Tag Archives: teams

Evidence of Innovation and Creativity

Is it possible to find a company that does not say they are innovative?  Is there any manager or VP that does not want more creativity?  I’m sure such companies and people exist somewhere but I haven’t found one.  We all want to foster innovation and creativity. Innovation In The Team Agile teams that are […]

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Gaming The Penny Game

Last month I had the opportunity to provide an Agile and Scrum class to a private client. We had a great day learning and having fun. At one point a clever developer threw a twist into one of the exercises that had me worried. Let me set the stage a bit. The Penny Game The Penny Game […]

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The Power of Smaller Teams

The issue of team size comes up very often in my interactions and online.  People are very anxious about this detail and for good reason.  The size of a team directly effects the culture and work they do, for good or bad. Documents Say… The Agile and Scrum literature, including training classes, recommend a team […]

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Velocity Moves Forward

Scrum and other Agile frameworks introduce the concept of “velocity” as a measure. Velocity a ratio of some work size (story points, ideal days, etc.) verses time measured as a sprint or iteration. So a team might say “We complete 26 story points per sprint.” Or a project manager might report “Our teams complete 224 […]

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Teams Over Projects

A team I have been working with recently had a crisis.  The customer of their project had put everything on hold.  In other words, the project was cancelled.  The company had plenty of other work to be done so they were not worried about losing their jobs.  The biggest worry for the team was breaking […]

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Creative Sparks For All!

I have posted before about my involvement with Ignite Phoenix.  This powerful community and wonderful team of volunteer organizers helps keeps me energized.  Last February 11th I gave the introduction presentation to kick off Ignite Phoenix #9: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy1aTQPjnXM] Creative Sparks They are everywhere!  Right now, near you, is another person.  That person cares about something, […]

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Agility Requires Clear Communication

The topic of communication has become a bit of an irritant lately.  Certainly I’m not the best communicator in the world, so I work at it.  I’m starting to wonder if many others have forgotten this key to productivity and enjoyment.  I have many thoughts on this subject.  Today I’ll address communication as an enterprise […]

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Teamwork for real?

(I have much to say about the Certified ScrumMaster Workshop that just ended yesterday.  This topic is burning my thoughts for some time now so it comes first!) Everyone “Does” Teamwork Recently I have been participating in the interview process for a technical position.  The opening is on a customer engineering support team.  Another of […]

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Remember Your Foundation

I had the opportunity to work with Mike Vizdos for a one-day Scrum coaching session.  A team in Chandler, Arizona was interested in finding ways to improve, to get outside eyes to help them see what they might be missing.  We and the team had a great day.  I re-learned something important about working on […]

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“BDUF Scrum” – Don’t do it!

Finding the Theme I enjoy helping people with Scrum and Agile. The more I do it, the more I learn and enjoy it. Many of my recent in person and online encounters have had a similar flavor to them. I didn’t put my finger on it until this morning. In an online exchange people have […]

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