February 26, 2020 Today we covered Portfolio Management and Leading Change. I was struck by the assortment and quality of the tools. Until today, I didn’t know how to identify an organization’s “tipping point” in its Agile adaption readiness. Now I have a whole set of tools to use in conversation with clients. I’ve also...
Category: Agile Adoption and Transformation
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Day Two :: SAFe Training – I Love Jazz
February 25, 2020 In my early teens I fell in love with classical music. The complexity, the endless combinations of notes running across a scale telling a story; reaching deep within the soul. As one master piece inspires the next, much of this music reaches levels of near perfection. On the other hand there was...
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Day One :: SAFe Training – It’s not a methodology
February 24, 2020 One of the major criticisms of SAFe is because it is so voluminous it, will collapse under the weight of its ever increasing complexity. That would be true, if it were a methodology. From the many things which were said today, it was made clear the framework presents the organization with experiments,...
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Diary of a SAFe Skeptic – Introduction
February 23, 2202 On my way to SAFe training in Seattle. I’m a big fan of LeSS and Scrum@Scale. However, we’ve discovered that some clients would honestly benefit from adapting SAFe. To stay true to our values we’ve decided to begin offering this option; thus the training. I’ll be posting my thoughts throughout the week...
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Watch for the Bait and Switch
The company had been burned. We were discussing a proposal with the company’s leadership, when suddenly one of them asked, “Am I talking to the people who will be delivering the training?” The manager called it “bait and switch…” “WindmillsPlantation-TurksAndCaicos-pic03” by KimCarpenter NJ is licensed under CC BY 2.0 When we asked why they asked...
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What’s New in SAFe 5.0
What are the most striking changes among the dozen changes in SAFe 5.0? The new areas of Continuous Learning Culture, Design Thinking and Customer Centricity are the most significant to me. For years, agile coaches have championed companies becoming learning organizations, and certainly, Scrum has enabled that via the Sprint Review and Retrospective’s inspect and...
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Agile Coffee Podcast on Kanban
The latest Agile Coffee podcast #63 from Vic Bonacci and Larry Lawhead focused on the topic of Kanban. Van Wray, an Accredited Kanban Trainer, walks through the differences of Kanban and Scrum and how to apply it in other areas of the business including the role of a Scrum Master in Kanban. Lots of great...
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What are the Agile Coaches Reading?
I was reading a book last week and thought it one of the better books I hadn’t heard of from others. It made me think, “What are others reading that I should know about?” I asked our Rocket Nine team, our partner network of agile coaches and trainers, and some of our most successful customers...
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The Cost of Servant Leadership
“I may not get there with you.” – Martin Luther King, assassinated the following day. I hope you had the day off for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, to look back and reflect on his impact. The holiday is one of only three national holidays that recognize an individual. The other two are George Washington...