Zen Project Management

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What is a Team

Zen Project Management

The last couple posts have focused on teams, but I haven't addressed a basic question; What is a Team? I ran cross-country in college, so I was on the team, but was it really a team? On days we had meets, it was really everyone for themselves out their on the course. Once we left the starting line, I would see little of my other teammates until we all finished the race.

Defining 130
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What is the Right Team Size?

Zen Project Management

Team in front of Computer Code, generated by DALL-E 2 What is the right size for a team? Can it be too big or too small? I worked with a team once that had 3 developers. They spent most their time mob programming in front of a 42 inch monitor, taking turns at the keyboard. They didn't need to do traditional stand-ups because they were swarming around one thing at a time.

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Even the Best Chefs can't make a bad recipe taste good; why someone else's Agile Transformation recipe may not work for you

Zen Project Management

I've been reflecting on some of the agile transformations I've been involved in over the past few years. In some cases, I see some real progress made. Other times it seems like just re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. An organization follows some recipe, but they don't get the results. Why? I was working with a large financial institution. They had adopted the "Spotify Model" (yes I know, it's not a real thing) and after that they adopted another scaling framework.

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Is it Time for Holacracy?

Zen Project Management

I was doing some research last weekend on Holacracy for a course I’m developing for University of California - Irvine Extension. I have been teaching for them for about 8 years now and I’m helping update their agile class offering. Holacracy really turns the industrial revolution style of organization on its head. Rather than leadership making the decisions for the workers to execute, the decision making is really pushed down to the people doing the work.

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What the Military can teach us about Sprint Planning

Zen Project Management

As a coach, I've seen many Sprint Planning sessions. Some are more effective than others. When it comes to planning, the military has a long history and we can learn a few things from them. Plans are worthless, but planning is everything - Dwight Eisenhower I have always interpreted the meaning behind this quote by Eisenhower to mean that through the act of planning, we gain a shared understanding of what we are attempting to do; the plan itself may change, but the goal won't The military talks

Planning 100
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Getting Rusty

Zen Project Management

I was in the Moab, Utah area last weekend and got some mountain biking in. I haven't spent a lot of time mountain biking this year so I was a bit rusty. By the second day I was starting to get my rhythm but it took a little time. Just like mountain biking, our agile skills can get rusty. I ran a Lean Coffee last week and before it I read a couple articles because I hadn't done a Lean Coffee in a while and wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything.

Lean 100
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If You're Going to Offshore, Get it Right

Zen Project Management

In general, I prefer having fully co-located teams but I've been working with a number of organizations that use off-shoring as part of their delivery model. Some have the right approach, others are missing the mark. When one organization I worked with decided to move to a Scrum framework, they were also setting up an off-shore model with developers in India.

SCRUM 100