Product Agility

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

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en-gbMarch 23, 2023

Value Measurement In Product Development & Scrum (with Fred Fowler, Author)

The importance of focusing on producing results that turn into dollars and cents rather than just being busy
Testing a thought about how similar should every organisation's approach to calculating value be.
The challenges of pointing out mistakes and assigning blame in disastrous situations
How people tend to become defensive when they are told they have been doing something wrong and try to shift the blame onto others.

Here are the Highlights

00:05:04 Measuring Productivity, Not Busyness
00:09:11 Blame Game: The Challenge Of Addressing Mistakes In A Defensive Environment
00:10:13 Being Selective With Gigs: Saying No To Some And Regretting Others
00:14:21 Excitement For A Worthwhile Cause
00:16:56 The True Purpose Of Scrum: Creating Valuable Products
00:22:09 Scrum: Making Decisions Based On Measured Results
00:23:38 The Importance Of Goals In Scrum
00:25:48 Should each organisation's value calculation be the same?
00:28:23 Episode Recap

Guest Bio
Fred Fowler is the former mayor of Sunnyvale, Ca and an internationally recognized expert on the Scrum Framework. He is certified with a Doctor of Scrum, Professional Scrum Master Level III, and has published two books on Amazon. He also hosts two Advanced Scrum Case Study podcasts, runs a Silicon Valley Professional Scrum meetup group of 2000 members, and recently started a similar group based in Shanghai.

Silicon Valley Scrum (including Links to Fred's books) - https://www.siliconvalleyscrum.com/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbMarch 16, 2023

The Potential Of The Kanban Maturity Model: Balance, Adaptability And Customer Satisfaction (with Teodora Bozheva)

Teodora Bozheva, creator of the Kanban Maturity Model (a brilliant tool for teaching people what customer centric really means) coaches, agile and product alike), where we have been exploring the organizational maturity levels in the model. Is this the 3rd episode of 3, We spoke about pre-empting customer expectations, flow metrics and how to create a superior business.

00:02:12 What it is level three "Fit for Purpose", in the Kanban Maturity Model?
00:04:20 Level three is about flow metrics and balancing capacity and demand. What else doe's it bring to the party?
00:05:46 Is the goal of maturing in the Kanban Maturity Model to be able to react to changes in the market? Or pre-empt them to achieve their business outcomes and organizational agility?
00:06:36 What tools does the Kanban Maturity Model offer to help organisations anticipate their customer or market needs and become a more mature business?
00:08:16 Is removing waste always a powerful tool? Perhaps not...
00:09:39 Is the evolution and improvement of processes something that is recommended for the later levels of maturity in the Kanban Maturity Model?
00:11:04 Are the higher levels reserved for only a few organisations?
00:12:10 Where and how can people learn more about the Kanban Maturity Model?
00:15:13 Recap on the conversation with Teodora Bozheva

Guest Bio

Teodora (https://bit.ly/TeoBzaLD) is the co-creator of the Kanban Maturity Model (the other person being David J. Anderson) a model that helps organisations that want to take an evolutionary approach to improve their culture & management so that they can adapt quickly to customer needs.

Kanban Maturity Model -https://bit.ly/kmmmLM

Berry Academy - https://bit.ly/berrypcs

Kanban University - https://bit.ly/KbnUnilm

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbMarch 09, 2023

Unlocking Success: Exploring The Kanban Maturity Model And Collaboration In Product Development (with Teodora Bozheva)

Teodora Bozheva, creator of the Kanban Maturity Model (a brilliant tool for teaching people what customer centric really means) coaches, agile and product alike) Teodora has a proven track record in helping organizations achieve improved levels of adaptability and delivery of products that customers love.

In this 2nd episode, Teodora and Ben delve deep into the early levels of maturity in the Kanban maturity model, explore what it takes to become more customer aligned and many of the vital factors that go into becoming a successful Product Company.

The Highlights

00:02:02 In the Kanban Maturity Model, what does Level 0 look like?
00:04:43 In the Kanban Maturity Model what happens at Level 1?
00:06:28 When in the Kanban Maturity Model do teams become customer driven?
00:09:00 The Problem with Copy and Paste Scrum
00:10:21 How can Copy & Paste Scrum help with Product Management?
00:13:45 Has Teodora witnessed changes in the types of people that are recruited when a company becomes more customer-centric?
00:15:35 How to de-risk recruitment during change

Guest Bio

Teodora (https://bit.ly/TeoBzaLD) is the co-creator of the Kanban Maturity Model (the other person being David J. Anderson,) a model that helps organisations that want to take an evolutionary approach to improve their culture &management so that they can adapt quickly to customer needs.

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbMarch 02, 2023

Product Agility with the Kanban Maturity Model with Teodora Bozheva

Teodora Bozheva, creator of the Kanban Maturity Model (a brilliant tool for teaching people what customer centric really means) coaches, agile and product alike). Teodora loves helping companies improve. I loved having her on the show!

Teodora has a proven track record in helping organizations achieve improved levels of adaptability and delivery of products that customers love.

In this 1st episode, Teodora shares all about the model and its positive impact on organizations. I recommend getting a pen and paper ready, as Teofora will share some golden insights!

The Highlights

00:02:31 Who is Teodora Bozheva?
00:05:51 A concise and brilliant explanation of Kanban
00:07:05 What is the Kanban Maturity Model (KMM)?
00:10:55 What are the higher levels of maturity in the KMM?
00:12:08 Is the KMM for a part of or a whole organisation?
00:14:57 Why maturity (as per the KMM) differs in organisations, and what can be done to make this work
00:18:59 What is the accelerant for maturity in an organisation that appears in nearly all levels of the KMM
00:19:59 A short and insightful anecdote on applying the KMM

Guest Bio

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbFebruary 23, 2023

Scaling Product Excellence @ PandaDoc Insider Secrets for Scrum Masters & Agile Coaches With Denis Salnikov

Denis Salnikov is a Head of Agile Practice at PandaDoc. He and Ben explored just what this role means in a company that is successfully using LeSS Huge - https://less.works/less/less-huge.

What themes did we explore?

How does PandaDoc decide how to group the features on their backlog?
PandaDoc has managers. What are their tips for making it work?
What does a Head of Agile Practices at PandaDoc do on a day-to-day basis?

Here are some of the highlights

00:01:38 - How did PandaDoc create Requirement Areas for their Product?
00:06:12 - What is area "area leadership" at PandaDoc, and how does it help to maximise the Product Value?
00:07:21 - Does the area leadership have any organisational structural relationship within it?
00:08:50 - Product owners have been known to inflate the potential value of their area to keep teams, "their Teams," working on it - This is how PandaDoc deal with that
00:11:24 - What is the best tip Denis can provide to those wondering how to create an area in LeSS Huge for the first time?
00:13:09 - How do reporting lines and organisational structure work with their Product Structure
00:15:05 - What is the day-to-day life like for a Head of Agile Practices at PandaDoc? do they have people management responsibility?
00:16:39 - Is a Head of Agile at PandaDoc just a Scrum Master?
00:19:39 - Denis is proud of his people management skills. How did he develop them?
00:20:48 - Sage advice from Denis... you have to hear it!

Guest Bios

Denis Salnikov is a certified Scrum Master, Kanban Coach & Agile Coach who has been consulting, coaching, mentoring, and teaching cross-functional development teams, management, and organisations since 2014.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsalnikov23/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbFebruary 16, 2023

Cracking the Code of Remote & Multi-Learning: Evgeniy Labunskiy & Denis Salnikov of Panda Docs

Evgeniy and Denis are both Heads of Agile Practice at PandaDoc. They joined Ben to share their top tips for making remote working and learning really work.

What themes did we explore?

The cost of remote working vs co-location
Effective, remote, Feature teams
How a teams geographic location can affect the part of the product they work on

Here are some of the highlights

00:01:24 - PandaDoc moved from complete co-location to complete remote working. What were the challenges and the journey
00:04:02 - What does "Multi-learning" mean in an agile environment?
00:06:06 - How has this agile power couple at PandaDocs bridged the remote working gap to make multi-learning easier
00:08:39 - What is the increased cost of collaboration and conversation when working remotely?
00:09:54 - The reason why working remotely can work? When we see our solo task as valuable more than teamwork
00:11:32 - The secret sauce to make remote work
00:13:14 - Tips for successful Feature Team Self-Design Workshops
00:14:44 - What is more critical in Feature Team Self-Design? Technical or Business domain knowledge?
00:15:40 - Are PandaDoc Feature Teams happier working remotely?
00:17:30 - What does Evengiy believe is an effective strategy for remote teamwork?
00:19:26 - Should your teams' geographic location influence the areas of the product they work on?

Guest Bios

Evgeniy Labunski has over a decade of experience in Agile within Product Development, Enterprise & Startups. He is a strategic thinker, a skilled resolver of conflict and lives and breaths flexibility and adaptability.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/labunskiy/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbFebruary 09, 2023

PandaDocs Agile Power Duo On Features and 5x Growth: Evgeniy Labunskiy & Denis Salnikov

Evgeniy and Denis are both Heads of Agile Practice at PandaDoc. They joined Ben to share trials faced during the Global pandemic and when growing to five times their original size (whilst still getting their product to market). They also share how they started with Large Scale Scrum, LeSS, to achieve their dreams of Feature Teams.

The big questions for me were

Why did they embrace Feature teams (teams who can deliver all features end-to-end)?
How do they get the whole organisation behind the idea of a whole organisational change?
What problems have they encountered, and what are they doing now to overcome them?

Here are some of the highlights

00:04:05 - Who or What is Panda Doc?
00:05:22 - What was the starting point for the journey of the Large Scale Scrum (LeSS) & Feature Teams?
00:10:32 - Did they choose LeSS & Feature Teams, or did they choose them?
00:12:14 - Starting a LeSS Adoption with or without formal LeSS Training?
00:14:13 - The negative side effect of not getting Certified LeSS Training for their adoption
00:15:21 - How growth dilutes an organisation's purpose when using Feature Teams
00:18:22 - Then Denis joined...
00:22:16 - Top-Down and Bottom-Up Adoption
00:23:49 - How 5 x Growth can affect an outstanding engineering culture
00:27:00 - What effect did the Covid Pandemic & the war in Ukraine have on PandaDoc

Guest Bios

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbFebruary 02, 2023

What the f*?! Is Flight Levels (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)

Cliff Hazell, ex-Spotify and Co-Founder of Flight Levels with Kalus Leopold is an expert on organisational change, systems, agile and Kanban. In this practical and somewhat philosophical episode, Cliff and I explore some meaty topics that Agile Coaches, Product People, Scrum Masters, damned pretty much anyone with interest in organisational change will love.

This is the third of three episodes that Cliff and I recorded

In this one, we speak about ...

2:29 - Why and How did Flight Levels come into existence (includes a brilliant metaphor)
6:21 - A Parallel between Flight Levels and Large Scale Scrum?
09:04 - Can there ever be one true way to achieve organisational agility?
10:14 - Are we solving the right problems?
11:56 - Flight Levels = Genius Marketing?
16:14 - Ahmad Fahmy’s Gemba Sprints
17:23 - Doe’s Flight Levels get leaders down to Gemba? (the palace of actual work)
21:37 - Will Flight Levels ever partner with any other approaches?
26:23 - What is the future for Flight Levels

And all this!

What is Flight Levels?
What did Cliff do before co-founding Flight Levels?
What is it if the challenge is not to get teams to perform better at achieving their outcomes?
Cliff shared a brilliant Typewriter based metaphor to explain why organisations fail that even your granny would understand.
What is the right information that organisations need?
Does it pay to be dogmatic about the terminology we use?
Should every problem we find be solved now?
How do Fight levels share pain around to make change happen?
What is the issue with the prevailing system of Technology (not Product ) companies?
Can coordination and visualising it create transparency and unlock opportunities for the future?
Will there ever be one framework to rule them all?
The future for Flight Levels will be looking at, in a post-covid world, exploring new ways to engage, self-paced content

Useful Links
Cliff Hazel - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cliffhazell/
Flight Levels Academy - https://www.flightlevels.io/
Ahmad Fahmy - https://www.ahmadfahmy.com/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbJanuary 26, 2023

The Power of Quitting & Org Change Pitfalls (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)

This is the second of 3 episodes that Cliff and I recorded on various topics.

In this one, we speak about Organisational change pitfalls Agile Coaches and other change agents can avoid. The power of quitting in a Product environment (as well as in our personal lives). Putting the parts back together rather than being reductionist (through critiquing the words holistic and systemic and a whole lot more (see below).

Should you want to skip to a specific point, this is probably useful (if chapters are not your thing)

02:28 - How Cliff tuned into his biases
03:24 - Diversity and Bias training challenges
05:34 - Cultural norming
06:25 - Ben overshares (probably)
08:41 - Why it's hard for some when moving from Project to Product delivery
09:23 - What were Cliff's experiences of individual change at Spotify
11:03 - How a 4 x 4 matrix can help explain change resistance
15:00 - Being courageously curious with the Left-Hand column technique
17:24 - Why doe's being rational and applying reasoning not work when you want it to
18:19 - How to create an appropriate course of action to tackle an organisational problem
19:46 - Why you should read Humble Enquiry and judge people on their intentions
21:43 - Tips to avoid failure with organisational restructures

And all this!

🧔🏻SA to Sweden was a cultural change that affected cliff, it led to people thinking his behaviour was abnormal.
🧔🏻He found his understanding of the world to be incomplete as it was only through his lens
🧔🏻What are some of the challenges Cliff has found with bias training?
🧔🏻Doe's just knowing our biases mean we can overcome them?
🧔🏻What is the link between lions and whether we believe someone could be a great leader or software developer
🧔🏻Cultural norming, how does this make individual adaptation hard?
🧔🏻Can we say that biases or always good or bad?
🧔🏻People are quick to judge what people say, post, and infer - but what about their story?
🧔🏻W

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

Annie Duke - Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away

en-gbJanuary 19, 2023

The Problems with Top-Down and Bottom-Up Change (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)

Cliff Hazell, ex-Spotify and Co-Founder of Flight Levels with Klaus Leopold is an expert on organisational change, systems, agile and Kanban. In this practical and somewhat philosophical episode, Cliff and I explore some meaty topics that Agile Coaches, Product People, Scrum Masters, damned pretty much anyone with an interest in organisational change will love.

This is the first of 3 episodes that Cliff and I recorded on various topics.

Should you want to skip to a specific point, this is probably useful (if chapters are not your thing)

02:15 - How did Ben become aware of Cliff and his work?
03:03 - Who is Cliff Hazell? In his own words
06:37 - Is the "Top Down and Bottom" metaphor useful when attempting organisational change?
09:20 - The problems with the terms "systemic" and "holistic."
11:39 - what is the big challenge when embarking on organisational change?
13:48 - What is it that Cliff finds both frustrating and amusing?
15:16 - The secret to Cliff's success
17:32 - what are the two pitfalls when trying to be outcome focussed
21:03 - What was the thing Cliff should have quit rather than carried on
24:06 - When an organisation should quit talking about focus
27:14 - why is it Naive to think that just training will change an organisational system?
28:42 - Episode recap

Useful Stuff

Sunk cost fallacy

the phenomenon whereby a person is reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial.

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbJanuary 12, 2023

Festive Fun! - Find Out About our Christmas Break and Plans for 2023

As this year comes to an end, I thought it would be the perfect time to take a short hiatus on the podcast! In order to prepare for all of the new amazing things that are coming in January. Thank you to all of the LeSS Listeners, we hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a great New Year! Listen out for us in 2023!

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbDecember 09, 2022

The Dynamics of High Performance Teams With Ari Tikka

Ari has woven his thoughts on group dynamics by consolidating 70 years of research into something he believes are the team dynamics fundamentals that everyone Scrum Master should know how to leverage to help teams reach high performance

WHO IS ARI?
Ari provides coaching, training, and consultation for Agile Teams, Product Owners, Adoption Leaders, and executives. He has worked in the software business since 1990, including seven years of developing fault-tolerant embedded real-time systems.

✨This research was done in som elunlikley contexts, you will be amazed what we in the Product Agility world can learn from coal miners.
✨Were Coal miners the first Feature Teams?
✨What is the "third" relationship that we can find in a team that is not between each individual but between the individuals and something else
✨how can understanding thie extra entity help us to create teams whose performance sets them apart from the crowd?
✨What can we develop in ourselves that enables us to be aware of this and manage the power it holds over us and others?
✨We learn the first necessary step in team forming, that if missed could caause performacne improvement inertia
✨What is the role of the "situational leader" and how teams thrive because of it
✨✨And how this situational leadership can then lead the team to an untimely death
✨How can you tell if your team is in its Teenage years?
✨How the teams "internal questions" are the key to the next stages of team development
✨How long does it take for teams to reach distinguiable levels of performance
✨Why "Dreaming" is better than "Norming"
✨How can we turn this advice to communiities?
✨Team resiliacny, does it mean being hard so nothing effects your or soft so that they can dented and recover, becoming something new

USEFUL LINKS
The images Ari was showing during the episode (Team Life Cycle) - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1D_GnHqZtnp1RsSnl0PBb8aQZcsYP2JZ-?usp=sharing
Teamwork and Rewarding, a blog post by Ari - https://gosei.fi/blog/teamwork-and-rewarding/
More info on Ari's approach - https://gosei.fi/teamwork/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbDecember 01, 2022

Enabling High Performing Teams With Ari Tikka

Team performance has almost become a taboo topic in the agile world, which I believe is ridiculous. Scrum Masters and Agile Team Coaches are there specifically for that reason. You can guess how I felt when Ari Tikka - https://www.linkedin.com/in/aritikka/ wanted to talk about this. In a word, EXCITED.

WHO IS ARI?
Ari provides coaching, training, and consultation for Agile Teams, Product Owners, Adoption Leaders, and executives. He has worked in the software business since 1990, including seven years of developing fault-tolerant embedded real-time systems.

WHAT IS IN THE EPISODE

🎭How introducing a new vocabulary and knowledge of teamwork enables transformational team dialogue and performance
🎭What type of work is inherently inconsequential, and why this work stops team performance improvement in its tracks
🎭How do you resolve the big impediments? What two things are needed in a room to accelerate continuous improvement and the removal of BIG impediments? Ari shares a huge secret to his success
🎭 How Ari's work builds on top of Richard Hackman's work (standing on the shoulders of giants - diff thumb)
🎭What are the enabling conditions that enable teams to have great performances?
🎭Does Ari think that psychological proofing to choose team members works?
🎭Would you believe that coaching a team only contributes 10% towards their performance? We talk about the other 90 10% of the performance that can be influenced.
🎭According to Richard Hackman's research, how much of an effect can coaching a team have when compared to, let's say, getting the team set up in the first place
a coach, if coaching a team may be only influencing performance by 10%, Ari gives you some options
🎭What is the contract game, and why should you know about it!

USEFUL LINKS

The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/255127.The_Fifth_Discipline
MIT Beer Simulation Game - https://web.mit.edu/jsterman/www/SDG/beergame.html
Richard Hackman's books - https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/701345.J_Richard_Hackman

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 24, 2022

What is Team Magic? - Ari Tikka

Ari Tikka - https://www.linkedin.com/in/aritikka/ has a magic wand for team performance, just what this wand was took me by surprise.

Not because its actually magic but because it stands a pretty good chance of working because
1) its not actually magic
2) its based upon research
3) Ari has a rather special approach.

WHO IS ARI?
Ari provides coaching, training, and consultation for Agile Teams, Product Owners, Adoption Leaders, and executives. He has worked in the software business since 1990, including seven years of developing fault-tolerant embedded real-time systems.

WHAT IS IN THE EPISODE?

In this episode, Ari makes the case that, to achieve a great systemic, organisational performance a Team, regardless of size, is required. Focusing on 7+/-2 won't get us to where amazing performances are staged, so we spoke about

🍄What is performance in a team context?
🍄Everyone knows there are two types of magic Harry Potter style (real) and Dynamo - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamo_(magician) (not real). Which is Ari's?!
🍄What are group dynamics?
🍄What does Ari recommend when you get to more than around eight teams?
🍄What type of Teamwork and collaboration mode has Ari seen between Product Owners
🍄The problems with people who have never really experienced great teamwork leading and managing teams
🍄In small-scale software development, how does Ari see leadership being enacted?
🍄How the performance of the "smartest person" has held back our thinking on Teams
🍄 Why is it that in some organisations, the "aggressive whippers" (aka Project Managers who focus on Jira ticket management) get promoted?
🍄 Ben's complete ignorance as to what Zen meditation is was exposed (Ben: "turns out its inverse floating")
🍄Is a Requirement Area - https://less.works/less/less-huge/requirement-areas in
If the enablers for Teamwork are the same for communities, so what are Ari's tips for getting a community working well?

USEFUL LINKS
Richard Hackman's books - https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/701345.J_Richard_Hackman

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 17, 2022

James Mayes - Dealing with The Product Mentor Shortage: Product Elevation Talk in Ten

James Mayers is the Cofounder & former CEO, Mind the Product. I grabbed James for 10 minutes at the Product Elevation 2022 conference in Dublin to get his talk in Ten.

Now his talk wasn't titles the "Product Mentor" shortage, but I needed something pithy to put on the thumbnail and it seemed relevant to our conversation.

Here is the offical title and synopsis for his talk

How to build the best support for you AND your team
Product mentors are in short supply, leadership mentors even more so - and real experts are always time poor. This lightning session will run through tips, tactics and hacks to help you build the support networks you need

What James has to say on mentoring in the Product world was fascinating, thought provoking and practically useful.

These descriptions are short, mostly because I am sat in the conference venue trying to keep the cycle time per episode nice and short :-)

Useful Links

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

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Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 10, 2022

Janna Bastow - The Skinny on Lean Road mapping: Product Elevation Talk in Ten

Janna is a product manager, taking the forms of a startup founder and CEO, consultant, and accidental event manager. As a product manager, she is always looking for better tools, which led to her founding ProdPad, product management software that helps you manage your roadmap and your product backlog.

Janna on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jannabastow/

Continuing with the hugely popular "Talks in Ten" format Ben is at the Product Elevation Elevation 2022 conference in Dublin asking people to summarise their talk in ten minutes (ish)

This time up it is Janna Bastow, her talk was enlightening and this short interview is rammed with good tips.

Here is the overview of her talk (and this chat)

In this talk, Janna will look at modern road mapping best practices, including where lean road mapping came from and how to put it to use in your organization. You’ll learn practical tips on how to move away from old school feature and date-driven roadmaps, and how to move your team on to a leaner, more objective-focused track of product management using OKRs.

Brilliant links

The slides - https://bit.ly/lean-roadmapping-okrs
A safe place to play with Janna's Prodpad- www.prodpad.com/sandbox
Prodpad- - www.prodpad.com/

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 10, 2022

Product Elevation Conference - Why Product Team Coaching Is The Secret Sauce We Need

Ben is at the Product Elevation Conference in Dublin and delivered an experimental talk on Product Team Coaching. TLDR: Its about how to increase Product Team Performance.

This talk was done live less that one hour before release, how's that for a low cycle time :-)

Product Elevation - https://skillsmatter.com/conferences/13772-pe2022-in-person#program

The slides are here - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1gfV1UHp2ZFov3iFEfCmkcQoEchsEzI8w?usp=sharing

Why experimental? The slides were a bit out there and the content, perhaps a little different to what people were expecting!

Either way, it went down brilliantly. Enjoy!

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

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Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 10, 2022

The UKs BIGGEST Agile Failure With Paddy Dhanda - Part 2 of 2

**DISCLAIMER** This is my MOST POLITICAL PODCAST to date and goes deep on a HUGE failure of a HUGE project. It is an emotive topic for many so I want to make it clear that there were great people working long hours and nothing we say is aimed at any one person. It was, in my (Bens') opinion, a systemic failure with nothing to do with individual people.

Pardeep "Paddy" Dhanda - https://www.linkedin.com/in/paddy-dhanda/, Creative Industry Awards Best Content Creator nominee, Agile Practices Director for the UKs largest technical training company QA picks up from where we left off in episode 1 to try and understand what could have been done to have made the £2 billion project less of a sh*t show. Having been on benefits for half of his life, this was a topic close to Ben's heart.

So what did we talk about?

✨ When people parent the truth away from the people doing the work.
✨ How the LeSS Huge Product Owner structure creates alignment
✨ With a project with such a strong purpose, why didn't people speak up?
✨Did the fact that consultancy firms had incumbent software give them too much power?
✨Would it have been possible for Universal Credit to have been a single Product with a single Product Backlog?
✨How competition between consultancy firms leads to feature/requirement land grabs, (much like corporate Cobra Paw - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45oTvnqTmrc) where the desire was to be the richest, not do the right thing for the people of the UK.
✨Was there any approach that could have saved the project from disaster?
✨ The Sponsor employed Go See, so what on earth went wrong?

Some awesome links

🔗 Universal Credit, the UKs largest agile failure - https://letmegooglethat.com/?q=universal+credit+agile+failure
Pardeep's AWESOME podcast superpowers.school - https://superpowers.school
🔗 Seacom Enterprise Agility Conference - https://www.seacom.online/
🔗 Check out this Visual Thinking Webinar - https://info.qa.com/visual-thinking-superpowers-ondemand-webinar
🔗 Must Read boo

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn

en-gbNovember 10, 2022

The UKs BIGGEST Agile Failure With Paddy Dhanda Part 1 of 2

Pardeep "Paddy" Dhanda - https://www.linkedin.com/in/paddy-dhanda/, Creative Industry Awards Best Content Creator nominee, Agile Practices Director for the UKs largest technical training company QA and ex IBM'er tells us about what it was like working on the UKs largest ever (to date) agile failure the UK Department Of Work and Pensions (DWP) £2 billion Universal Credit Platform. Having been on benefits for half of his life, this was a topic close to Ben's heart.

With around £1.12billion burnt on consultants, Paddy tells us what it was like working there and what he blieves were some of the biggest hurdles that lead to the DWP pulling the plug on all agile development for this delivery.

Sounds pretty unbelievable right? You can find more information from this great write up from Computer Weekly - https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240187478/Why-agile-development-failed-for-Universal-Credit

What is:

Housing benefit - https://www.gov.uk/housing-benefit
Council tax benefit - https://www.gov.uk/apply-council-tax-reduction

So what was explored?

💣 A whole new reason why component teams are created that I had never though of.
💣How Paddy came from the UK's worst performing school to the UKs worst agile delivery
💣What was the human skill that was missing that caused it to be such a HUGE failure
💣 What do you get if you have 200 super intelligent consultants, what do you think they were optimising for?
💣 Universal Credit was seen as the UKs Conservative governments flagship agile programme, how did this contribute towards it's failure?
💣 <Sarcasm> How you can you be totally agile when you have vendors handing large requirement documents they have spent years writing? </Sarcasm>
💣 Why so many scenarios they had to implement couldn't be without them being discussed by the UK Government leaders
💣Do any agile approaches take into account the operational overhead created when technology is not the silver bullet?
💣 What is and who were the "middle users"?

Host Bio

Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱!

Ben Maynard

Product Agility Podcast

Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes

Spotify - https://spoti.fi/3XzuzND
iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p

Want to come on the podcast?

Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/ProdPodCn