Tag: scrum team

So what’s the big deal with carryover? Lemme tell you about WASTE

Talking to a team about carryover at a daily scrum meeting led me into a very uncomfortable confrontation with someone who already didn’t like me. Not sure why but I ascertained it had something to do with the unhealthy relationship between product and technology organizations and the fact that product was pushed by sales to make commitments on behalf of the teams that were essentially never met on time (more on that issue in a later post). So a contentious confrontation – read on…

June 19, 2017 1

Working from home is a privilege, not a right

So who isn’t a fan of working from home? Very few would openly admit to being against it. The fact of the matter is the most effective way to communicate is still face to face no matter what new tools we have (individuals and interactions over processes and tools). Does working from home have its place? Yes. Has it been abused and made us less effective as well? I think so.

November 15, 2016 8

Strategies for product owner across multiple teams (with different products)

A product owner should be dedicated to one team. Or no more than two teams working on the same product with the same product backlog. But what about a product owner who we spread across two teams with different backlogs working on different products? We’re asking them to be two people and it’s not sustainable! This product owner told me he was in 17 hours of meetings between the two teams per week (and I added it up and it was true)! For the product owner who should be splitting his/her time between self thought, stakeholder and customer input, and team time, it’s not possible for those things to be equal or sustainable not to mention the loss of productivity when context switching/multitasking. Though unfortunately this is the non-ideal reality sometimes.

June 7, 2016 3

How do companies make themselves stand out via interviews?

When interviewing for jobs, you want to leave the a memorable impression on the interviewers and company you’re interviewing with. But what about the opposite? Shouldn’t the company be focusing on leaving a memorable impression on you? I’ve been interviewing extensively over the past few weeks looking for my next contract, and a lot of the interviews melt together. Some, however, stand out very clearly and make me positively remember how the particular companies differentiated themselves in my head. Here are a few examples on how you can leave a memorable impression on potential employees and stand out from the hoard of other companies they are inevitably interviewing with in the high demand IT/Agile industry.

May 4, 2016 3

MVP: Minimum Validation Phrase – How I know I’m making a difference

I received a text message last night from one of my developers around 8:15 pm. “Do you want to talk shop?” it said. My first thought was, oh dear, what is broken now? (it’s release week as it is every other week and it’s been a rough month or two). When he called me and what he said next completely blew my mind.

September 17, 2015 6

I want updates!



President & Exec Director: Women in Agile

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