I’ve been invited to present a 90-minute session about Games Facilitation at Deep Agile 2010. And so I would like to exercise the Wisdom of Crowds and ask you this: what do you want to learn about Games Facilitation and why? Reply by submitting a comment (or two!) and I’ll convert them into a set of presentation goals with acceptance criteria.

All ideas by 1 May please! Many thanks and hope to see you at Deep Agile 2010. Be there or be square!

Ahead of Marketing

It was great to have celebrated this April Fool’s Day by seeing Seth Godin present ‘Ahead of Marketing’ live in Antwerp, Belgium. The event was organised by Flanders DC (District of Creativity) with around 1000 attendees awaiting with bated breath to hear words of inspiration from one of the most famous marketers around.

Seth Godin in Short

Seth shared 7 core messages with the audience:

1. Abandon instructions. According to Seth, we’re all conditioned to strive for mediocrity from school age. It’s this conditioning that stops many of us from daring to be remarkable. We set our own limits.

2. Do work that matters. Seth urged us to make a difference regardless of our job title. Make solving interesting problems a key part of our job.

3. Become an artist. Make a splash of genius by solving a problem like no one ever has before. Make people think. Instead of treating our jobs as a mere means to an end, we should use it as a platform for our ‘art’.

4. Real art demands courage. ‘Art that matters always involves going the other way,’ said Seth.

5. Ship! Ship! Ship! Real artists ship their creations. Ship early and often.

6. Give gifts. Paint pictures. Make the world better.  Give away your art often. Giving makes you create more.

7. Teach people to lead. Seth invited us to begin by leading ourselves. And to encourage others to do the same.

My Takeaway in Market Speak

Practice the gift of giving. Be generous to be better.

Out in the Field

Imagine. You wake up. It’s Friday. It’s almost the weekend. The first thing you see is a blanket of bright white snow. With a deep breath, you take in the tranquil setting. You feel quietly envigorated. A thought light as a snowflake forms in the snowdome of your mind. Yes. Today’s the day. Today marks a fresh start. A new beginning.

And the thought? It is this: ‘I can be better than I was yesterday.’ This thought always takes me back to the Agile Values. Seven simple words. Communication, Simplicity, Feedback, Courage, Respect, Trust and Transparency. How many of us know these words by heart? Words that trip off the tongue so smoothly when times are good? Those same seven words that become a thorn in our side when we come under pressure, leaving us deflated?

Thinking, Being and Doing

In Agile, Retrospectives are a good way to take time out and reflect. To have a good root around our minds to make sense of what we have done, what has come to pass and what we intend to do going forward. It’s a chance for others to show you what you cannot see for yourself. It’s an opportunity for putting those seven values into practice.

And what about the actions we can take to improve? We don’t have to wait for snow. We don’t even have to wait for a new day or  a new year. The moment is Now.

I feel under the weather. May be it’s just a passing chill I’ve caught. Truth be told, I’ve not been feeling my usual cheery self of late. I just don’t feel right.

But that’s enough about me. How have you been? How are you feeling? May be you’re a bit fed up with it all. Are there times when you wish you had more money? Or may be you dream of being revered by the masses? Perhaps you wish you could hide the signs of ageing? If your answer is ‘Yes’ to at least one of these 3 questions, then I have some bad news. You may have contracted Affluenza, the nastiest of viruses to be sweeping the English-speaking world. Don’t worry though. We have plenty for company.

A Society Under the Weather?

According to Oliver James, author of Affluenza, the Affluenza virus is defined by a pre-occupation with money. The Affluenza virus values consist of Money, Possession, Physical and Social Appearances and Fame. The virus is the product ‘Selfish Capitalism’ and leads to emotional distress such as anxiety and depression. This emotional distress, in true consumerism ‘Compete-by-Eating-Your-Own-Convenience’ style, further feeds your hunger for Selfish Capitalism. Selfish Capitalism, in turn, magnifies your preoccupation with the virus values. And hey presto! That’s how this vicious cycle keeps going and growing.

But wait! Before you despair because you’ve been lying awake at night wondering why you’ve been feeling so glum about life as you know it, there’s Hope.

Be Brave, Be Bold

Hope comes in the form of returning to the basics. It’s about addressing everyman’s fundamental needs to lead a fulfilling life.

• Feel secure. About who you are and what you have.
• Be authentic. Be yourself and be true to yourself.
• Be autonomous. Do what you love. And do more of it – even if it means you go solo.
• Feel competent. Have confidence in your own abilities. Get in the practice to help that confidence grow.
• Be part of a community. Participate and contribute. Have fun in great company.

Vaccines

Oliver James recommends the following:

1. Have positive volition (not ‘Think Positive’)
2. Replace Virus Motives (with intrinsic ones)
3. Be Beautiful (not attractive)
4. Consume what you need (not what the advertisers tell you)
5. Meet your children’s needs (not those of little adults)
6. Educate your children (don’t brainwash them)
7. Enjoy motherhood (not desperate housewifery/husbandry)
8. But authentic (not sincere), vivacious (not hyperactive) and playful (not game-playing)

Antidotes

If, like me, you’re one of the infected, you need to act fast. Get lots of fresh air. Do more physical exercise. Burn off as many calories as you consume. Do at least one thing you love every day. And, as a friend just reminded me, take stock of all that you have and be thankful for such riches.

How will you transform this winter’s discontent? What will you do to make yours a life less ordinary? Make 2010 a Happy New Year!

Facilitation is a key skill in personal and team effectiveness. A facilitator by definition is someone who makes it easier for others to communicate while maintaining a neutral stance themselves. According to Steve “Doc” List, each of us can choose to adopt the role of facilitator whenever we take part in a discussion, be it at work or at home. Doc demonstrates the complexity of good facilitation in his session Facilitation Patterns and Antipatterns at Agile 2009.

Attributes of a Good Facilitator

A good facilitator:

• Creates an open environment so others can make decisions during the discussions.
• Recognises disruptive behaviour within a group and does something about it (using The Facilitation Four-Step – see below for more details).
• Has no authority.

Good facilitation, according to Doc, means ‘dealing with attitudes and behaviours that lead to more effective meetings so that meetings become more productive and even enjoyable’. It’s not the facilitator’s responsibility to work on motivating others. Instead, a good facilitator recognises negative behaviour and deals with it in a respect way to all those involved.

The Role-Playing Facilitation Patterns and Antipatterns Game

The theory on good facilitation was brought to life by Doc’s meeting game attended by stereotypical meeting-goers.

The game is made up of 13 types of personas (also known as Patterns and Antipatterns depending on your role as meeting facilitator or participant). Each persona has distinct motivations:

• The Benevolent Dictator: ‘I know what’s best for all of you.’
• The Guide: ‘I’m here to hold the lamp and show the way.’
• The Gladiator: ‘It’s all about the combat!’
• Curious George: ‘I’m here to ask not tell.’
• Professor Moriarty: ‘The end, if it’s what I want, justifies the means.’
• The Conclusion Jumper: ‘I don’t need to hear everything you have to say – I’ve got it!’
• The Orator: ‘I’m worth listening to.’
• The Superhero: ‘I’m here to rescue you.’
• Sherlock Holmes: ‘With enough information, we can reach a conclusion.’
• The Repetitor: ‘It’s worth repeating. It’s worth repeating. It’s worth repeating.’
• Switzerland: ‘It’s not up to me.’
• Be Yourself: [Insert your own motto here]
• The Facilitator: Persona who facilitates a practice meeting.

The first round of the game involved each player randomly drawing a card and playing out their persona during a meeting on a given topic (eg ‘We should use Scrum instead of XP’). The player who draws the Facilitator card plays the role of meeting facilitator. The aim of the game is for the group to guess who was playing which persona. Then we played a second round, with each player drawing two cards (instead of only one) and playing both their personas during the meeting. This duality gave each player an additional dimension which made divining the characters based on their behaviours much more difficult.

The Facilitation Four-Step

The Four-Step is useful for faciltators when dealing with negative behaviour during a meeting. Doc recommends taking the following actions when the meeting becomes blocked:

1. Interrupt – Stop the speaker in mid-flow in as polite and as respectful a way as possible.
2. Ask – Ask the speaker to sum up or clarify their point.
3. Redirect – Ask others to share their points-of-view.
4. Commit – Return to the original speaker and double-check with them that they are happy to move in the direction of the rest of the group.

What I Liked About the Session

• The game successfully highlights the importance of what Doc refers to as ‘Collaborative Conversations’, conversations that have 2-way flow, involving talking and listening.
• The game is an excellent example of how experiential learning enables us to gain a deeper understanding of how and why certain skills and techniques work in the real world.
• The session reminds us of the importance of self-awareness, empathy and moderation if we are to play the role of facilitator effectively.

What Would Make the Session Perfect

• I would have liked to play more rounds to improve my facilitation skills.
• I would have liked to learn more about the manifestations of combined personas embodied by an individual and how to deal with the behaviour they exhibit.
• I would have liked to learn more about the personas in terms of Patterns and Antipatterns depending on your role as meeting facilitator or participant.

Afternoon Timeslot 1:

• 14:00 – 15:30 – Learning: the best approaches for your brain with Mark Levison, Linda Rising because understanding how our mind works frees us up to grow.
• 14:00 – 15:30 - “Flirting” With Your Customers with Jenni Dow and Ole Jepsen because I want to understand how the concept of flirting can be used to improve communication at work.
• 14:00 – 15:30 - The Prisoner’s Dilemma: Applying Game Theory to Agile Contracting with Simon Bennett because I want to learn how to use Game theory to create compelling contracts.
• 14:00 – 15:30 – Skills for Agile Designers with Rebecca Wirfs-Brock because I want to learn how Agile Practices can increase the value of UX design.
• 14:00 – 15:30 – Coaching Success: Getting People to Take Responsibility & Demonstrate Ownership with Christopher Avery, Ashley Johnson because I want to learn The Challenge Game to help myself and others grow.

Afternoon Timeslot 2:

• 16:00 – 17:30 – The Business Value Game: How to build and use a Business Value Model with Portia Tung and Pascal Van Cauwenberghe because we creating the highest business value possible is why we do Agile.
• 16:45 – 17:30 – Scrum and CMMI: from Good to Great – are you ready-ready to be done-done with Carsten Jakobsen because it’s important to understand how to leverage the strength of both tools.
• 16:00 – 16:45 – Bob and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (The Biologist’s Tale of Risk and Uncertainty) with Julian Everett because it’s always handy to know multiple techniques for dealing with risk and uncertainty.

No need to look so glum! There are even more Real Options on Day 2 of the conference than Day 1! Marvellous.

On Monday, I wrote: I have yet to make my first choices for the timeslots, I’m keeping my options open for now!

On Tuesday, I’m writing: It’s 6 am Tuesday morning and I’ve refined my shortlist for Day 2 (see emboldened session titles) to at least two options per timeslot based on what I learned on Day 1 and what I need to learn from the remainder of the conference. Of course I don’t have to decide which session until the last responsible moment… just before the session begins or just before the session ends. It’s important to note, however, that the value of each session (Real Option) diminishes depending on when I join the session.

Tuesday, 25 August 2009

Morning:

• 11:00 – 12:30 – Pragmatically “Crossing the Chasm” from Project-level to Enterprise Adoption with Ahmed Sidky and Chris Sterling because for Agile to endure, it has to be adopted across the enterprise.
• 11:00 – 12:30 Release Planning (The Small Card Game): Discover What Works with Chet Hendrickson and Ron Jeffries because I get to play a game run by Chet and Ron!
• 11:00 – 12:30 – The Beer Game with Agile Teams – MIT Game Theory in Agile Project Management with Tom Looy because it’s a great chance to learn about Game theory with a game.
• 11:00 – 12:30 – The Pomodoro Technique: can you focus – really focus – for 25 minutes? with Staffan Noteberg because I’ve been practicing with the tomato and want to use it right.
• 11:00 – 12:30 – Creating “Big Picture” Designs without Big Design by Desiree Sy because getting the approach to UX on Agile projects right gives us a greater chance of delivering the highest possible value to the customer.
• 11:00 – 11:45 Tips and Techniques For Implementing An Agile Program Across Distributed Teams with Tamara Sulaiman because tips and techniques for distributed working offer insight into the nature of team.
• 11:45 – 12.30 – Leveraging Collaborative Tools with Distributed Customer Teams with Luke Hohmann because I want to see which tools are useful in which contexts and why.

Afternoon:

• 14.00 – 15.30 – Facilitation Patterns and Antipatterns with Steve “Doc” List because as an Agile Coach, I’m always looking for ways to improve my facilitation skills.
• 14.00 – 17.30 – Do I Still Have a Job? Roles and Org Structure in an Agile Transition with Alex Pukinskis and Mark Kilby because I’m interested in learning about models of change.
• 16:00 – 16:45 – An Agile Development Team’s Quest for CMMI Maturity Level 5 with with Sean Cohan with Hillel Glazer because I want to understand how Agile and CMMI can complement each other in practice.
• 16:45 – 17:30 – Group Relations & Social Systems with Dan Mezick because I want to learn what Group Relations is and how it can be useful in Agile.
• 16:00 - 17:30 – How to Develop Your Leadership Power Daily: An Agile Approach to Growth with Chris Avery because I want to learn about the mental models from work on the Responsibility Process that I already use with teams.

The conference looks set to get off to a great start with plenty of Real Options on Day 1! Here’s a shortlist of the sessions I’m most curious about. Emboldened session titles indicate my current first choice per timeslot. Putting The Law of Two Feet into practice is always a Real Option, too!

Monday – 24 August 2009

Morning:

• 11:00 – 12:30 – The Agile Playground with Tobias Mayer because it’s a chance to share our games and get new ideas for applying Agile. Pascal, Vera and I already share our games on www.agilecoach.net.
• 11:00 – 12:30 - Workflow is Orthogonal to Schedule with Mary Poppendieck because I’ll learn ways to communicate and deal with a common problem in project planning in order to better manage projects.
• 11:00 – 12:30 – Developing Agile Leaders and Teams: A Developmental & Transformational Path with Gilles Brouillette because I’ll get a roadmap for showing how people can develop their Agile skills as individuals and team members.

Afternoon:

• 14:00-17:30 – Creating Agile Simulations and Games for Coaches and Consultants with Elisabeth Hendrickson and Chris Sims because I love creating games to help myself and others learn more effectively.
• 14:00-14:45 – New Approaches to Risk Management with David Anderson because I want to learn about new ways of managing risks to give the projects I work on the best chance of successful delivery.
• 14:00-14:45 – Software Development for Disney Animated Feature Film Production by Rajesh Sharma and Brian Wherry because I want to see what happens when Art and Technology come together when Disney develops software to produce its feature films.
• Accidental Adoption – The Story of Scrum at Amazon.com with Alan Atlas because I want to hear about how Amazon adopted Scrum.
• 14:00-15:30 – Advances in Release Planning by Jim Highsmith because I want to learn new techniques and get ideas to get more value out of Release Planning.
• 14:00-15:30 – An introduction to Agile Through the Theory of Constraints because it’ll provide the basic theory behind The Bottleneck Game (a simulation of how to apply the 5 focusing steps from the Theory of Constraints) which Pascal and I’ll be facilitating on Wednesday morning.
• 16:00-16:45 – Giving and receiving effective feedback by Liz Keogh because I can never get enough practice on giving and receiving feedback and, most important of all, taking action from feedback.
• 16:00-17:30 – Mapping the Agile Enablement Battlefield with George Schlitz and Giora Morein because I want to find out how others define Agile Enablement and how it can be compared to a ‘battlefield’.
• 16:00-17:30 – Team Start-up: one of the first Agile Adoption activities by Lyssa Adkins because different coaches have different approaches for introducing a team to Agile.

So much choice, so little time

Apprentice: The problem with Agile 2009 is that there’s too much choice!
Agile Coach: Is it possible to have too much choice?
Apprentice: Sure it is! I don’t have the time or the energy to read through all the session descriptions before the conference starts!
Agile Coach: It’s always better to have too many options than too few.

Can too much choice be a bad thing?

The wide choice of parallel sessions and topics can be a major headache for many attending Agile 2009 next week. When asked, ‘Can too much choice be a bad thing?’, I find myself instinctively thinking ‘Yes!’ at the sight of the hefty programme, yet I know there’s a better answer because of the numerous high value sessions in the programme.

The real problem is the amount of session information participants have to process in time to make choice after choice to make the most of their time at the conference. One approach is to use Real Options, an optimal decision process that lets us postpone important decisions until the last responsible moment so that we can gather more information before we need to decide. The result: the best possible decision based on all the information we have at the time.

What’s a Real Option?

A Real Option has:

• A value – if not, why would we consider it?
• An expiry condition – a deadline or condition by which we have to choose
• A cost: Buying cost + Exercising cost – the Buying cost gives us the right (not the obligation to implement a decision in the future for a known cost); the Exercising cost is the agreed price to implement the decision.

Real Options: The Optimal Decision Process

The Optimal Decision Process helps us structure our thinking in 7 steps (especially when we’re under pressure):

Step 0: Identify your goal(s)
Step 1: Identify your options
Step 2: Calculate the first decision point: Decision Point = Deadline – Implementation Time
Step 3: Decide which option to take under which circumstances
Step 4: Seek out information and more Real Options
Step 5: Reduce Implementation Time to push back Decision Point
Step 6: Wait… wait… Until the first/next decision point
Step 7: Make the decision with confidence.

Real Options applied

Let’s see how Real Options works when it comes to planning your investment of time at Agile 2009.

Step 0: Identify your goal(s)
Let’s assume your goal is to learn as many useful things you can use at work as possible. Ideally you’ll have acceptance criteria so you know when you’ve reached your goal. Refer back to your goal often throughout the conference so that you can refine your strategy to get the most out of the conference to satisfy your acceptance criteria.

Step 1: Identify your options
Each timeslot (eg 14.00 – 15.30) contains a set of sessions you can attend. Each of those sessions is an option. Only those that you consider valuable are Real Options. Let’s assume you create a shortlist of sessions you think will be useful to attend per timeslot. These are your Real Options per timeslot. Other Real Options might include having meaningful discussions while chilling out at the bar instead of following the programme.

Step 2: Calculate the first decision point: Decision Point = Deadline – Implementation Time
Now let’s take a timeslot with the Real Options you’ve identified. You work out that it’ll take you 10 minutes to get to any session at the conference venue. This is the implementation time. Note that the implementation time for all the options are therefore the same: 10 minutes. Next, we calculate the deadline for the options. The deadline for each option is, in fact, when the session ends so if you want to get there for the summary in the last 10 minutes, for a session that ends at 15.30, then 15.20 – 00.10 = 15.10 (although it’s worth bearing mind the value of an option, in general, decreases the later it is that you join the session). For those of you who like to participate from start to finish, it may be more useful to consider the deadline as the time the session starts (ie 14.00), in which case the decision point is 14.00 – 00.10 = 13.50.

Step 3: Decide which option to take under which circumstances
You’ve come up with a shortlist of sessions you’re interested in for a particular timeslot, but you still haven’t decided which one to go to. As a preliminary step, I typically prioritise the sessions from most likely to be useful to least likely to be useful to me. My deciding circumstances might include: 1) If I discover evidence that a speaker is a good speaker/facilitator, then I’ll prioritise their session over the others; 2) Depending on my energy levels nearer the time of the timeslot (it’s important to maintain a sustainable pace at a 5 day conference!), I might prefer a presentation over an interactive workshop.

Step 4: Seek out information and more Real Options
A key activity of Real Option is information gathering. By gathering as much information as possible up to the decision point, you’ll be able to make better informed decisions. Find ways of hearing the presenter speak prior to their session so you can decide if their communication style suits your learning style. Speak to other conference guests and speakers to find out their views on your first and second choices. That way, you can validate your most valuable choices by leveraging the wisdom of crowds. You’d be amazed how far and wide the reputation of a good presenter and/or presentation travels even at a conference of more than a thousand people.

Step 5: Reduce Implementation Time to push back Decision Point
One way of reducing the time it takes you to come up with a shortlist is to divide and conquer the data processing effort. By this I mean, mingle with other conference guests as early and as often as possible (remembering sustainable pace of course!). Look around for folks in similar roles with similar interests to yourself and find out which sessions they think have the most potential. Ask 10 random people which session they plan to go to next and you’re bound to find some opinions that re-affirm or negate your choice or even ideas for more options. This approach means you also get to meet 10 new people out of whom at least one is likely to enrich your conference experience.

Step 6: Wait… wait… Until the first decision point
Remember, you only have to make your session choice 10 minutes before the session starts or 20 minutes before the session ends. With the bar-discussion option, you only have to decide before the bar closes.

Step 7: Make the decision with confidence
Imagine it’s now 08.50 on Monday morning and you’ve got as much information as you could gather in the time given with the effort you care to invest. You exercise your first choice option with confidence because you know it’s the best choice based on what you know and if it goes wrong, you’ve got other real options to exercise.

Read more about Real Options here. Remember ‘Sustainable Pace’ and have fun!

Well-known for our penchant for fun and games, Pascal and I will making an appearance at Agile 2009 to play two of the most popular games in our ensemble: ‘The Bottleneck Game’ and ‘The Business Value Game’.

Learning about the Theory of Constraints with The Bottleneck Game

Pascal and I kick off next Wednesday with The Bottleneck Game to demonstrate the five focusing steps from the Theory of Constraints and how it correlates with Agile, Lean and Real Options.

It’s a favourite among our set of learning games which demonstrates, time after time, the relevance of the Theory of Constraints not just to projects or our work, but the way we see the world around us. After playing the game with us, you’ll acquire the necessary techniques and hands-on application to share with colleagues and friends.

Join us to learn:

• About Agile, Lean and Real Options techniques
• How to understand processes, a crucial step in business analysis
• How to use the Theory of Constraints, the Five Focusing Steps and Throughput Accounting to improve processes
• How to explain all of the above to your teams and customers
• How to create a shared “big picture” vision of a value stream for people and teams who work in functional silos
• How to get teams to collaborate to reach a common goal.

Arrive early to the session because there’ll only be enough room for 60 game enthusiasts!

Surely it doesn’t get much more exciting than this… or does it?

‘Show me the money!’ with The Business Value Game

… Yes it does! Pascal and I trialled The Business Value Game for the first time in public at Agile 2008 in Toronto. We’re back this year and in Chicago with a bigger and better version based on the valuable feedback we’ve had from playing with our numerous client teams, conference goers and fellow Agilistas around the world.

Join us next Wednesday afternoon and:

• Experience the issues facing the Customer/Product Owner
• Experience the link between program, project and story prioritisation
• Discover the right level at which to estimate Business Value
• Learn “good enough” business value estimation techniques to start delivering higher value today.

We’ll be running a total of 6 parallel teams for 50 people. Come early to get a seat at the table!

Request for Help!

We’re looking for a helper to help co-facilitate The Business Value Game. The only pre-requisites are 1) You’ve played the game before and you understand how it works; 2) You want to play it again in the large with 60 people! Contact us if you’re available and interested to help out.