Personal Thoughts
Robert Galen
We've Moved
We've Moved
Walking Their Talk, Sustainability, Inspiration
Robert Galen
Sustainability

I saw this wonderfully courageous and informative post by Sabine Canditt the other day where she wrote about Sustainable Scrum. 

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/sustainable-scrum-responsible-choice-sabine-canditt-x0gef

After just completing a The Week program facilitated by the amazing Ann-Marie Kong, it touched my heart.

That said, I wanted to highlight one comment reaction/interaction between Sabine and Erich Bühler 

Erich said—

Thank you for bringing this approach into the world! Scrum does provide an iterative approach for teams to create value, but its scope is limited to the product level and struggles with dynamics across the whole organization for several reasons.
Without updating the underlying business and financial model at a strategic level, Scrum alone cannot transform organization-wide sustainability.

Sustainability
Short-takes, Inspiration
Robert Galen
Sandy’s Take
Sandy’s Take
Short-takes, Personal Thoughts
Robert Galen
The Human Aspects of Agile Coaching
The Human Aspects of Agile Coaching
Coaching, ACGW, Personal Thoughts
Robert Galen
Keys to Building your Coaching Relationships

I talk a lot about the first step in coaching any client (individual, system, team, etc.) is to build a relationship, gain empathy and understanding, and then gain an idea of where/how to help initially. So, do NOT start to coach until you’ve done some relationship-building. 

But what does a coaching relationship, or a professional relationship in general, look like? What are aspects of that? Here are a few things that come to my mind—

  • Making + taking the time.

  • Explaining what you do—what is Agile Coaching.

  • Building some empathy; walking in their shoes; understanding where they are coming from.

  • Meeting them where they are.

  • Listening; reflective listening; building metaphors together.

  • Connecting with their language, not yours.

Keys to Building your Coaching Relationships

Rants

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Has Scrum’s time come & gone?

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Has Scrum’s time come & gone?

I think the answer is a resounding…

YES! 

But let me explain a bit…

First, what do I mean by Scrum?

Let me share a multi-faceted definition of Scrum to focus on what I’m railing against. 

Scrum has been “around” since the mid to late 1990’s. So, for ~25 years. That’s an incredibly long time for a methodology (or framework) for software development (and other things) to exist.

Second, when I say, Scrum, it’s the Scrum that was created by Schwaber and Sutherland. The Scrum that’s defined in the Scrum Guide. That has been periodically updated by those two esteemed gentlemen.

Third, when I say Scrum, it’s the Scrum that has created/inspired a certification frenzy across:

  • Scrum Alliance

  • Scrum.org

  • Scaled Agile

  • PMI

  • SCRUMstudy

  • Scrum Institute 

  • Scrum Inc.

That has inspired literally hundreds of people to jump on the certification trainer bandwagon and doll out as many (typically 2-day class) certifications as possible. Why? Mostly because it’s such a lucrative way to make a living.

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Can There be Too Much of a Good Thing?

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Can There be Too Much of a Good Thing?

I have a good friend, Ryan Ripley, who is an excellent Scrum trainer with Scrum.org (PST). I just attended a workshop with him and it contained lots of Liberating Structures or LS. 

And when I say lots, I mean LOTS!

And he was clearly excited about them and about stringing structures together. In our debriefs, it was almost as if LS was a pattern language for teaching. In other words, how to teach specific, complex topics and how to communicate to a diverse group of students.

Now I’m not an expert on LS, but it seemed as if Liberating Structures was his new favorite technique when it came to teaching.

But was that good?

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Does anybody remember laughter?

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I’m wondering if the #1 metric for agile teams (individuals, groups, organizations) is joy? Or to quote Robert Plant – Does anybody remember laughter? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZB4hPyPR2M

I’ve often reminisced in my classes that I started developing software for the sheer joy of it. I had fun doing it. It was creative. It was something I could do alone and within teams. It was something that created something useful for a customer/requester and I could deliver it to them and see how it delivered value. It brought me joy.

Then somewhere along my journey, the bean counters took over. As did the project managers. The folks who micromanaged me, putting more stock in estimates than the work itself. Folks who, in many cases, didn’t have a clue as to what I was doing. They started pushing me for artificial dates and telling me the wrong thing to build. They didn’t listen to me or treat me like I was a partner. I became a software developing cog in their machine.

Then, I lost my joy.

Developing software became a job, a chore, and joyless. I lost the excitement and fun.

Then in the mid-1990’s, I discovered agile. The manifesto, Extreme Programming, the agile mindset, and a new, more inclusive way to create teams that delivered valuable software. And something magical happened.

I got my joy back. Building software became fun again. Was it challenging, and hard, and sometimes aggravating? Yes. But my overall feeling was again one of joy.

That agile was the best way to build software. And, just as I was feeling good again, then it happened…

Again, I lost my joy.

Enter…The Agile Industrial Complex

Lately agile isn’t fun anymore! It’s lost its joy.

One reason for that is the Agile Industrial Complex that is selling:

  • Certifications,

  • Training,

  • Coaching,

  • Frameworks,

  • And Bears…Oh My!

For huge sums of money. It appears that they’ve lost their way and that the dollars are driving much of what they do. Instead of leading with agile basics and principles – both personal and agile. 

There is so much failure in the world around agility. Given the money to be made, charlatans are popping up everywhere. They claim to be experienced, but they’re not. They claim to deliver a magical performance result. They can’t. And client success suffers as a result.

In particular, the scaling frameworks drive me crazy. Everyone seems to want a Silver Bullet solution for scaling with SAFe leading the way. Here are my final thoughts on that.

And the bean counters seem to be taking over agile. Along with managers, the Agile PMO, project managers, and everyone else who is trying to take away the spirit of the agile team.

Several others have written about the Agile Industrial Complex and warned against its joylessness -

Wrapping Up

But I’m hopeful.

I’m hopeful that there are initiatives afoot that will bring about another era of agile in practice. One that gets back to the roots of the thing. A back to basics if you will. And, one that reemerges the joyfulness.

I’m looking for my joy and I’m hopeful that I will find it again. And does anyone remember laughter?

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.

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You’re WRONG, Jeff!

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You’re WRONG, Jeff!

I saw this post from Jeff Gothelf.

https://medium.com/@jboogie/fixed-time-fixed-scope-projects-always-end-in-1-of-3-ways-none-of-them-good-9fa66e7d129e 

In which he says that Fixed Time & Scope projects end in one of 3-ways:

  1. We move the deadline

  2. We reduce scope

  3. We implement “crunch mode”, everybody puts in 80-hour weeks till the deadline, burns out, quits and goes to work somewhere else.

I want to respond to Jeff’s thoughts…

First, option #3 is was coined by Ed Yourdon as a Death March. I personally like the imagery that inspires.

Second, I agree 100% with his 3-alternatives. They seem almost as absolute as gravity in software projects.

But he goes on in the article to make the point that Product Management is primarily responsible for these problems.  

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Oxymoron?

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Am I the only one who really struggles with the terms:

  • Agile Project Manager?

  • Agile PMO (Project Management Office)?

I see them being used all of the time. I encounter them in adds for open positions and in organizations who are striving to introduce agility. The terminology seems to be pervasive.

But at the same time, if you put on an agile mindset, they seem to be oxymorons.

It’s not the People

And my beef isn’t with the people filling those roles. It’s with the role and responsibilities associated with them.

Here’s another “Test”

One side-effect of using these terms, and I hear it all the time, is the organizations also use the term resources to refer to their people.

Again, this terminology doesn’t align with an agile mindset.

Wrapping Up

It’s simple. Really it is.

If your organizations is moving down the road to aligning with agile principles and the mindset. Then you really don’t need project managers and a PMO.

Instead you need accountable, self-directed, and trusted teams who have a goal and understand the importance of transparency.

And you need leaders who support them, get out of the way, and expect great things. With no real need for “projects and project management”.

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.

BTW: Here’s an article by Anthony Mersino that not only supports my point, but does a MUCH better job of communicating it. Please take the time to read it - https://vitalitychicago.com/blog/myth-agile-project-manager/

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SAFe No Longer - My Final Farewell

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SAFe No Longer - My Final Farewell

I saw a note on LinkedIn the other day about the implementation roadmap on the Scaled Agile website. I followed it here -

https://www.scaledagileframework.com/implementation-roadmap/

I found a really nice diagram that reminded me of the children’s game Chutes and Ladders. It had a wavy path for folks to follow in order to successfully implement SAFe.  

As I looked at the diagram, I imagined $$$ at specific points where the SAFe folks (Scaled Agile proper, consulting firms, SPC consultants, tooling firms, etc.) could “cash in” on SAFe training, consulting, and tooling.

In other words, I followed the path and heard an ongoing CHA-CHING in the air!

And as I looked at it closer, it finally dawned on me that SAFe was no longer safe. It was no longer supporting the essence of the agile manifesto. That it had clearly crossed the chasm from agile-focused framework to agile-buzzword and revenue generation vehicle. I guess the realization hit me that SAFe, while perhaps ok for others, was no longer safe for me to support. Which made me feel sad.

I’VE BEEN TORN FOR 5+ YEARS