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.

How to improve your software delivery process

When it comes to improving the way we deliver software projects, it’s rarely technology that’s the real problem. Nor is it inevitably a skills issue. Instead, the greatest challenge with building software is this: How do you spot the problem when you can’t see the process?

That’s where The Bottleneck Game comes in. The Bottleneck Game simulates a production line at the Hats and Boats Company where its workers are paid a fair wage (by chocolate of course!) to produce pairs of hats and boats. For each pair of hat and boat produced by the team, the team gets paid a bonus (in the form of chocolate of course!). You don’t get fairer than that as jobs go.

The game teaches us about the Theory of Constraints (TOC). According to the Theory of Constraints, every system has one key constraint which determines the throughput of value. This constraint is called the ‘bottleneck’. The theory states that we can improve a system’s throughput by applying the Five Focusing Steps on the bottleneck. Any effort spent on any constraint other than the bottleneck will have little impact or even have an adverse effect on the existing system.

The Five Focusing Steps

Step 0: Make the goal of the system explicit – Make clear the goal you want to achieve.

Step 1: Find the bottleneck – You can spot a bottleneck because it’s usually a stressed out resource, with work piling up upstream to it and resources sitting idle downstream from it. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Do something with the bottleneck to improve the system as a whole.

Step 2: Exploit the bottleneck – Begin by ensuring the bottleneck resource is 100% utilised, focused on delivering value and working at a sustainable pace. Make sure there’s always work with high value available for the bottleneck to work on.  After all, Time is Money. As you’ve already paid for the bottleneck resource, this step requires no extra investment nor increases your operating expense.

Step 3: Subordinate everything to the bottleneck – This means the rest of the system must subordinate decisions to help out the bottleneck. Since the bottleneck is the most important part of the system, get the rest of the system to work at the pace of the bottleneck to help deliver the maximum value possible. Like the Exploit step, this step comes at little or no extra cost since you’ve already paid for the existing resources to deliver value. By definition, a non-bottleneck resource will always have slack, so you can also get the non-bottleneck resources to share some of the workload of the bottleneck.

Step 4: Elevate – You elevate by investing on training and tools for the bottleneck and other team members. You can also increase the number of the type of bottleneck resources. Since all these actions incur extra cost, you should apply Elevations only when you can’t find any more Exploits or Subordinations (which come at no extra cost in comparison). The Five Focusing Steps focuses on maximising the value of your existing investment before incurring further cost.

Step 5: Rinse and repeat – Once the bottleneck’s situation is improved and it’s no longer the primary constraint, the secondary contraint that determines the throughput of the system gets a promotion! It becomes the new bottleneck and you get the chance to apply the Five Focusing Steps all over again. Practice makes perfect!

It all sounds like hardwork and so much fun…

That’s because it is with The Bottleneck Game! Look at the intense expression on each player’s face. In spite of all the tricky origami involved, everyone who plays with us is always keen to stay after the game to talk some more about how to apply the Five Focusing Steps to their work.

Pascal and I will be running The Bottleneck Game at Agile 2009 in Chicago on 26 August. Restrictions* apply!

* There’s a maximum of 60 places in the session, so join us early to get a good seat!

If you were to ask me, ‘What’s the best way to get the most out of a conference?’ I would reply, ‘To present a session – it’s a great opportunity to consolidate, reflect on and share your experiences! Plus you’ll amplify your learning by getting feedback from a live audience.’ In my experience, presenting (and, better still, co-presenting) is more fun than you can ever imagine.

If you were to ask me, ‘If I could only go to one Agile conference this year, which should it be?’ I would reply, ‘XP Days Benelux of course! It’s a conference organised by Agilistas for Agilistas. And we mean it.’

At XP Days Benelux, we create better conferences year on year by putting the Agile Values and Practices into practice.

• Communication: The first step in participating is to submit a session proposal. It’s the best way of getting the most out of a conference!
• Simplicity: We encourage folks to submit their proposal as early as possible – even (and especially) if it’s in draft form. A great way to know if an idea is any good is to sound it out on an audience.
• Feedback: We ask all submitters to provide feedback on proposals using The Perfection Game. The best proposals are the result of iterative and collaborative thinking. And, of course, great sessions help create a great conference!
• Courage: Every presenter takes a chance when they submit a session. With so much to gain, what’s there to lose?
• Respect: At XP Days Benelux, we provide an open and friendly environment where we can have fun and learn from one another.

Why not submit a session proposal today?

Hurry! The closing date for proposal submissions for XPDays Benelux 2009 is 1 August 2009. Find out more about past XP Days Benelux conferences here.

What Went Well

• Henrik Kniberg‘s opening keynote on ‘The Thinking Tool Called Agile’ reminds us that Agile is a tool and therefore a means to an end. It shouldn’t be a goal in itself.
• Rob Westgeest promoting XP Days Benelux 2009, the most fun-filled and educational Agile conference I know.
• Pair poetry writing with Pascal – we wrote a haiku to capture the lifelong journey towards achieving Flow.
• Rob Thomsett‘s curious and entertaining closing keynote about IT teams from the perspective of Management which made me laugh out loud lots!
• Co-presenting a session on The Toyota Way and how to make Lean and Agile endure with Pascal Van Cauwenberghe, featuring Snow White and the Seven Dwarves implementing a kanban system and applying Pull!

What Went Wrong

• Only session titles were available on the programme – there weren’t any full session descriptions to provide details on what the sessions were about.
• The nightclub setting and poor lighting made it difficult for participants to focus during presentations.
• The programme didn’t cater for interactive or experiential sessions to promote active learning.
• One day conferences are too short when there are so many folks to meet and learn from!
• Pascal and I didn’t attend any sessions because we wanted to rehearse our session some more, face-to-face.

Puzzles

• Is the Toyota Way easier to implement in Japan because of the hierarchical nature of Japanese culture?
• And so what if this is the case? Is it reason enough to not practice the Toyota Way simply because it’s harder if you’re not Japanese?

Lessons (Re-)Learnt

• The Toyota Way in a nutshell: Think ‘Long-term’, Respect for people, Continuous Improvement.
• The Agile (XP) Values complement the principles of Lean and enable us to make a mindset shift based on long-term philosophy.
• Continuous Improvement is about being better than you were yesterday everyday.
• The importance of taking responsibility for our behaviour and what we do.
• Miyamoto Musashi, a famous seventeenth century warrior who lived to a ripe old age, says the secret of his success is: “Do not develop an attachment to any one weapon or any one school of fighting’ – it’s about mixing and matching your tools according to the context. There is no one tool that fits all. Magic bullets don’t exist.
• I have much to (re-)learn.

Appreciations

• Many thanks to the organisers for looking after us during our brief stay in Amsterdam!
• To the enthusiastic participants who attended The Toyota Way session and their subsequent conversations about how we can help teams grow.

Pascal and I are in Amsterdam next Wednesday to present ‘The Toyota Way‘ at the Integrating Agile Conference. The conference is organised by the Agile Consortium and focuses on ‘the integration of the Agile way of thinking and working with existing organisational processes and structures’.

Being phat and keeping it Lean

I’m really looking forward to the conference because:

1. Pascal and I’ll be co-presenting a new version of ‘The Toyota Way’ – it’s the first time we’ll have presented this session together and we’ll be sharing stories based on our experiences as Agile Consultant-Coaches to illustrate how we use Lean and Agile to create effective (and happier) teams that deliver business value fast.
2. Henrik Kniberg‘s an inspiring speaker with genuine and extensively applied Agile and IT experience and he’s giving the opening keynote.
3. I’ll be learning firsthand from more practioners of Lean and/or Agile.

Interested?

To help grow the Agile Benelux Community, the organisers are offering a 50% discount in the run-up to the conference. All sessions will be in English. To qualify for the discount, simply mention you’re a reader of the ‘Selfish Programming Blog’. We hope to see you there!

Qu’est-ce qui était bon?

• Jouer le rôle du Père Noël (le rôle du coach agile) dans le jeu ludique par François Bachmann and Jacques Couvreur pour apprendre l’art de la rétrospective basé sur les techniques de ‘Agile Retrospectives‘ par Esther Derby et Diana Larsen
• Raconter l’histoire de Blanche Neige et les sept nains version Tarantino à 46 adultes enchantés
• Jouer le jeu de la valeur métier avec Pascal et Laurent Morriseau parmi une soixantaine d’adultes
• Faire la session ‘Miroir, gentil miroir… pourquoi moi?‘ à l’extérieur parce qu’il faisait tellement beau
• Les discussions diverses avec Pascal Pratmarty, Jacques, Kemal Asad-Syed et Sandrine Olivencia
• Le grand tour à la barque avec deux beaux agilistes Christophe Thibault et Pascal au Chalet de la Porte Jaune

Qu’est-ce qui était mauvais?

• Les repas n’étaient pas très  bons (et normalement, j’adore goûter la cuisine française!)
• Il n’y avait pas de glaces près du lac par un temps tellement beau
• Rater la séance musicale par Bernard ‘Ben’ Notarianni

Les questions grandes et petites

• Qu’est-ce que ça veut dire lorsqu’on croit qu’on n’a rien appris d’une session?
• Qu’est-ce que ce que nous pensons des autres nous dit sur nous-mêmes?
• Quel est le but des keynote speakers?

Ce que j’ai (re-)appris

• Nous pouvons seulement changer nous-mêmes
• Chacun apporte de la valeur
• Comment on joue un jeu nous dit beaucoup sur comment on travaille
• L’importance de suivre le Responsibility Model sur nous-mêmes

Les appreciations

• Merci à Sara Lewis et Raphaël Pierquin pour la traduction du jeu de ‘Miroir, gentil miroir… pourquoi moi?’
• Merci à Laurent pour la traduction du jeu de valeur métier
• Merci à Pascal pour avoir documenté le feedback de la retrospective de ‘Miroir, gentil miroir… pourquoi moi?’
• Mille mercis comme toujours aux organisateurs de XPDay France pour un programme plein de choix
• Merci aux enthousiastes de conte de fées agile (Agile Fairytales) pour leur esprit ouvert et ludique

A l’année prochaine! Voir ici pour ce billet en anglais! Entretemps, vous pouvez trouver les avis des participants par rapport nos sessions sur agilecoach.net.

What Went Well

• Participating in François Bachmann and Jacques Couvreur‘s session on how to hold retrospectives based on techniques described in ‘Agile Retrospectives‘ by Esther Derby and Diana Larsen
• Captivating the imagination of 46 grownups through the retelling of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves Tarantino style (and in French for the first time!)
• Running part of our Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me? session outdoors and in
• Facilitating The Business Value Game with more than 60 avid players as a triad with Pascal and Laurent Morisseau
• Conversations with Agilistas such as Pascal Pratmarty, Jacques, Kemal Asad-Syed and Sandrine Olivencia
• Rowing in a barque by two Agilista beaus Christophe Thibault and Pascal in the beautiful setting of Le Chalet de la Porte Jaune

What Went Wrong

• Catering: Starters and mains looked good, but weren’t very tasty
• Wish we had ice creams during the break by the lake on a beautiful summer’s day
• Missing out on Bernard ‘Ben’ Notarianni‘s outdoor guitar recital

Puzzles

• What does it mean when we learn nothing after attending a session?
• What does what we think of others tell us about ourselves?
• What is the acceptance criteria for selecting a keynote speaker?

Lessons (Re-)Learnt

• We can only change ourselves
• Everyone has value
• The way we play games reflects the way we work
• The importance of practicing The Responsibility Model by Chris Avery on ourselves

Appreciations

• To Sara Lewis and Raphaël Pierquin for helping to translate ‘Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me?’ en français
• To Laurent Morriseau for helping to translate The Business Value Game en français
• To Pascal for writing up and making available the participants’ retrospective feedback on the ‘Mirror Mirror’ session here
• To the organisers of XPDay France for making so much fun in one place possible!
• To all the Agile Fairytales enthusiasts for their support in helping Agile Fairytales grow!

This entry is also available in French! Also, you can find out what others thought about our sessions on agilecoach.net.

Quel beau voyage!

After many hours of iterative translating and tweaking, Pascal and I are off to Paris to present two conference favourites at XP Day France next week: 

• ‘Blanche Neige et les Sept Nains : le miroir magique vous aide à mieux travailler en équipe‘ (‘Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me?‘)
• And the latest version of Le Business Value Game.

Venez nous rejoindre pour la fête et récrivez votre destin avec Blanche-Neige et les sept nains et Bert, le comptable extraordinaire, qui vous aide avec la Valeur Métier.

Mille mercis!

• To Sara Lewis and Raphaël Pierquin for helping to translate ‘Mirror, Mirror on the Wall… Why Me?’ en français
• To Laurent Morriseau for helping to translate The Business Value Game en français
• And to Pascal for laughing long enough to make the Tarantino-retelling of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves suitable only for adults!