Troubleshooting Agile

With a pandemic raging around the world, how can you and your agile team make sense of the world around you and adjust accordingly? The Cynefin framework gives you a way to categorise known and unknown information and figure out how to approach and change your work appropriately. We describe the framework (including how to pronounce Cynefin!) and explain how you might use it to help your agile team cope and even thrive in a challenging environment. SHOW LINKS: - The Cynefin framework: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynefin_framework - Detailed Cynefin drawing by Edwin Stoop: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynefin_framework#/media/File:Cynefin_framework_by_Edwin_Stoop.jpg - James Gleick Chaos book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos:_Making_a_New_Science Episode transcript: https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/posts/cynefinsensemaking/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a free video when you join our m

When a client tells Squirrel "of course there are no releases on Fridays", it's a red rag to a bull. After Squirrel rants for a bit, he calms down and we argue strongly for releasing often, even when it hurts—in fact particularly when it's difficult!—to "bring the pain forward" (Jez Humble). SHOW LINKS: - Jez Humble on doing painful things more often: https://continuousdelivery.com/ - Dr. David Burns on anxiety and exposure: https://feelinggood.com/tag/exposure/ Episode transcript: https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/posts/doreleaseonfridays/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a free video when you join our mailing list! 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us at info@conversationaltransformation.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (or just like and subscribe), you'll find us here: itunes.app

Following up from last week, we propose some ways to become emotionally aware, which we argue again is a key skill for success in an agile team. We suggest enriching your feeling vocabulary, self-distancing through disciplined recording of your conversations, and using check-in methods to spread the practise across your team. SHOW LINKS: - Center for Nonviolent Communication Feelings Inventory: https://www.cnvc.org/training/resource/feelings-inventory - David Burns Feeling Chart: https://feelinggood.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Feeling-Words-Chart-with-Five-Secrets-v-2.pdf - The Four Rs: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/learning-through-case-studies-the-4-rs - Check In from the Core Protocols: https://liveingreatness.com/files/core-protocols-3.03.html#check-in Episode transcript: https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/posts/emotionalawareness/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a f

Prompted by a listener, we look at a tool from Jim Dethmer called The Line. This leads us to discuss the value of being emotionally self-aware with a variety of examples from our recent consulting practise and bringing in several tools for increasing this awareness, including Six Thinking Hats, the Ladder of Inference, and the Core Protocols. SHOW LINKS: - Jim Dethmer on "Leading Above the Line": https://fs.blog/jim-dethmer/ - Naive realism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Na%C3%AFve_realism - Feeling Good podcast on "Hidden Emotion": https://feelinggood.com/2020/02/24/181-live-therapy-with-sarah-shrinks-have-feelings-too/ - London Organisational Learning meetup: https://www.meetup.com/London-Action-Science-Meetup/ - Ladder of Inference: https://www.foresightdesign.org/blog/2017/12/21/what-does-the-ladder-of-inference-even-mean - Six Thinking Hats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Thinking_Hats - Core Protocols check-in: https://liveingreatness.com/files/core-protocols-3.03.html#check-in - Past episode on tra

How do you know if a software team is any good? How can you compare teams and the commercial value they are producing? And what are metrics good for anyway? We discuss these, especially the latter, concluding that metrics are triggers for questions not answers in themselves. We look at burn-up and burn-down charts and cycle time, though none of these are fully satisfying. SHOW LINKS: - Phases of team activity: https://image.slidesharecdn.com/2015-150507130312-lva1-app6891/95/agile-is-for-wimps-toplevel-software-development-in-the-21st-century-19-638.jpg?cb=1431003851 - Burn-up and burn-down charts: https://stayrelevant.globant.com/en/why-you-should-use-burn-up-chart-in-agile-instead/ - Cycle time: https://codeclimate.com/blog/software-engineering-cycle-time/ - Momentum vs urgency: http://testobsessed.com/2020/02/momentum-urgency/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a free video when you join our maili

A listener asks us what to do when a story takes longer than one sprint. Our suggestions involve turpentine, slicing elephants and walking skeletons. SHOW LINKS: - Story splitting: https://agileforall.com/new-story-splitting-resource/ - Elephant carpaccio: https://alistair.cockburn.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Elephant-Carpaccio-exercise-instructions.pdf - Walking Skeleton: https://gojko.net/2014/06/09/forget-the-walking-skeleton-put-it-on-crutches/ - Feature thinning: http://www.agilekiwi.com/other/agile/feature-thinning/ - Unmade: http://unmade.com - Releasing 50x/day: http://timothyfitz.com/2009/02/10/continuous-deployment-at-imvu-doing-the-impossible-fifty-times-a-day/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a free video when you join our mailing list! 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/

We tell the story of a company demanding that developers finish a huge project "so they can test it just once", and then explain why this is only a good idea if you intend to shield yourself from all learning. SHOW LINKS: - The Goal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Goal_(novel) - Externalities: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order and get a free video when you join our mailing list! 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (or just like and subscribe), you'll find us here: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/troubleshooting-agile/id1327456890?mt=2

Squirrel tells the story of the most painful manual testing experience he's ever been part of, and we discuss the value of manual testing, how humans differ from machines, and approaches to application verification that don't involve torture. SHOW LINKS: - Cockburn's "Characterizing people as non-linear 1st order components in software development": https://ameyakarve.wordpress.com/2012/07/22/characterizing-people-as-non-linear-1st-order-components-in-software-development-cockburn-us/ - The Unicorn Project: https://itrevolution.com/the-unicorn-project/ - Testing vs Checking: https://www.satisfice.com/blog/archives/856 - Exploratory testing: https://www.satisfice.com/exploratory-testing - Explore It!: https://pragprog.com/book/ehxta/explore-it - CITCON: https://citconf.com/ - CruiseControl: http://cruisecontrol.sourceforge.net/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devop

Squirrel's client is struggling to deliver because product managers are a bottleneck. The Theory of Constraints gives us a framework for addressing these problems - and typing faster or adding developers are not part of the solution! SHOW LINKS: - The Goal: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/113934.The_Goal - Theory of Constraints; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_constraints - Subordinating to the constraint: http://www.sixsigmatrainingconsulting.com/six-sigma-tools/3rd-step-subordinate-all-other-tasks-to-the-constraint/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (o

No matter how safe you make your retrospectives and other discussions, if your team don't have the skills to share information, you're running a substantial risk that someone will withhold information and you'll make a less than informed decision. We discuss ways to acquire and use information-sharing skills yourself and with your team. SHOW LINKS: - Blog post on withholding information: https://softwarelifecycle.wordpress.com/2020/01/16/withholding-information/ - Google on psychological safety: https://rework.withgoogle.com/guides/understanding-team-effectiveness/steps/foster-psychological-safety/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.co

We talk to Mirco Hering about agile dogmatism, the value of diversity, how to experiment with your processes, using stories to drive change, and his book Devops for the Modern Enterprise. SHOW LINKS: - Crossing the Chasm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_the_Chasm - Devops for the Modern Enterprise: https://itrevolution.com/book/devops_modern_enterprise/ - Mirco: https://twitter.com/mircohering *** 
Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (or just like and subscribe), you'll find us here: itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/troub…d1327456890?mt=2

A special episode - audio of our talk on "conversational transformation" at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit. Practical steps you can take today to get your team on track to a successful digital/agile/devops transformation, using effective if difficult conversations. - Video of the talk and info on the book: https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/ *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (or just like and subscribe), you'll find us here: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/troubleshooting-agile/id1327456890?mt=2

After Squirrel argued passionately in a previous episode that non-functional requirements should be eliminated, we invite medtech expert and portfolio CTO Alex Hudson to visit and describe why he finds NFRs helpful. It turns out that the two positions are closer together than we might have thought, and we get fascinating stories about medical device design and 30-second page loads along the way. SHOW LINKS: - Alex Hudson: https://twitter.com/ealexhudson and https://alexhudson.com/ - Previous rant episode: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/squirrels-rant - Twitter debate with Alex: https://twitter.com/douglassquirrel/status/1207400245002457090 - The "ilities": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-functional_requirement *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear a

We review our holiday reading and watching plans for listeners who might want to join us in exploring lean and agile ideas over the break. We also list our top 5 episodes from 2019 and preview a few events planned for 2020. SHOW LINKS: - Ed Catmull on conversations and other challenges at Pixar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2h2lvhzMDc - Kent Beck on throughput vs latency: https://medium.com/@kentbeck_7670/inefficient-efficiency-5b3ab5294791 - Mark Schwartz, War and Peace and IT: https://itrevolution.com/war-and-peace-and-it/ https://twitter.com/schwartz_cio - Subscribed by Tien Tzuo and Gabe Weisert.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subscribed_(book) - The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Lencioni : https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21343.The_Five_Dysfunctions_of_a_Team - Lean Thinking by Womack and Jones: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/289467.Lean_Thinking - The Phoenix Project by Gene Kim : https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17255186-the-phoenix-project - The Unicorn Project by Gene Kim : https

Squirrel gets hot under the collar about non-functional "requirements", and after he gets his rant off his chest, we discover NFRs are all too often just excuses to avoid a conversation. In addition, we touch on the "ilities", security, and ethical considerations for software developers. SHOW LINKS: - The "ilities": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-functional_requirement *** 
Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us a review on iTunes (or just like and subscribe), you'll find us here: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/troubleshooting-agile/id1327456890?mt=2

Mark Schwartz, author of War and Peace and IT, describes his experience in the CIO trenches, where low trust between "the business" and IT bogs the organisation down in lengthy acquisition processes and contract negotiations rather than delivering business objectives. We touch on value stream mapping, how to use devops and its relatives devsecops and finops, briefing and back briefing, and what we see as the root of the disconnect between business and tech, a lack of trust. SHOW LINKS: - Mark Schwartz, War and Peace and IT: https://itrevolution.com/war-and-peace-and-it/ https://twitter.com/schwartz_cio - Value Stream Map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value-stream_mapping - Briefing and Back Briefing: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Art-Action-Leaders-between-Actions/dp/1857885597 *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.yo

Last week, Domenica DeGrandis talked with us about making work visible. Today, we distinguish that idea from a related one, that of making your *output* visible. How can your team show its results frequently? What symptoms indicate that this might help you? What results can you expect from showing meaningful business value often? SHOW LINKS: - Domenica's Making Work Visible book: https://itrevolution.com/book/making-work-visible/ - Lean Thinking: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lean-Thinking-Banish-Create-Corporation/dp/0743231643 - Genchi Genbutsu: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genchi_Genbutsu - Alistair Cockburn on Elephant Carpaccio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lNvr2RWbFo *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! New video of us at the Las Vegas Devops Enterprise Summit 2019 is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the sho

Sunday is the new Monday, and that’s a bad thing - says our guest today, Dominica DeGrandis, author of Making Work Visible. How can you move from default yes to an effective, smooth flow of work? Dominica addresses this question while touching on queueing theory, empathy, and hope! SHOW LINKS: - Dominica’s Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/dominicad - Domenica’s web site: https://ddegrandis.com/ - Kanban book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kanban-Successful-Evolutionary-Technology-Business/dp/0984521402/ref=asc_df_0984521402/ - Queueing theory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queueing_theory - Paul Graham on Maker and Manager Schedules: http://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html
 *** 
 Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! 
 We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show. 
 Email us: see link on troubleshootingagile.com 
 Tweet us: twitter.com/TShootingAgile 
 Also, if you'd like to leave us

Have you ever "flipped the bozo bit" on someone, concluding that he or she is completely clueless and communication is hopeless? We tell some tales of bozo bits we've seen flipped, describe some causes and consequences including the idea of "duelling ladders", and suggest how to get out of the bozo bit trap. SHOW LINKS: - The Bozo Bit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bozo_bit - Jim McCarthy's book on the Bozo Bit: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dynamics-Software-Development-Jim-McCarthy/dp/1556158238 - Previous episode on the Ladder of Inference: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/introspection-with-the-ladder-of-inference - Fear is the Mind Killer: https://dune.fandom.com/wiki/Litany_Against_Fear - Squirrel and Jeffrey speaking on Conversational Transformation at DOES Las Vegas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMT_Tqzf_vc *** Our new book, Agile Conversations, will be out in May 2020! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can pre-order! We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or fe

Today we finish our conversation with author, podcaster, and DevOps expert John Willis https://twitter.com/botchagalupe . John covers a wide variety of topics at lightning speed, including: SHA - a hash algorithm, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SHA-1 CAB - Change Advisory Board, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change-advisory_board Jim Benson on Kanban - http://personalkanban.com/pk/about-us/team/jim-benson/ Andreesen on “software eating the world” - https://a16z.com/2011/08/20/why-software-is-eating-the-world/ Knight Capital disaster - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight_Capital_Group#2012_stock_trading_disruption CAMS - https://medium.com/@brunodelb/the-cams-model-to-better-understand-the-devops-movement-ffe6713c3fd7 Deming 14 points - https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newSTR_75.htm Peter Senge 5th Discipline - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fifth_Discipline Equifax breach - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-49070596 Air France 447 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flig