It was good to hear Christopher Avery re-cap on The Responsibility Model in his session How to Development Your Leadership Power Daily: An Agile Approach to Growth at Agile 2009.

According to Christopher, Responsibility has long been considered as a character trait. Or, depending on your view of the world, a character flaw.

Redefining Responsibility

Newsflash: Responsibility is neither a character trait nor flaw. Christopher describes Responsibility as the way you respond to a problem. Responsibility is completely subjective. It’s also a feeling. This is why Responsibility is so difficult to talk about.

There are six progressive phases in the Responsibility Model:

1. Denial - ‘Problem? What problem? There’s no problem.’
2. Blame – ‘I don’t have a problem working with you. You seem to have a problem with me. That makes it your problem. ‘
3. Justify – ‘I guess it’s possible that I’ve become insensitive to other people’s feelings and needs. I can’t help it though. After all, I’ve been doing this job for a long time. It’s who I am.’
4. Shame – ‘What have I done? I’m going to look such an idiot in front of the people at work. How am I going to live it down? Why should they help me after the way I’ve behaved?’
5. Obligation – ‘Tell me what you think I should do. I have no choice but to do it (even though I don’t want to). I’ll do whatever you say. It’s only a job after all (no one can expect to do a job they love).’
6. Responsibility – ‘I can wait for them to change but that could take forever. No, it’s up to me. I want to fix the problem. So how am I going to be a better colleague? I know! I’ll listen more. And be more considerate towards others. It’s a start.’

What I Liked About the Session

• It was interesting to see the audience’s reaction to The Responsibility Model since the model was new to the majority of them. I remember feeling uplifted when I first came across it; the algorithm makes the notion of Responsibility explicit as a repeatable process.

What Would Make the Session Perfect

• It would have been very useful to experience the model as an exercise to internalise it.
• I would have liked to hear more about the latest research Christopher’s been doing related to the model.

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.

The first Agile (XP) Value is Communication. Communication is probably one of the most talked about themes on Agile teams, yet it is probably one of the most difficult ones to realise. Jenni Dow and Ole Jepsen show us how in their session “Flirting” With Your Customers at Agile 2009.

Jenni and Ole liken developing rapport with a customer to two people flirting since successful relationships are based on Effective Communication through Mutual Understanding.

An 8 Step Guide to Flirting with Your Customer

1. Radar – Be switched on because every moment is a chance to connect with people.
You: I’m aware of my thoughts and how I’m feeling right now. I’m also aware of those around me.

2. Target – Identify who you need to connect with and why.
You: To deliver maximum value for my organisation, I need to gain support from senior management. Patrick’s a senior manager. I’ll go speak to him.

3. Move In – Show you’re interested in them by inquiring about their perspective on things.
You: Hi Patrick. Graham suggested I speak to you about how we currently deliver software. Do you have 5 minutes?

Customer: I’m on my way to another meeting.

You: How about I walk you there and we talk on the way?

Customer: OK!

You: What’s bothering you most about the software delivery process?

4. Back Off A Little – You’ve shown your interest in them, now give them a chance to reciprocate.
Customer: The way we do releases is a serious problem. They’re simply taking too long.

5. Open Up – Share more information.
Customer: Your concern mirrors my experience with the teams I’ve been coaching in your organisation. If we begin by applying some Agile practices to Release Management, we should be able to improve the process and reduce the overall time it takes per release.

6. Dance - Socialise!
Customer: Thanks for inviting me to this team lunch. It’s been great to hear firsthand from the team how they think Agile’s working out for us. What we really need is a repeatable process.

You: We’ll be learning more about process improvement based on the Theory of Constraints next Tuesday. We’ll be playing The Bottleneck Game, a production line simulation. You’re welcome to join us!

Customer: Mmm… I’m booked up already next Tuesday. Leave it with me and I’ll see what I can do.

7. Get Real - Work through a crisis together.
You: Patrick, I need your help.

Customer: What’s the problem?

You: The Release Management team thinks Agile is just a fad. They want to sit tight and wait for it to pass.

Customer: Thanks for letting me know. I’m seeing the Release Manager this afternoon. I’ll let him know that Agile is the way forward and we all have to do our bit to increase the value we deliver.

8. Enjoy - Enjoy the relationship and help it grow.
Just as 20% of the cost of a piece of software is incurred during development and the remaining 80% goes into maintenance, a similar distribution of effort applies to establishing and growing relationships. 

Tips to Effective Communication and Meaningful Relationships

When applying the 8 steps, it’s important to remember to:

• Be open and receptive.
• Ask questions.
• Listen first.
• Find common points of interest/concern.
• Listen some more.
• Sense-check by playing back what you’ve heard (eg ‘If I understand correctly, the time it takes to do releases is a key concern for the organisation’).
• Apply the Agile Values (Communication, Simplicity, Feedback, Courage and Respect). Always.

What I Liked About the Session

Jenni and Ole are a great example of pair-presenting. I thoroughly enjoyed their session for three main reasons:

1. It takes courage to tackle a tricky topic, especially that of human social interaction.
2. Jenni and Ole created an environment where everyone could safely experiment with the steps.
3. The steps were delivered in a good-natured way so as to make us laugh and help us remember them!

What Would Make the Session Perfect

• I would have liked to practice the 8 steps in triads (with two participants and one observer) in order to 1) gain a deeper understanding of the steps and 2) get feedback on my application of those steps.
• I would have liked to learn more about ways to grow a relationship - Step 8 - since relationships that endure are the ones that require time and effort.

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.

Today marks yet another Agile First – It’s the first time Pascal and I are presenting two of our all time favourite Agile games in the United States on the same day:

• 09:00 – 10: 30 (Grand Ballroom A) - We play The Bottleneck Game, a simulation of  a production line at The Hats and Boats Company where you’ll experience and apply the five focusing steps from the Theory of Constraints and learn about how it correlates with Agile, Lean and Real Options. Maximum 60 participants.
• 16:00 – 17:30  (Plaza Ballroom B) – We go for gold with The Business Value Game, a jam-packed game where you come to grips with release planning and the role of the Agile customer by playing sales people competing for resources to deliver the highest possible business value for your organisation. Maximum 50 participants.

Bonus! Henrik Kniberg, author of Scrum and XP in the Trenches, has volunteered to help facilitate The Business Value Game (having played it for the first time with us at Agile 2008) so that we can scale it up to 50 participants like we did at XPDay France earlier this year!

We’ve played these games on numerous occasions with our clients and Agilists in Europe, so we ’re intrigued by how the participants at Agile 2009 will fare compared with our European counterparts! Come to the sessions early to avoid disappointment as places are limited. We look forward to seeing you there!

Where can I find out more?

You can download the games (including full instructions!) from www.agilecoach.net and play them for free with your colleagues and even family and friends. Warning: Having fun can be hardwork!

 All the games on www.agilecoach.net are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 license.

Reviewing my plan for Day 2

As Tuesday’s conference day is fast approaching, I’ve reviewed my Real Options for the day.

Meanwhile, I’m trying to plan 1-day ahead which seems to give me a healthy balance of focus on the present day of the conference and enough information just-in-time for making well-informed choices at a sustainble pace. Sustainable pace is key at Agile 200X conferences because of the gargantuan amounts of information around!

Day 3 at Agile 2009

As usual, the sessions with emboldened titles are the ones I’ll be attending!

Morning Timeslot 1:

• 09:00 – 09:45 – Agile @ Yahoo! from the Trenches with Mun-Wai Chung and Brian Drummond because experience reports provide useful insights into an individual’s journey through Agile adoption as a part of team.
• 09:00 – 10:30 – Activity Theory for Manifesting Agile with Robert Biddle because I’m intrigued by cultural-historical activity theory, a psychological framework for understand collaborative behaviour.
• 09:00 – 10:30 – Narrative Acceptance Tests – A Behaviour Driven Approach with Antony Marcano and Andy Palmer because acceptance tests help define ‘Done’ and success.
• 09:00 – 10:30 – The Elephant in the Room: Using Brain Science to Enhance Working Relationships with Sharon Buckmaster, Diana Larsen because I want to understand how the male and female mind works and the impact it has on our relationships at work.
• 09:00 – 10:30 – The Bottleneck Game where Pascal and I’ll be co-presenting a simulation on The Theory of Constraints’ Five Focusing Steps because experiential learning provides learning that sticks!

Morning Timeslot 2:

• 11:00 – 12:30 – Telling Your Stories: Why Stories are important for your team  with Johanna Hunt and Rachel Davies because storytelling is a vital vehicle to improve our understanding of ourselves and those around us. If you love stories, check out Agile Fairytales - they help teams grow!
• 11:00 – 12:30 – You say tomato, I say Pomodoro with Renzo Borgatti because it’s a second chance to learn about personal effectiveness using timeboxing and other Agile techniques such as planning.
• 11:00 – 12:30 – Emergent Design & Evolutionary Architecture with Neal Ford because it will enable me to explain why Big Design Up Front in comparison with iterative and incremental design more effectively.
• 11:00 – 12:30 -  Help me to see… corporate culture with Alan Cyment, Tobias Mayer because I want to improve my collaboration skills by playing the Dialogue game.
• 11:00 – 12:30 – Multi-team sprint planning – how to do all the teams together with Henrik Kniberg because Henrik’s a great speaker who always provides value as a hands-on Agile practitioner!
• 11:00 – 12:30 – The Agile PMP: Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks with Mike Cottmeyer because I want to better understand the responsibilities of Agile Project Management.

The key to reliable delivery, according to Mary Poppendieck, is understanding that Workflow is Orthogonal to Schedule. This is my experience report of the session at Agile 2009.

The Secret of Success: The Story of the Empire State Building Project

The goal of the Empire State Building project was to 1) create the tallest building in the world; 2) bring in revenue by opening the building to the public within a year.

The secret of the project team’s success was Focus on Flow, in this case, getting the right materials to the right people in the right place.

Key Sucess Factors

1. Teamwork of owner, architect and builders working as one team – consulting and involving experts early.
2. Hire deeply experienced builders (then delivering to a fixed price contract).
3. Focus on the key constraint: material flow.
4. Decoupling – creating ompletely independent schedules allowed swift response to impediments/surprises.
5. Cash Flow Thinking: each day of delay cost $10,000 ($120,000 today), making speed well worth it.
6. Design to meet constraints – the schedule was not derived from the building design, the building was designed based on constraints (such as building in the middle of New York, the laws of physics, zoning ordinances).

How to Achieve Reliable delivery

1. Establish high level system goals. Create high level system design based on the goals. Understand what the the business really needs.
2. Involve those who understand the details early in the design process. There is no substitute for experience.
3. Apply teamwork based on respect and trust. Managing by solely by contract-based thinking increases costs 30% – 60%.
4. Reduce complexity with wise decoupling  (eg reduce architectural and schedule dependencies; provide alternate options for ‘Critical Path’ items).
5. Understand and manage the biggest constraint – know what that constraint is and how to deal with it.

Tips for Leveraging Workflow and Scheduling Together

1. Level the workload because it provides greater control over the schedule and increases a schedule’s predictability.
2. Create the schedule with people with knowledge and experience.
3. Optimise throughput, not utilisation because lower utilisation delivers higher performance.
4. Ensure slack is built in because it allows for team to respond to feedback and cope with normal variation.
5. Limit work to capacity.
6. Timebox don’t scopebox.

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!