What I want to explore here are ideas on how to use Lean Manufacturing to help waste reduction in areas outside of manufacturing. When I worked in manufacturing, everything was about Lean Six Sigma. Outside of manufacturing, that sort of cultural drive to improve doesn’t seem to be […]
Scrum has been too often shoved into situations where it has no business being. I know Scrum proponents will often tell you Scrum is versatile and it can go anywhere – it can’t. There are jobs that are too big for Scrum. Scrum is a lightweight approach. It […]
*The following is written by guest blogger Tammy Ziemba Agile development is based upon a value system and specific core practices, that when reliably connected, result in high performing software development organizations. Build up Wildly Important Goals: A team can concentrate on 1-3 things at any given […]
Projects fail for several reasons and those reasons often vary depending on who you ask. My own opinion, you can track back just about every single failure reason to issues with planning or issues with communication; sometimes both. That is, of course, assuming you have adequate support from […]
Quite simply, Osmotic Communication is the accidental overhearing of background information that may later end up being important. The term was coined by Alistair Cockburn, one of the signers of the Agile Manifesto. “Osmotic communication means that information flows into the background hearing of members of the team, […]
Untrained staff, new employees, inexperienced technical resources. If you have been a project manager (predictive or adaptive) for any duration of time, you have had to work with someone who lacked some knowledge in a needed area. You have probably also had tight deadlines and not enough time […]
The Scrum Master is one of three recognized roles in Scrum. They are the servant-leader for the Scrum team, which means they serve the team by working to provide what the team needs to complete their job. This could be working to make sure they have the right […]
There are many sources available that discuss Agile and Agile principles. One of the most well-known is the Manifesto For Agile Software Development, which is commonly known as the Agile Manifesto. This includes the 12 Principles behind the manifesto. I personally have some issues with the Agile Manifesto, […]
I get it. There are some bad employees out there. Sometimes those employees are just that way and you cannot do anything about it. Other times, you create them. Posting a want-ad like the one shown here, and maybe I am wrong, seems like a sure way to […]
The Big Five is a classification system of personality traits that many psychologists propose as being the principle traits of individual differences in personality (Carleton University, 2013). These traits may determine how an individual perceives the world and how they interact with it. While these may not be […]
You want your team to work as a unified team, but for some reason, your efforts at building a team-driven culture seem to be failing. You put up all the posters, talk about the value of teamwork in meetings, created a reward program to honor those that go […]
That often depends on who you ask. Some will say it is the Scrum Master. Some will insist it is the Product Owner. Some people will insist there isn’t one – technically, by name only, there isn’t one. But I am here to tell you that A) There […]
*The following is written by guest blogger Salarco Since 2012, I’ve been working for an international organization that promotes leadership through different kinds of cross-cultural exchanges for young people between 18 and 30 years old. Our goal is to promote peace and fulfillment of humankind’s potential through […]
If you haven’t already, complete Self-Hosting Jira for Small Teams Part 1: Installing Jira At the end of Part 1, you either had the installer launch Jira for you, or you can navigate a web browser to http://localhost:8080/secure/SetupMode!default.jspa This is a reference to the localhost. That means your computer. You […]
There is a claim among people that Agile teams are leaderless. The claim can sound reasonable on the surface, with all the talk about self-organizing teams and a lack of defined roles… But it is wrong for several reasons: Self-organizing does not mean leaderless Agile is not a […]