richard and Peter talk with Mark Ethier, founder of leading audio production software company iZotope. Even if you’ve never heard of iZotope, you’ve heard the results of their products—they’ve won Emmy, Oscar, and NAMM awards for their contributions to TV, film, and music production. Among other topics in this dense episode, Richard, Peter, and Mark discuss how iZotope went throug...

Leaders often have to make difficult decisions in the presence of uncertainty and complexity. And they need to involve others in the process—sometimes to make a decision collaboratively, sometimes just to bring everyone along. In this episode, Peter introduces the 3ID Pattern, a structure for making decisions in uncertain times, which also works for communicating clearly about a decision that has...

In this episode, Richard and Peter talk with leadership coach and speaker Melissa Boggs. We dig into a range of topics, including her former role as Chief ScrumMaster at Scrum Alliance, the lesser-known challenges of leadership, coaching and being coached, and the ways the rules of work need to change to create more human-centric organizations. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/melissa-...

In this episode, Richard and Peter look into a recent report from the US Surgeon General on “Workplace Mental Health & Well-Being” as well as the business media’s puzzling reporting on it. Spoiler alert: the Surgeon General has a lot to say about why making work fit humans matters and the mainstream business media can’t make sense of it. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/surgeon-gen...

In this episode, Richard and Peter take on two related questions: “Can those Agile success surveys be believed?” and “How should we think about measuring the success of our own Agile adoption?” Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/measuring-the-success-of-agile-adoption/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tpt...

In October 2022, Peter ran across the Grand Canyon, not just once, but twice in a single day. In October 2019, Peter could barely run a mile. In this episode, Richard interviews Peter about this huge transformation in his life and the lessons for individuals and teams who want to create their own sustainable, positive changes. Episode page: https://humanizingwork.com/couch-to-running-45-miles-acro...

We’ve just returned from hosting the 2022 edition of our annual Humanizing Work Conference in Veil, Colorado. On the last day of the conference, we asked a few of the participants to share an idea or concept they picked up that was particularly meaningful or useful to them, that they thought you might benefit from hearing. In this episode, you’ll get a glimpse into the takeaways from seven partici...

In this episode, Richard and Peter interview Vivian Rhoads, President of the Women’s Health business unit at Pharmavite. Vivian has adapted ideas and practices from agile software development to build highly-productive innovation teams in the vitamin and supplement space. Vivian’s work at Pharmavite reduced their cycle time for new innovations from a few years down to a few months and increased th...

In this episode, Richard shares our favorite tool for helping Product Owners restore some sanity to their lives. The PO Board is a way to structure the Product Backlog so that the Product Owner knows exactly what to focus on, at what level of detail, and with which stakeholders on any given day. We’ve taught this approach to thousands of Product Owners, and they regularly report that it has been a...

In this episode, Richard and Peter answer the question: “I was in a 1:1 with my boss and I shared a problem I was observing on the team. She reminded me of her motto: ‘don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions.’ The challenge was that I didn’t have a solution. Should I wait to share the problem until I’ve come up with a solution?” They also get into why managers shouldn’t say this, even if their...

This episode includes an excerpt from one of our monthly Humanizing Work Conference Alumni community sessions. In the session, Peter shared a 20 minute presentation about his circuitous career path and five lessons he’s learned along the way. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/5-lessons-in-career-development Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter...

In this episode, Richard and Peter answer the question: “Do we really need a retrospective every sprint? It seems like a waste to do them that often.” Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/do-we-really-need-a-retrospective-every-sprint/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/ https://www.linkedin.com/compan...

In this episode, Richard and Peter answer the question: “We want to get better at having uncomfortable conversations on our team. We either avoid them or don’t handle them well. How can we improve at this?” Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/having-uncomfortable-conversations-on-a-team/   Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ htt...

Leading the kind of culture change that produces an engaged, empowered, human-centric organization can be exhausting and difficult. In this episode, Hart Shafer, the CEO of TheraSpecs, explains why it’s worth it. This is an excerpt from our Deep Dive episode on Hiring, check out the show notes for links to that full episode, which is packed with good ideas for anyone who leads or participates in t...

Hiring is hard everywhere. But it’s particularly challenging for human-centric organizations that want to hire for self-organization and collaboration. The differences between good and bad candidates are hard—or impossible—to determine from resume reviews and traditional job interviews. In this episode, Peter and Richard share a breakthrough hiring approach developed by their friends Hart Shafer a...

In this episode, Richard answers a question from a friend in the non-profit world: “I came across a template for creating a ‘user guide for working with me.’ Are these used in the business world, and if so, do they work out in practice?” Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/should-you-make-a-user-manual-for-me/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitte...

In this episode, Richard and Peter answer the question, “How do we know whether an item on our Product Backlog should be a User Story or a Task?” Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/backlog-stories-vs-tasks/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://ww...

In this episode, Richard and Peter dig into the popular “5 Whys” root cause analysis technique, including the limitations of the technique and why the question “why?’ can get you in trouble. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/whats-wrong-with-the-5-whys/ Connect with Humanizing Work: https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/ https://ww...