Begin as you intend to go on
As an Agile Coach, I always start with a Personal Agility Rating exercise whenever I work with a new Agile team. By ‘new Agile team’, I mean a team with whom I’m working for the first time, regardless of their Agile experience. I do this for two reasons: 1) [...]

As an Agile Coach, the greatest challenge for me on any Agile Enablement gig is The Wall. And I don’t mean the Project Wall (aka Kanban Board), the one with the iteration backlog on display for all to see, where stories and tasks take their turn journeying across the columns of TODO and In Progress [...]

Last night saw the largest gathering ever to attend Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me?, an Agile Fairytale session on improving personal effectiveness, created by adults for everyone. More than 20 people converged to learn how to create their own happy endings on Day 2 of the AYE Conference in sunny Phoenix, Arizona.
Rediscovering the [...]

Playing to learn about the Theory of Constraints
It’s 5 pm on a Thursday night and everything’s already pitch dark outside. We need at least 7 players to play the Bottleneck Game created by Pascal Van Cauwenberghe but we only have 6 eager participants. Being an Agile Coach has taught me to be resourceful (think Macgyver), [...]

Today’s a special day for my team: we’ve got one more day before our Iteration 1 Show & Tell and, of course, it’s Diwali, the Hindu festival of light. During the second part of our standup this morning (what we call ‘Information Broadcast’ where we share useful information among the team outside of the 3 [...]

‘Exoftware has been ranked 6th in the 2008 Deloitte Technology Fast 50, a ranking of the 50 fastest growing technology companies in Ireland. Rankings are based on average percentage revenue growth over five years. Exoftware grew over 1300% percent during this period.’
- Deloitte Ireland

One of the hardest things about becoming agile, [...]

One Agile coach says to another, ‘How do you find the strength to carry on?’
The other coach replies, ‘I believe in “happily ever after“‘.
Going Off the Rails
In my experience, the toughest period on any Agile Enablement gig is the first two iterations. Some have described it as a rollercoaster ride - the corkscrew-space-mountain type where [...]

Fear of the Unknown
One interesting similarity between being a coach on an Agile Enablement gig and presenting at a conference is this: dealing with an audience who secretly fears the Unknown.
In my experience, there are 3 main groups:
a) Those who ask for help
b) Some too afraid to ask for help
c) Others who think they know [...]

The most striking thing about Toronto is its people. It’s a place where diversity is reflected in every face in the crowd, from groups of friends to couples and families. Walking along Queen St on a Saturday afternoon gives me hope. Here is a community that realises the sociological, cultural and cognitive evolution that Gene [...]

I’m in Toronto for Agile 2008 with Pascal Van Cauwenberghe to present two sessions: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me? and Les Neuf Cases (known as ‘The Nine Boxes‘). Being away from home is great because it gives me time and distance to reflect on my Agile Enablement gigs both past and present.
Nothing is [...]