This post was adapted from episode 123 of the Troubleshooting Agile podcast with Jeffrey Fredrick and Douglas Squirrel. We’re continuing with our tour through Agile Conversations and we’re up to the fear conversation. That’s when I remember enjoying writing some of the stories. And fear is really important because it’s so foundational. I consider this the original sin of unproductive conversations, in a sense. It’s kind of the root of why our conversations so often go astray. In the … [Read more...]
Trust and Test Driven-Development for People
This post was adapted from Episode 122 of the Troubleshooting Agile Podcast. This is number three in our series as we go through our new book, Agile Conversations. We’re up to Chapter Three and this chapter’s all about trust. One of the things we were having a challenge with was finding something new to say about trust, because we’ve said so much about it. You can listen and read to some of our past thoughts on trust here: The First Thing to Build is Trust Be Predictable to Build … [Read more...]
Conversations: How to Improve and Why You Won’t
This post was adapted from Episode 121 of the Troubleshooting Agile Podcast. Continuing our tour of our new book Agile Conversations, we come to our chapter on the foundational method for conversational analysis, the Four Rs. We briefly explain the value of conversational analysis, and share our observation that even highly motivated people who know how much it can help their agile teams find it hard to actually pull out a piece of paper and do an analysis. The reasons for this are very … [Read more...]
Software Factory to Feature Factory
This post was adapted from Episode 120 of the Troubleshooting Agile Podcast. The Taylorist Mindset and its Outcomes In the Taylorist mindset, management is there to debug the machine of the company. The workers are interchangeable parts. And the job of management is to fine tune the machine and monitor all of the parts to make sure they’re compliant and doing what they’re told. There is a role for motivation here. But the only motivation is negative. Just make sure that people know … [Read more...]
Undoing IT Silos: How the “Walled Garden” Anti-Pattern Gets Started
Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick are the authors of Agile Conversations. This is an excerpt from their recent article in MIT Sloan Management Review, Solving the Problem of Siloed IT in Organizations. Learn more at ConversationalTransformation.com. In the past decade, the growing understanding of the importance of technology to business has led to a surge in business transformations—whether the flavor is digital, DevOps, Lean, or Agile, the aim is to speed up software development by … [Read more...]
You Need More Conflict, Not Less
By Agile Conversations authors Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick. When teams first adopt Agile, Lean, or DevOps practices, they often think that they’ll have less conflict with the new methodology. “We’ll stop fighting over deadlines because we’ll estimate the work first,” they say, or “Work in Progress limits will mean we don’t get overloaded.” Surprise! The estimates and limits and tests usually lead to more clashes, not fewer—and this is a good thing, because the conflicts give us … [Read more...]
Strengthen Your Conversations Skills with Remote Work
BY AGILE CONVERSATIONS AUTHORS DOUGLAS SQUIRREL AND JEFFREY FREDRICK Collaboration is built on skills, and you can build those skills through deliberate practice. This growth mindset view is particularly useful in our world of suddenly enforced remote working. Remote collaboration is more demanding and unfamiliar to a lot of people who are experiencing it for the first time. Responding to these new challenges with a fixed mindset, taking the view that remote working is just hard and … [Read more...]
Take The Slow Lane To Build Trust
By Agile Conversations authors Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick Congratulations—you’ve decided to improve trust with someone at work. It could be the project manager who sets deadlines without consulting you, or that customer who’s complaining endlessly that you don’t deliver sufficient quality, or the star salesperson who sells features the company can’t deliver. Whoever it is and whatever the symptoms of the lack of trust, the first rule is—SLOW DOWN. When we talk to clients about … [Read more...]
A Note from the Authors of Agile Conversations
Hello friends! After years of research, learning, and practice, we’re so glad that we can finally bring you Agile Conversations. It started for us in a small study group, seeking to improve our own communication skills. Encouraged by our initial success, we began working with others. Now, after working with more than 100 companies and thousands of individuals, we’re confident these skills can radically and rapidly change the dynamics in an organization. Along the way we’ve seen far too many … [Read more...]
Conversations: Humanity’s Secret Weapon
Adapted from the upcoming Agile Conversations by Douglas Squirrel and Jeffrey Fredrick. Our Special Power In his book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, Yuval Noah Harari explores what has allowed humans to become the dominant species on the planet. His answer is that we have a special kind of communication, unique among animals. Many animals can communicate the idea “Run away from the lion!” through barks, chirps, or movement. Building on top of that, the development of human and … [Read more...]
