Ant Murphy

This is one of the most important factors for change practitioners in working in an agile environment. And no it's not about training, pivoting or experimentation. One word. Cadence. Having the right change management cadence to support agile change initiatives is critical. For example, having the right stakeholder engagement pieces in place so that you can 'release on demand'. Release on demand is a practice and a process whereby new functionality is deployed as needed based on stakeholder needs. Depending on the change impact of the feature the change manager needs to be ready to send communications and updates as needed, sometimes within a short notice period. Note that not all releases necessarily require communications for users. And depending on the type of change being released different formats of communication may be leveraged. For example, system changes may benefit from within-app notifications versus emails or other forms of update. Communications and engagement may also be bundled as necessary to provide a packet of updates to stakeholder groups versus constant and continuous updates. The change practitioner needs to examine the nature of change impacts and stakeholder needs to determine the right tactic to be used. Other cadences include sequencing and planning, release design, BAU integration, etc. Check out our articles to find out more about these. #changemanagement #agile #transformation

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I have a claim I can apply agile theory / thought into anything. So it didn't surprise me when I tackled this annoyingly overgrown bush that I thought hmmm I know what this reminds me of, technical debt. Technical debt is a bit of a dirty phrase in software delivery and in agile it's something teams actively trying to manage so to avoid the kinds of releases that break more than they introduce. Basically to paraphrase me you can't build 💩 on 💩! So like this bush. I've let it grow far too big and it's kind of done its own thing growing in every direction it fancies, intertwining and crossing over and it's a mess. But now I want to prune it, tidy it up so it doesn't cast a huge shadow on my lawn. And that should mean I identify some of the larger branches, cut them and that brings down large sections at a time. Easy peasy. But alas the debt is too high. The overgrowth is such that I can't even get to the part of the bush I want to cut away so instead I need to sort the mess of twigs and leaves at the front to get anywhere near to the part I need to access. It takes me twice as long as I wanted it to thanks to all the surprise tangles. If only I'd managed the growth more frequently and kept it trimmed where needed and the crucial parts accessible. Worth thinking about eh? What parts of your software need a trim? P.S yes I know I look amazing in my tiktok shop headband headphones

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Just read a good article in HBR on Agile Planning. https://lnkd.in/gcXtyTey Planning in an Agile organisation opens up a number of challenges. Long term, inflexible plans may be easier to build alignment on, but they ultimately hinder a company from pivoting and flexing its strategy in uncertain markets. It’s better to distribute planning, so that planning is made by autonomous and empowered teams who are closest to the soft and hard data needed to make good decisions. But this brings its own challenges - at scale, how can these teams align their plans to work together and achieve shared goals? In my view, there’s 2 critical pillars: 1. Simple Rules defining a strategy - any team should have a number of simple, well understood principles to follow, that when followed ensure general alignment to organisational goals. Complex strategic modes won’t cut it - teams have to make decisions fast without going back to the strategy primer to figure out exactly how to fit in. 2. Transparency of plans and goals - when teams set their goals, they should make them transparent within the organisation - both to anchor the team itself to them, and to create a shared language when communicating and collaborating with other teams. By being transparent on their goals, teams can find the points of alignment and opportunities to collaborate to enhance value. #strategy #agile #planning

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If you are a leader or business owner frustrated that your days seem to be full of all the wrong types of activity, this post is for you. One of the first business owners I helped via agile coaching had contacted me because he was getting increasingly frustrated at the amount of fire fighting tasks he found himself doing either from his team sending him endless emails asking for clarity or sign off and then how slow it could be getting progress updates back to the customer. This also meant he had little to no time left for where he wanted to place his attention which was on business development. After our initial chat we'd identified that poor communication systems and a lack of transparency in the team's work was mainly to blame for the ineffective use of his time which had meant he himself had become the bottleneck both to his team and to the customer. Our solution was to bring in a golden source application that he, the development team and his customer would be given access to. This immediately ensured he could update the customer on progress without needing to email out for the update first whilst giving the team a space to raise questions and queries to the corresponding work items. We complimented this by establishing a boundary on when the team should expect a response from him and letting them know that for the first working hour he would make himself available and respond to any questions / requests for sign off etc. This took a week or so to embed but once it did the efficiency of the team rocketed and the business owner who once had been bogged down with a sea of requests now had over 80% of his time back to dedicate to the value add tasks his business needed. Two reasons I'm sharing this: 1) Business / agile coaching doesn't always need to result in standing up an entire agile framework, in fact a lot of the time I will cherry pick the very best practices to tailor to each specific problem. 2) I can't always articulate a monetary value in relation to what my services provide (I'm working on it, I'm new to all this 🙈) but if it's time you are looking to gain back from mountains of tasks that feel never ending - let's talk!

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Simon Reindl and I had the pleasure to reflect with Laurens Bonnema on the complexities of Agile transformations and how they're often influenced by the underlying politics and power dynamics within an organisation. It's fascinating to consider how these elements can either facilitate or hinder the success of Agile initiatives. In our work, it's crucial to recognise that every organisation is a political environment where power struggles and influence are ever-present. Navigating these dynamics effectively requires not just an understanding but also the ability to engage strategically with the political landscape. Here are some key issues we often encounter: 🔸 Understanding organisational politics 🔸 Recognising power struggles and influence 🔸 Engaging with the political landscape 🔸 Training and practising political skills 🔸 Facilitating successful Agile transformations Podcast in the comments! How have you managed power dynamics in your Agile transformations? Comment below!

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The best practitioners in any discipline look beyond specific toolsets or frameworks, instead spotting familiar patterns, models and factors that affect success. I first realised this when I was a software engineer. In my career to that point I'd learned a few languages and, to be honest, had struggled with the learning curve of some of them. I was good at thinking through a problem, working out edge cases etc but struggled to use some languages effectively like an extension of my thinking. In contrast, a colleague with a few more years under his belt seemed to move from language to language seamlessly. It was a bit like when you find musicians who can create a tune out of any instrument soon after handling it. Instead of feeling around the strings, keys or valves, this chap was very quickly able to demonstrate applications in a new language and help us understand the pros or cons of investing in it or using it to solve a given issue. Looking back years later I realised that the languages themselves were irrelevant. My colleague could fix problems because he recognised common patterns or paradigms when dealing with software problems. Once he understood the problem, he knew enough to construct what he wanted out of whatever language or tool. In contrast, I just didn't know my field enough at the time to know what it was that made particular solutions successful or higher quality over others. With facilitation, once we're aware of a need for strong facilitation skills it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking more tools = better facilitation. What is missing from so much that is written about the subject is what actually happens when we bring people together and what common patterns we notice when facilitation works well. Understanding this before picking up another tool or gimmick means we can develop great competence and focus on a smaller number of tools, still using the best ones for the job but knowing them enough to know how we might flex or tweak things when we work with the real world and relationships around us. In June I'm discussing this and more as part of my conference session at the Regional Scrum Gathering Ghent 2024 . See you there? Re-Evented Scrum Alliance #RSGGHENT24 #agile #agilecoaching #facilitation

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One of the best parts of being an agile coach for me is helping people start out on their journey in learning to channel a more agile mindset. Once I start talking about the magic I see in agile ways of working, something lights up in me that then spreads to the teams I'm working with. Check out these reactions to my Intro to an agile mindset presentation and if they make you a bit more agile curious, get in touch.

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What do you need to facilitate a workshop… Turns out, not much. Some desk space, agile principle cards, post-it notes & a sharpie will do For an on the fly workshop I facilitated with my client, it lead to some great discussion, with limited prep needed. I’d love to know what other techniques you use to facilitate those last minute workshops/conversations? Post in the comments ➡️

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Join me and John Coleman, co-author of the Kanban Guide, for a ProKanban.org 'Applying Metrics for Predictability' class on 10-12 June, 2-7pm each day (friendly for US timezones!) This guaranteed to run course is for anyone looking for strategies to answer the number one question any customer or stakeholder will always ask when you start something: “When will it be done?". If you're struggling with work that is endlessly late, an inability to accurately forecast and you're relying on guesses about the future on when you will deliver, this is for you. In this hands-on class, we will give you the tools that can be used at a team, department or company level to help you answer these questions and more. We will cover: 💥 Flow metrics: a deep dive into WIP, Cycle Time, and Throughput 💥 Flow analytics: an introduction to cumulative flow diagrams, scatterplots, histograms and other supporting charts - including how to utilise them for better predictability 💥 Forecasting using a Monte Carlo Simulation: how to use flow metrics to answer “When will it be done?” 💥 Quantifying risk and risk management: how an understanding of risk is crucial to developing accurate forecasts and how to communicate that risk to your customers in terms they can easily understand 💥 How to get started: immediately apply these techniques to your current project or process to achieve the results you are looking for. You will get: ✅ Hands-on training with real strategies and tools you can take away ✅ An exam token for two attempts to take the industry recognised Professional Applied Metrics (PAM) certification ✅ A digital copy of the course materials ✅ One hour of additional individual or team coaching from me to help you further embed these awesome ways of working. Sign up link in the comments below 👇 #datadriven #flow #metrics #flowmetrics #training #kanban #scrum #agile

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Unleash Your Potential for a Cleaner Agile Future!  🌱 Join us for the latest in practical Agile strategies as we partner with #PMISydney for a one-hour workshop Whether you’re passionate about Agile, Sustainability or #AI this session has something for you 📅 Mark Your Calendar: Date: 12th June 2024 (Wednesday) Time: 8:30 PM (AEST) Why Attend? * Understand the interconnectedness between agile thinking, environmental sustainability, and personal development. * Overcome perceived obstacles through agile concepts and innovation. Gain insights from years of coaching experience in IT and sustainability projects. * Empower yourself through coaching-centric learning techniques for climate-focused action.Keep up with major industry trends globally while accessing guidance from top-tier resources. Practical insights and strategies to adapt industry leading methodologies to your specific needs. 🔗 Register now: https://lnkd.in/gczg2EhQ Join Alan Taylor on this journey to unlock your potential and contribute to a cleaner, healthier future for our planet. 🌿 Regardless of your expertise level, discover how an agile approach can unleash your best self. Leave empowered to make a positive impact in your workplace and beyond! #PMITas #PMISydney #Agile #Sustainability

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To me, a real expert in agile isn’t just someone who has all the answers, but someone who knows how to ask the right questions. This idea shifts our focus from simply knowing things to truly understanding and exploring them. Wisdom comes from curiosity and a willingness to dig deeper. When we question what’s in front of us and look beyond the surface, we open the door to new ideas and discoveries. This way of thinking encourages curiosity and critical thinking, which are key to both personal and professional growth. So, remember, asking the right questions is the real secret to learning and making progress.

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SAFe to Scale: The Practical Guide to Scaled Agile for Product Managers and Product Owners, my new book, will be available on April 30, 2024! Pre-orders are now available here: https://lnkd.in/eAsWFz4R #ProductDevelopment #Agile #ScaledAgile

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If you’ve ever worked with end-to-end testing frameworks, you’re likely familiar with the frustration of brittle tests tightly coupled to implementation details. Whilst we endeavour to minimise this, some coupling between test and implementation detail is often unavoidable, and this can lead to tests that are prone to break from small, irrelevant, and non functional changes to the UI, whist the behavour is still working as expected. Brittle tests have great potential to introduce unnecessary delays in release cycles. This happens because end to end tests are broad in scope and it’s impossible to know if the rest of the functionality works as expected if a test fails early in the process. This is expecially burdensome as E2E tests are often performed late in the day due to their high cost. For this reason the developer feedback loop can be significantly hampered, and the maintenance cost can be substantial. Large Language Models (LLMs) offer a promising solution to this inherent problem. Test cases can be defined at a high level, and then LLMs can dynamically interpret the DOM at runtime, then create appropriate test scripts based on the current state of the UI based on the test objective. This means that anyone, regardless of their programming skills, can write these test cases. Instead of relying on implementation details, these tests interpret with the UI like a user would, and determine the most appropriate way to test the current version of the UI based based on test requirements, thus avoiding all unnecessary coupling to implementation detail. While there are inherent complexities, such as the context size of the HTML representation of the DOM, and other challenges notably around performance, the potential for more robust and adaptable testing is significant. I have seen promising results from optimization techniques such as Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) search on a custom render tree representation of the DOM, enhanced with computer vision classification of bounding boxes. Given the success of universal scraping solutions leveraging LLMs, the idea of stable end-to-end tests might just be within our grasp. Imagine a future where end-to-end test cases are so robust that they not only survive multiple iterations of a UI but could even operate across platforms where the functionality is the same, such as testing the search functionality of different search engines. This prospect invites us to reconsider not just how we test, but the very resilience and adaptability of our testing frameworks, making them accessible to a broader range of contributors. #Testing #EndToEnd #LLMs #Automation #SoftwareDevelopment #AI

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Why Outcome Focus is the Secret to Agile/Digital Transformation Success Recently, a client was so focused on the design/look of information in a document (i.e. ugly, awkward, draft), that they failed to understand the immense value of the conversations that the crude document fostered. This shortsightedness, valuing Output (in this case - the crude document format), over the Outcomes (the insightful discussions and information derived) is a textbook example of misguided focus - valuing Output over Outcomes. In today's fast-paced world, leaders must pivot from measuring success by outputs alone. Instead, a paradigm shift towards outcome-oriented strategies can drive substantial benefits. Understanding the Power of Outcomes: While outputs are important, they don't always equate to success. Valuing Output as more important than Outcomes tends to lead business initiatives the *Wrong Way*. On the other hand, Outcomes focus on the tangible results and value derived from those outputs. This shift in focus ensures alignment with strategic goals, better customer satisfaction, and more effective resource allocation. The Executive Blindspot: As in the above mentioned experience, many leaders remain fixated on outputs, often at the expense of long-term value and adaptability. By recognizing this pitfall, executives can steer their companies toward true agile/digital transformation success. Embrace Change, Drive Value: Leaders who prioritize outcomes over outputs will find their organizations more agile, customer-centric, and prepared to thrive in a competitive market. #OutcomeFocus #DigitalTransformation #StrategicLeadership #BusinessStrategy #CustomerValue #AgileTransformation #wrongway #intrinsicagility

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My agile bookshelf currently consists of the following books I like to think it covers a range of practical aspects of agile, coaching principles, consulting advise and applying agile to different contexts. A favourite of mine is "That's Not How We Do Things Here": This engaging story format makes it a breeze to read, all while planting thought-provoking seeds about change management - which is critical alongside any agile transformation!! While I'm proud of this collection, I know it's not complete! What hidden Agile gems are lurking on YOUR bookshelf? Share your recommendations in the comments, and let's build the ultimate Agile Library together! ·      Coaching Agile Teams; Lyssa Adkins ·      Coaching Journal; David Lowe ·      Team Topologies; Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais ·      The coaching habit; Michael Bungay Stanier ·      The trusted advisor; David Maister, Charles Green, and Robert Galford ·      Agile Selling; Jill Konrath ·      Training from the back of the room; Sharon Bowman ·      SPRINT; Jake Knapp ·      Agile Retrospectives; Ester Derby and Diana Larsen ·      The five dysfunctions of teams; Patrick Lencioni ·      Making work visible; Dominica DeGrandis ·      The Toyota Way; 14 Management Principles ·      97 things every scrum practitioner should know; Gunther Verheyen ·      The art of doing twice the work in half the time; Jeff Sutherland ·      The scrum fieldbook; J.J. Sutherland ·      Applying scrum with Kanban; Andy Hiles ·      Essential Kanban condensed; David J Anderson and Andy Carmichael ·      21 tips to facilitate and coach agile scrum teams; Pashun Consulting ·      Xlr8; John Kotter ·      Leading Change; John Kotter ·      That’s not how we do things here ; John Kotter ·      Agile for non software teams; Gil Broza ·      Turn the ship around; L. David Marquet ·      Sooner, safer, happier; Jonathan Smart #Agile #Agilecoaching #Books #ContinuousImprovement

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Are you working in Australia? Loving the life, loving the sunshine, but wishing you could upskill without using all your hard-earned cash on training? It’s a bit of a stretch - but stick with me. Imagine if you could get your Agile Foundations or Agile Product Owner certification underway from the comfort of your own bed/couch, and be all done before lunchtime, ready to kick into your day in the land of plenty?! Imagine if that didn’t cost you an arm and a leg because you could use the tanking NZ economy and our cheap offer to your advantage? Nomad8 have two amazing online ICAgile courses coming up - that can make all this a reality for you. 1. Agile Foundations course, to get the knowledge you need to bring Agile goodness to your role. Learn about the Modern Agile values and principles and how to apply them to your work. Understand the practices of Agile and when they’re useful, or when they’re not. 2. Agile Product Owner course, taking you through some of the key elements of being a great product owner. Both courses run online from 9am-12.30 NZT (that’s 7am-10.30am AU time) Magic! The first people to sign up get a massive discount off the standard price. See more here: https://lnkd.in/g3WrRUjm OR book your tickets right away: Foundations (17, 19, 24 June) :  https://lnkd.in/gQctMMN7 Product Owner (3, 4, 10, 11 July) : https://lnkd.in/gNstWCfm And for no other reason than that she's pretty here's a photo of Luca, one of the Nomad8 dogs, enjoying the sunshine and her job as chief stick collector. #training #ICAgile #agile #remote #productowner #productmanager #ICAgileProductOwner

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3 Shocking Reasons Why Agile Coaching Isn't Just for Experts When: 24th July 12noon ACST Where: Agility@Scale Podcast https://lnkd.in/gYanRcun Who: Bob Galen Why: Some perspectives imply Agile Coaching is for a small set of specialized agilists who serve to improve everyone else. Or that it’s a unique role that others, including managers, Scrum Masters, and leaders, will find challenging to master. This event intends to debunk those notions. Bob Galen subscribes to several generic notions in agile contexts. One is that everyone has leadership potential and can rise to be a leader. The other is that everyone is a coach, can coach, and has a foundational responsibility to coach, regardless of their role. The only questions are will, skill, and experience. In this talk, Bob will explore the nuance associated with agile coaching to demystify it and encourage you to find your inner agile coach in whatever role you currently hold. He’ll share and explore the Agile Coaching Growth Wheel as a competency model for agile coaching. Next, he'll explore the critical aspects of an agile coaching mindset. Finally, he’ll give you a chance to practice having a coaching conversation. Bob hopes to inspire you so your inner Agile Coach emerges, grows, and shines. #NeuroAdaptability #ScrumCraft #neuroagility #theagilestoic #dontbeadick #agile #scrum #agilecoaching #agiletransformation

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3 Shocking Reasons Why Agile Coaching Isn't Just for Experts When: 24th July 12noon ACST Where: Agility@Scale Podcast https://lnkd.in/gYanRcun Who: Bob Galen 🇺🇦 Why: Some perspectives imply Agile Coaching is for a small set of specialized agilists who serve to improve everyone else. Or that it’s a unique role that others, including managers, Scrum Masters, and leaders, will find challenging to master. This event intends to debunk those notions. Bob Galen subscribes to several generic notions in agile contexts. One is that everyone has leadership potential and can rise to be a leader. The other is that everyone is a coach, can coach, and has a foundational responsibility to coach, regardless of their role. The only questions are will, skill, and experience. In this talk, Bob will explore the nuance associated with agile coaching to demystify it and encourage you to find your inner agile coach in whatever role you currently hold. He’ll share and explore the Agile Coaching Growth Wheel as a competency model for agile coaching. Next, he'll explore the critical aspects of an agile coaching mindset. Finally, he’ll give you a chance to practice having a coaching conversation. Bob hopes to inspire you so your inner Agile Coach emerges, grows, and shines. #NeuroAdaptability #ScrumCraft #neuroagility #theagilestoic #agile #scrum #agilecoaching #agiletransformation

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