Deborah Hartmann Preuss

Culture & Methods

Lean + Real Options = Reduced Complexity and Risk

Real Options, a decision-making process based on Financial Option mathematics, was mentioned by Kent Beck in his 1999 "white book," Extreme Progamming Explained. More recently, Agilists have been exploring how Real Options intersects with Agile. Now Chris Matts and Olav Maassen specifically address the Lean Software community, proposing that application of Real Options improves Lean Development.

Teaching Games - Fun or Serious Business?

Michael McCullough and Don McGreal, creators of the Tasty Cupcakes teaching games website, have published an article on "Fun Driven Development." The economic downturn hasn't squeezed these games out of our training programs - in fact, they've become a staple where Agilists gather to exchange ideas. Here's a little history and some starting points for using games with your teams.

ScrumBan - Evolution or Oxymoron?

Kanban workshops, courses and conferences are springing up, and practicing Agilists are investigating what this method, adapted from Lean, offers their teams. Attractive benefits are cited, from revealing bottlenecks to happy teams experiencing more "flow". But thought leaders warn that Kanban's laid back approach is "kryptonite" to Scrum's call to resolve impediments immediately.

Is Leading Self-Organisation like Conducting an Orchestra?

Traditional management models don't tell leaders how to support their Agile teams without undermining their emerging self-organisation. Allusions to musical performance and "conducting the orchestra" abound - but not all are in agreement. Is the "conductor" model a good practice or an anti-pattern? In his TED talk, conductor Itay Talman shows that it may depend on what we think a conductor does.

Ladies: Please, Would You Submit a Proposal?

Although it's widely accepted that diversity leads to innovation and performance, visible leadership in the IT community often doesn't represent the diversity of the community itself. What can be done to increase diversity in the leadership of our high-tech communities? One suggestion is to actively help a more diverse group to get their talks accepted at conferences.

Forrester Releases Free Research Report on Lean for Business

Forrester Research, in preparation for their Business Technology Forum next week, has released an analyst report for free download, entitled "Lean: The New Business Technology Imperative." Aimed at management, it discusses Lean as a whole-business imperative, and its impact on IT, cautioning: "Don’t get so caught up in eliminating waste that you forget to create value and increase flexibility."

Retrospective of Retrospectives

Once all your teams use Agile and are busy implementing local improvements, what happens to the larger organization formerly called "IT" or "Systems Development"? A coach with a large Agile program shared the strategy they designed to let the larger community spot trends and benefit from all this learning. Paulo Caroli calls it "Retrospective of Retrospectives".

Stanford Study Shows: Maxi-Multitaskers' Performance Impaired

A Stanford University study confirms that multitasking is definitely counterproductive: maxi-multitaskers fared worst in several standard tests. Agile implementors take note: there's good reason to urge each team to work on one product, with one product owner - splitting time across many tasks is a less effective way to work.