Trying to change an organization too fast or to too much tends to result in no change it at all. In fact, attempting to transition a company to a new method can cause an organization to go in reverse: it becomes less functional.

In an earlier blog, How to Affect Change,I discussed this as the balance of the need for change against the fear of change. Extending these concepts, I want to look at the relationship between the amount of change attempted with the effectiveness of those attempts (see the figure below).  read more »

It is essential that teams understand what the business value of the stories they are working on is. We must always remember that the software we are developing is useless, in and of itself. What is useful is what it enables – either by our customers (if we are a product company) or by our own staff using it (if we are in IT). Stories always need to be pieces of the business solutions – either providing it or creating the infrastructure to provide it.  read more »

I had an interesting conversation with Masa Maeda of Shojiki Solutions a few days ago. Somewhere in the conversation the observation that a kanban board was a value stream map (VSM) was mentioned. A value stream map shows your workflow as well as the time it takes to do the work. Here is a simple example:

 Reflections on a New Year: Part 2

 Going beyond Scrum: Part1

Chapter 5 of the new book, Lean-Agile Software Development: Achieving Enterprise Agility, discusses "Going beyond Scrum." This is a big chapter, so we are going to take it in two parts. First, we want to consider the implications of the maturing and segmentation of the Scrum community and two key factors required for being able to scale Scrum to an enterprise: taking a systemic approach and looking at the team holistically, how it fits with and must work within the organization. Next time, we will look at kanban, managing the flow of work, and using the Scrum clinic to (reusing) good practices learned by others.  read more »

Before you read on, let me give a disclaimer.  This is not intended to be read by anyone who provides Scrum training or consulting.  If you are a Scrum trainer or coach, please stop reading now.  This is for those of you who have been trying to implement Scrum and are having challenges in doing so. This is especially to those of you who call yourselves (or are called by others) “Scrum Butters” (that is, those who do Scrum but). If you are in this latter category, please read on.  My message has three parts:

Virginia Satir said that people prefer familiarity over comfort.  The equivalent of this in transitioning organizations seems to be that people prefer pain over fear.  That is, the current pain they are experiencing over the fear of what change may be. Here are some thoughts I've had about changing organizations.

Most people don’t change unless there is a compelling reason for them to change. This compelling reason usually takes the form of current pain they want to relieve or a fear of future pain they want to avoid. Change itself, however, is painful to most.

 Reflections on a New Year: Part 1

The beginning of the year is a natural time to think about what is coming in the year. Alan Shalloway shares his thoughts about some of the areas in which Net Objectives will be investing its energy and thought as we help to serve our partners and customers.  In addition to our normal areas of training and coaching in Lean, Agile, acceptance test-driven development, design patterns, and process improvement. But what else? In this podcast, Alan and I talk about two key areas where we are going to be investing our energy: Kanban and what it takes to help enterprises and teams make the transition.    read more »

There is a division in the agile community about whether one should rely on people or focus on people supported by systemic thinking (no one I know of suggests systems alone are enough). This debate is often the people over process Vs. people and process (or as Don Reinertsen would say people times process). I've been in the agile community for some time and have seen some interesting things that I think shed some light on this debate. This long-time perspective has enabled me to see an interesting pattern.  read more »

Note: In reviewing this blog I do notice it sounds a little like an advertisement because I've described things from the perspective of what Net Objectives has done. However, I believe it is important to describe actual events and not theory. Most of what I write about comes from my own experience and the experience of other Net Objectives consultants. I describe what we have done to create the context for what we've learned. I am proud of our success and am merely trying to explain the tone.