David Morris on Lean Leadership, Change, Governance, and Coaching
People often use the terms agile and lean interchangeably, as if they are the same thing. They are not. Others assume that if you are doing one then you are doing the other. This is partly true, although they are quite different concepts that come from different sources. While applying lean principles to agile development … Continue reading Stop trying to make agile development too lean
Too many people still seem to adopt Scrum by going through the motions, like playing a game of soccer at school because its the team sports lesson. Of course, better results are achieved when players are serious about improving their ball skills and team behaviors. They become invested in the outcome. How do we shift … Continue reading Why adopting Scrum is more than a game
This week, I passed my Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Agilist certification, with a score of 89% (46 questions out of 52 right). Whilst I am happy to have added a better understanding of another approach to scaling agility in large organizations, not everyone shares my enthusiasm. Hardly a day goes by without this luminary or that … Continue reading Becoming a SAFe Agilist
Should key terms be written with leading capitals or in sentence case? Should someone be known as a Product Owner or product owner? We are used to so many of the terms we encounter and use day-to-day being capitalized. Articles, course, and books all scream them. Why is this? Are these really proper nouns or is it just marketing … Continue reading The over capitalization of Scrum
Wait? What? Did I read that right? One hundred and one techniques? Sounds like a lot. Are you sure? Scrum, as we know, is a framework for iterative and incremental feedback-driven product development. A framework provides only the bare bones within which we can follow a number of different practices to achieve the same ends. … Continue reading 101 techniques for product discovery and delivery in Scrum
Communities of Practice are great, right? Whether you call them Guilds, Centres of Excellence, or Special Interest Groups -- it is good to create a space for people who share a common discipline to support their joint professional development. But what happens if these sit in isolated pockets? Welcome to the headache of Villages of Practice. The benefits of communities … Continue reading How to avoid siloed villages of practice
Following the 2015 success of 'Agile Project Management in easy steps', I was asked to write a book on Scrum. Two years later it has now been published and will be available through most booksellers and websites, as well as electronically. However it was not a certainty that I would do this. Firstly, when I … Continue reading Scrum in easy steps
Ever been confused over what people are talking about when they use the terms capabilities, competencies, and capacity? In everyday business communications these terms are often used interchangeably. Even the thesaurus and dictionary definitions suggest they are alternatives for each other. What is this about? Of course, language evolves and meanings shift gently with each new generation. There is a risk, though, … Continue reading Understanding Capability, Competence, and Capacity
While our delivery teams focus on designing, building, and testing product increments, we can pretty much guarantee that unforeseen problems will block their work. Once these have occurred, we call these impediments, because they impede work, but while they are potential, we call them risks. It is good practice to identify risks and impediments as … Continue reading Four steps to agile risk management
I have been quiet for a while, and this is largely because through the last nine months I have been completing my masters thesis on strategic business agility. This is vital today, as organisations face turbulence caused by so many factors like digital disruption, climate change, financial crises, regulatory change. Yet nearly two-thirds of organisations attempting to change … Continue reading Barriers to agile transformation