What I love about Agile ways is its empiricism. Accepting that we cannot predict and plan how things will turn out. Accepting instead, to just start, try something, learn, and adjust along the way. Accepting that “good enough” trumps “perfect” at every step. Preferring to be approximately right-ish, quickly than exactly wrong, slowly. This holds … Continue reading When Is Good Enough Not?
Management tends to get a bad rap whenever Agile ways of working are discussed. Sometimes this is warranted and other times it is not. One narrative is the manager who basks in the glory of their own magnificence. Those managers may very well deserve to be a lightning rod for criticism and blame when empowered … Continue reading Is Management a Security Blanket or Straitjacket?
I don’t envy customer service agents on the front lines dealing with customer support calls. It must take tremendous patience and restraint to deal with the onslaught of confused and often irate customer calls. All the while being recorded for quality control purposes. I know this because I’ve been the confused and irate customer calling … Continue reading An Unexpected Customer Support Story
After almost 40 years working in organizations of all shapes and sizes, first as an employee and then as a consultant, I’ve witnessed first hand how much of an influence the distribution of power can have for joy at work. More recently, I can see how the distribution of power can shape my value and … Continue reading How Are The Currencies of Power Changing?
Whenever I heard the term “pairing”, I used to think of wine and food. The process of combining certain wines with certain foods so that the unique texture, flavours and chemical compounds of one enhance the other to create a climatic dining experience. I am by no means, a wine connoisseur or a sommelier. The … Continue reading Pairing Beyond Programming
Most of the time, I didn’t see eye to eye with my late step-mother. However, on one occasion, I did. It was during the peak of the pandemic in late 2020. My step-mother was in the hospital and my dad was home alone. He was lamenting to her how it seemed everyone had forgotten his … Continue reading Get Rid of Employee Appreciation Day
When I help organizations learn, struggle through and embrace Agile ways of working, I inevitably hear the following sharp rejoinder from staff and management alike: “We don’t want more meetings!” Usually, as a result of introducing Scrum events or Core Hours to teams. It’s often a telltale sign that I have much work to do. … Continue reading No More Meetings?
One of my most memorable accomplishments as a teenager was getting my driver’s license. It took me a couple of tries. When I finally passed, I felt overjoyed. I let out a sigh of relief as the dark clouds of doubt and failure parted. For me, driving a car was one of those rites of … Continue reading Being Agile is Like Driving a Car
“We did not communicate well enough to get those people, as I say, to let go of that rock and swim across the river of change with us.”Roger Smith, General Motors CEO, 1987 I just renewed my Project Management Professional (PMP) credential for another three years. I’ve been a PMP since 2006. Long before I … Continue reading The New Frozen Middle
“There is no truth. There is only perception.” In the mid-1800’s when French novelist Gustave Flaubert coined this phrase, there was no digital social media. Radio, television and the telephone hadn’t been invented yet. People around the world relied on word-of-mouth and print media reports for the state of current events. Any reports would’ve been … Continue reading More Than Size Matters
nextchapterconsulting.ca 