Category Archives: Agile Scrum

How much you can learn from people drawing a boat.

01 Monday Dec 2014

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These techniques allow you to create a safer environment because it is set in scene, the team become actors and artists that voice their concerns and opinions through a medium without exposing their sometimes vulnerable selves.

It’s good to jazz things up sometimes, so I decided to do a little experiment with our team. Experiments are good, they are the basis for advancement.

retro technique

retro technique

We use a big boardroom for our retro’s, with 2 massive boards on the wall. So I asked every member to go up to the board and draw a boat. The boat has to represent themselves, no other direction was given. ( a variation on a known retro technique)

It was fascinating to see the result. Most ships looked very similar, with sails and a mast, some had people on deck, some were just the ship and then there are the creative exceptions, massive battleships with guns and enough room to land a few F-14’s.

The drawings reflect a lot of the artists personality and skills, so it gives you great insight about underlying personality traits, ambitions, potential issues and insecurities, but I am not yet going to go into that detail in this post.

Step 2 was for every one to put their name on the boat, emphasising once again that this boat represents them as a person in the whole setting of this sprint.

Step 3 was to draw anchors. Each anchor representing something that is slowing them down, the size of the anchor represents the importance.

One observation is that this technique allowed people to be more open about personal challenges within the sprint. Identifying through the boat made it easier to open up as there is an object that protects you. It was also fun for the team to try something different.

In addition to the individual boat drawings, we added another experiment. A suggestion for improvement came up but there was some pro/con within the team. So we decided to try out a debate.

You know the traditional debate teams in college where one is pro and the other is con, this is what we did. One person was elected to represent pro, another to represent con and the rest of the team where the jury. Drawback was that it was time consuming, pro was that as a team we got to safely challenge each others beliefs and look at everything objectively. Again it created a safer way to deal with challenges. I will definitely be using this technique again as even the more quiet members of the team voiced their point of view through this technique and didn’t feel insecure when their ideas were challenged because it was all part of the exercise.

These techniques allow you to create a safer environment because it is set in scene, the team become actors and artists that voice their concerns and opinions through a medium without exposing their sometimes vulnerable selves.

Thanks,

Brigitte

Hidden gems in retro – learn from history to improve in the future

13 Thursday Nov 2014

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speedboat

In my native language, we have a saying: ‘EEN EZEL STOOT ZICH GEEN TWEEMAAL AAN DEZELFDE STEEN!‘ Loosely translated it means:  ‘A donkey doesn’t trip twice over the same rock.’

So basically, you are an idiot if you make the same mistake twice. In real life, planet earth seems to be populated with idiots and I must admit, on occasion, I am one of them.

Why? Cause we don’t take the time to stop and look around to see what rock actually made us trip. Or we just assume tripping is part of our natural behaviour. Or we know the rocks that make us trip, we know they shouldn’t be there but we accept that there is nothing we can do. Or maybe we are even to scared to look if there are any other paths that would allow us to avoid the rocks? There are so many other variants that stop us from making the same mistakes twice and ultimately, stop us from improving.

So that is why we have retro’s. A brief moment to stand still, look at what went well, what didn’t go that well. There are 2 parts: Identify (inspect) and plan to improve (adapt) – tip: develop your own personal retro. I do that all the time, take some time to just sit and ask myself the questions what I like about my behaviour, where I can improve,…

There are plenty of techniques out there and different ways to get to the same result. At the moment, with my current team I use a technique that the previous scrum master used and I added in: start, stop, continue.

The retro’s are good at the moment, our team has gotten used to them and is slowly understanding the value of surfacing issues in a diplomatic way. Hopefully in the future, we will reach a level where we don’t even need diplomacy any more, just respect, but at the moment, we aren’t there yet. So what does the retro look like? Every one gathers in the meeting room, they can sit, stand, walk around, whatever is comfortable. And we start by asking every one to give us 2 words of what they felt last sprint. To give some examples, sometimes words like these surface: ‘lots of fun’ (yes 3 words, but I’m flexible with the number 😉 or ‘very bored’ or ‘cautiously optimistic’. I write them on the board, in a mind map with the initials next to them of who said what. – the reason I use mindmap is: I want my team to understand the value of approaching emotions or concepts in an analytical way. This mindmap will usually be on the left side of the board.

Once I have gotten the words, I draw a table on the right side of the board:  start, stop, continue this will lead to the conclusions. Showing the team that what they analyse immediately reflects into valuable improvement areas.

Then I go back to the left side and pick one member out and get them to explain more in detail what their words mean. It’s great fun, wherever we can, we keep it light, even when the words are more loaded, because it is important to show that we are looking at problems that people have, the problems are the issue, not the people.

Retro’s are fun, why? Neuroscience has given us enough info to know what fun does to our brain, eliminates stress, actually grows neurons, bottom line, makes us smarter in the most efficient way. We come out of a retro energized, even if we tackled hard topics.

I usually also embed some coaching in my retro’s where I need to, you plant the seeds, the team runs with it and you see the individuals improve!

Don’t get me wrong, retro’s are in my opinion the hardest, it requires a lot of skills to see what approach to take to get the best out of your team and what approach to take towards every individual. Because I have rarely seen teams that are on the same level of experience, maturity,…

But, they are the most valuable, THIS is where you IMPROVE, add tremendous value to the business ( improve process, individual and team)… if you do it right.

Now go out and play!!!

🙂

PS: If you want to know about other techniques, look up 4L, play boat, mad sal glad, quartering, silent writing (if you need help with establishing safety),…

The hidden gems of refinement – phase 2

06 Thursday Nov 2014

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This is part 2 of the hidden gems in refinement, you will find part 1 as the previous post on my blog.

Part 2 of refinement continues as part 1 if you did not manage to finalise part 1 in the first refinement. ( get all stories estimated in T-shirt sizes ) -ultimately, the t-shirt sizing is good enough to start your sprint planning, but I always try to add another level and dig a bit deeper in the stories if time allows it. The sooner we spot potential issues, the sooner we can do something about it.

So, Part 2 is  all about refining further and at the same time, revisiting the stories to get them in every team members mind. Did you know that the way the stories are written ( AS A [PERSONA] I WANT TO […] SO THAT […] ) to be optimised for sucking the information up in your brain? Like songs, we remember stories easier than de-coupled words. So I guess the next step up for remembering stories will be creating song cards, but I haven’t gone that far yet with my scrum master experiments, maybe one day 😉

Also the format is there to really make you think about why you are building what you are building, you you are creating it for and what it actually is that you are creating. This  triggers usually other areas of thoughts/requirements that might have slipped through the net if you didn’t take the trouble to write the as, what, so format. (As a scrum master, make sure that people do THINK about it, and not just use the format without thinking… trust me, it does happen…)

Do we write out the whole format on the card? No, as with everything, nothing is black and white, you need to THINK. What does my team need? Visibility, clarity and to understand the meaning behind it. If you are trying to fit AS a forgetful user I want to… on a card, it looks visually cluttered. So to fix that, I am using a visual persona ( stickfigure with a legend, most of our persona’s are re-occurring anyway so every one gets to know our actors )  I leave out or abbreviate the i want to and the so that is optional anyway, but when I use it, it gets abbreviated or replaced by an arrow ( especially when I am working with a techy  team, arrows is part of their alphabet)

Now back to phase 2 refinement.

This is what it looks like:

Agile refinement phase 2

Agile refinement phase 2

From refinement phase 1, you got to put the stories into T-shirt sized bubbles. Now it’s time to take the relativity one step further.

For every bubble:

  1. Find the smallest piece of work put it to the left of the bubble
  2. Find the biggest piece of work, put it to the right of the bubble
  3. Look at the other cards and put them relative to each other.

For small, you have 3 areas to use (LEFT = 1 user story point, MIDDLE = 2 user story points, RIGHT = 3 user story points)

For the others, you only have 2 columns ( LEFT and RIGHT )

Why do we have 3 options for small and less for medium (5,8), Large (13,21), XL (34,55): The smaller an item, usually, the easier it is to predict the effort so you can have more precise ranges. The more complex, the bigger the ranges ( so they can hold more diverse cards – when it comes to effort. BTW effort = TIME * people)

XL, is another kettle of fish… If an item is XL, find out why. Is it really too big or too unclear or a bit of both? Can we split it out following INVEST? If you can- do so and re-organise the cards. Will it fit into a sprint? if No, then you need to split the card even if it doesn’t follow INVEST, I know there is not a lot of info out there on these scenario’s but, Agile looks at reality, so reality needs to be reflected at all times. Use pragmatism in these cases, that has always worked well for me. But to be honest, it’s very rare that we can’t find a way following INVEST to make it fit into a sprint.

So what are the hidden gems?

  • Individual level => Brain-training + efficiency training due to format of cards and repetition
  • team work as always – they work together deciding smallest, biggest,… it is amazing to see a team really do this together, they form a bond!
  • commitment and autonomy. The team has estimated this, it’s them saying: we can do this, and we feel confident it will take us this amount of effort. => motivation!

I hope you enjoyed this 🙂

Thank you and see you next time!

Brigitte

The ‘so that’ of refinement.

05 Wednesday Nov 2014

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Agile is so effective because it has a lot of hidden tools in it that work. Surprisingly, a lot of the scrum masters and even Agile coaches that I have come across don’t talk about these things. Some don’t know about them, some choose not to reveal them, some even think it’s not part of their job to care….

But, I am a strong believer in clarity, as clarity creates meaning, meaning creates purpose and purpose is one of the corner stones of motivation, which ultimately leads to higher efficiency and thus, higher business value.

When people know the WHY, they will follow, they will learn, they will care. ( why do you think the most successful leaders focus on WHY and not HOW )

I am going to talk a little bit on how I do refinement. Not saying it’s the most effective way and you SHOULD be doing it like this, no, you have your team, you have your style, you will learn what works. But, I do want to show you what has been very successful for me and my teams.

REFINEMENT PHASE 1:

– I have 2 refinements, for a 2 week sprint, in the middle of each week. They are 2 hours long at the moment, because our team is not fully aligned yet. They will become less time consuming over time. But you look at your team and at your needs.

Take a look at this MVP drawing I did on the train this morning, this is the visual representation of my refinement ( phase 1 = week 1) – the second refinement is slightly different, but more on that later.

Agile refinement Phase 1

Agile refinement Phase 1

Phase 1:

Input ==> Prioritised backlog of cards

Iteration per card:

  1. Use a visual reminder of what we are trying to get to: estimation in T-shirt size. (WHY? Are the estimations that important? They are important for different reasons, but one of the hidden gems will become clear when you read on, it’s a tool to make sure the team is on the same page and to create more x-functional mindset)
  2. Ask the PO and the team for clarity on 2 subjects: Business requirement and the detail of what they need/want + How the team thinks of tackling this ( on a high level ) – PO should not interfere with the how, but in my team, he does have a voice and we can openly discuss things because it aids in cooperation and x-functional nature of the team, it brakes down tribes and creates a vibe of truly working together to create business value. BUT… in some teams, you CANNOT do it. If you have a PO with the tendency to micromanage, do not give them a voice until you have coached them into being more efficient.
  3. SM: Do we, as a team, have a clear enough understanding of what is involved to do a high level estimation? Yes? OK, 3,2,1 – estimate!!!
  4. If you notice a big diversity of estimation, it means one of 2 things: 1. your team is not estimating as a team (yes, I ask them to estimate as a team, because it has proven much more efficient – promotes x-functional, understanding of each others challenges, they become a more tight business unit and less risk of silo-ing) or 2. There is a level of un-clarity.
  5. SM: Person Small – Why? Person Large – Why? : You ask the extremes to make their cases, the team chips in when they do and the blanks get filled in, the misunderstandings surface and the team reaches a mutual agreement.
  6. Re-estimate.
  7. All on same level – great, we all know what to do on a high level, we have surfaced effort, complexity and our level of understanding to PO and we have done it as a team, ready to go for it and deliver that business value!!! 🙂

So the hidden gems:

  • Estimation as a team creates understanding and respect for each others challenges
  • It’s the basis of x-functional
  • It highlights where there is misunderstanding
  • It highlight areas of improvement in individuals and teams ( is someone constantly estimating too high? Why is that? lack of confidence? more experienced, so they know what is REALLY involved? Tendency to be to perfectionist and not lean enough – depends on case by case of course, sometimes perfection is needed…)
  • It creates a common purpose, the basis of mastery and… they did it all themselves ( autonomy – growth ,…) => basis of motivation ( autonomy, mastery, purpose)

I actually use bright coloured cards with cardboard 3D letters of S, M, L, XL and the physical cards. We have everything in JIRA too, but screens are banned during that meeting… all for a reason.

Why a tangible visual? Cognitive psychology has shown us an insight in how our brain works, the more we understand it, the more we should use that knowledge to find the most effective communication tools. The brain creates meaning through the senses. Visual is one of those senses. Our primary visual cortex picks up basic shapes initially ( circles or squares ) it relais info to the other areas in our brain: Ventral stream, Dorsal stream and limbic system. Respectively for the WHAT (its a card, its a letter), the location of the body in space and the feeling, gut, strong emotional reaction.

I use all of the above to add to the experience, and why not? science it there to use, not just to be interested in. Win-wins for the win 😉

And… it works. You actually see it during refinement, people are more involved, they stand, they sit, the move around, the physically move the cards… it helps embed all the info and associated info in the brain…

We’ve got the tools, we’ve got the knowledge,… use them, explore them, improve them 🙂

Building a highly efficient team is building highly efficient individuals

26 Friday Sep 2014

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Highly efficient teams exponentially increase business value.

I am a scrum master, but my area of expertise is the subtleties of human interaction and making individuals more efficient.  The more efficient the individual, the better the team, the higher the business value. And it is not just a 1+1=2  relationship, with every individual that ‘gets it’ your business value output increases exponentially.

Business value increases exponentially as people's efficiency goes up.

Business value increases exponentially as people’s efficiency goes up.

Yesterday, something interesting happened with my scrum team. I constantly do small experiments, to analyse and increase value where I can.

This team, has impressed me in the past with how they take matters in their own hands. On the last sprints, when they needed to know something, they just went and got that information and shared it with every one that needed to know.

It wasn’t always perfect and some individuals are more advanced at doing this than others, but I found it remarkable, you don’t always see that quality. In some teams, the misconception even exists that the scrum master should be the one ‘organising’ everything and being a bridge.

As a side note: I am not saying that there are no situations where as a scrum master you can’t jump in and help, or where you consciously decide to take on a bit of this work as a transition, there can be a multitude of reasons where being a temporary bridge might be the right thing to do, but that is food for another post.

In the current sprint, the team have taking on work with a lot of unknowns, they need to communicate with a team that before they haven’t had a lot of interaction with, the technical solution is not straight forward and there have been some external emergencies which surfaced some frustrations,…

As the days in the sprint went on, I noticed that the cards linked to the interaction with the new team, were not moving. The first few days the team seemed to have good reason for that, but we are now almost in the middle of our sprint and only one card has moved over to in progress. I try to not interfere unless the situation reaches a critical moment. Especially with this team, because the focus is getting them from good to great and learning and responsibility is a big part of that. But usually, because I care a great deal about them and the project, when it reaches a certain threshold, I will start working on a backup plan, without them knowing. So yesterday morning I started that prep. I usually start about 2 hours before every one else, gives me the time to focus.

Later that morning, the lead developer came to me and voiced his concern that we hadn’t started yet on international. So to put his mind at ease, and to see his reaction, I showed him that I had already started, I also asked him what he needed and he said he needed an info session with the other team. So, I said I would organise the meeting. ( not the right thing to do by the way )

I checked with every one involved and set a time, invitations were sent and it was clearly visible on the board when that info session was starting, 3 PM.

At 3, no one was there, one person was on the phone and emailing, the other was still in another meeting and one of the other developers was still working on a different task. So, I went over and asked: ‘are you ready?’

D1: Hmm, it’s not really a good time, I am right in the middle of something.

Me: Is it urgent?

D1: Not really but I am just in a flow

Me: Ok, but this meeting is for you all, it is not for me, you told me this morning that you needed this urgently. Things change, as is often the case in reality, and that is perfectly acceptable, but why wasn’t anyone notified?

D1: You are right, we do need this, it’s ok.

Of to the next one…

Me: Hello, are you working on an emergency?

D2: Hello, ow is it that time already? no its not an emergency, it’s a very difficult problem though that i need to help X with, but we wont be able to solve it in the next 30 minutes. So I will come over.

External team member: I am just on the phone, and then I need to send a quick email, I will be there in 2 minutes.

10 minutes later, every one was finally available. But it was like herding kittens ( an expression I heard one of my colleagues use on several occasions and I must admit, it has a nice ring to it 🙂

The above scenario is not a big deal and I paraphrased it a bit, but it illustrates the subtleties of balance between self-organising and dependency. Because I took it in hand, the team lost a little bit of their maturity, of their sense of responsibility. And a sense of responsibility, is one of the most valuable talents of a highly efficient team.

So today, I am going to have a sidebar mini retro to point that subtlety out so they can reflect on it and learn and claim their independence back.

It’s fascinating being a scrum master, challenging and the longer you do it, the more you realise that your role probably has to deal with the biggest unknowns of all and you need to be strong enough to be able to handle those unknowns.

Yours truly,

Brigitte

Agile, the road to a new society where productivity and happiness soar hand in hand.

19 Friday Sep 2014

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Isn’t it clear? I don’t think it is clear for everyone how much Agile can contribute to the biggest necessity in the future of this society. Let me shed some light on that.

I love analysing stuff, always loved it, even from when I was a little girl. My parents told me a story from when I was about 5 years old. I had gotten hold of their alarm clock and I was taking it apart. When they asked me why, I said I wanted to know how it worked. I haven’t changed much since then, but instead of taking apart alarm clocks, I take apart processes, society and people. I can’t help it… at my core, I am an analyst.

Why do I do it? Curiosity and a desire to understand so that I can help improve. And isn’t that a little bit what Agile does? You look at what is reality, you inspect, and seek how you can continuously improve.

It’s the only way, one of the many purposes of life is growth, we continuously evolve, whether we want to or not, it’s part of our nature. The way we grow, that’s up to us, we are the masters of our destiny, because even though we can’t predict what is going to happen, but we are the master of how we react to it. And our reactions might not always be the most optimal, we can only shape our lives in a more efficient way when we learn to understand and evolve our reactions ( inspect and adapt ).

As a society as a whole, you must have noticed we are facing a severe problem, depression, disease, demotivation, unhappiness. What is life when you are living it in those circumstances? And at the same time, you try to keep your family fed, your relationships alive and a roof over your head. The pressures of work seem to rise and rise. And instead of businesses taking responsibility over their most valuable resource, what often happens is that they try and put a plaster over a gushing wound and send them back into battle. It’s not the right way, this is a typical example of loose-loose.

Agile provides us with an answer to win-win. It’s based on the core principals of decent human beings. You know, you can trust them. It’s like your kids growing up, at a certain time, you need to let them be their own person, responsible for their destiny and trust that they will do the right thing. Same with the people working for you, people care. They care about their work and they want to do a good job (there are always exceptions, but that is what they are, exceptions, not the majority)

The more you give people the freedom to contribute to your product, make it part of what they are passionate about, make it theirs… the more you will see productivity, innovation and creativity soar. And at the same time, happiness will go up.

I think we have only just scratched the surface of what we can do with Agile, I think we can take it much further than just letting teams organise their work, I am a strong believer that we should experiment with having teams determine to the fullest how they work. This means work hours, rewards, holidays,… I know some companies are already experimenting with this… but the way you do it, is, like in a family, in a safe environment where you continuously look back, review, adapt, grow.

If we follow this approach, I am convinced that we will reduce costs, increase happiness for the people at work but also in their immediate family, which will again have a side effect on other companies and people.

Will this be an easy road, no, it won’t be and you need the right people to guide the way, if you want to do this experiment, you will need a brilliant scrum master, a PO and a team who are mature enough. But if you do take this journey, you will most certainly have a huge competitive advantage.

Yours truly,

Brigitte

Explosions are imminent

16 Tuesday Sep 2014

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I have seen it countless times, when faced with a challenge, people, businesses, revert to old, known behaviour. It takes courage to actually stand still, investigate what is right and be brave enough to implement it.

At my current company, we have had a huge success with Agile. When the CTO made the courageous decision to hire a completely new team and a very talented Agile Coach/scrum master, and took on a new project ( with a deadline ) he knew that he was setting himself up for success. And that is what happened. Not only did he deliver in time, the product was delivered with high-quality, by a happy, self organised team.

The last sprint goal was: keep calm. And that was it. Never before had I, or any other team member been in a live release that was so calm and effective, it was almost surreal and it showed us all what Agile can do.

That, was only scratching the surface and it wasn’t even SCRUM to the letter, as with most projects, in reality, there is a balance to be found, it’s continuous improvement, it’s transition towards Agile. But even in this setting, these were some of the side effects.

The team members were actually happy, a sight that you don’t often see in a place of work. Even though countless studies have shown the immense importance of happiness on productivity, loyalty, drive and creativity.

The team had clarity and transparency, again, not 100% but the trust is there, the basis has been set and now, when there are issues or dangers, they get raised fast and we have the ability to react quickly.

The team was a team, everyone knew what they were doing and they helped each other grow.

Now… a project got thrown in with a rush, it had to be delivered in 2 weeks. No product owner, no clarity, no reason why, no agile, it just had to be done and it had to be done quick.

So what has happened? Almost every member of that team and of the other teams working on this project has come to me with frustration, anger, dis-trust in the project, dis-trust in the company and even in other team members. That well-oiled machine got a huge spanner thrown into the wheels and now it’s stuck, it’s at a risk of over heating, explosions are imminent.

So what can we do? As scrum masters, first thing we did is try and create clarity. Force people to stand still and talk to each other long enough to get at least more visibility and get things down on cards. At the same time, manage individuals to keep motivated, keep believing that this is just a spanner and once taken out, we will be running smoothly again. My co-scrum master had the brilliant idea of doing a scrum reset, the perfect time to get back to basics. Together, we set up the process to introduce bitesize scrum (scrumbites) to lead the way back to how it should be. In daily iterations we will get back to basics, diffuse the situation, get everyone motivated again and bring back a productive happy environment.

Well… as we all know, knowledge comes from experience and I think this has shown us again how far we have come through agile and it has shown us that we do not want to go back.

Why am I not writing about scrum?

28 Monday Jul 2014

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It’s funny, As a scrum masters’ blog, you would expect to see more posts about scrum or agile.

So why don’t I write more about scrum as the framework? Well, for me, what counts is the overall goal of delivering business value, the essence of it all AND what that TRULY means. There are so many blogs about scrum, how to write the best user story, how to hold your ceremonies, how to do this, how to do that… and they all have tremendous value, but, in the spirit of eliminating waste… why would I write about them? What is it that I have to offer in the world of agile? It’s not how to write the best user story… it’s about the underlying gems in Agile, the true spirit of it, or at least, my interpretation.

More than anything, I work with people. Whether you want to view it from a pure emotionless old fashioned economical view (your resources) or from a more respectful view, your team, bottom line is, these people create your business value. And how they connect, how they operate, how they feel, that is what will determine the true success of your project.

Late 19th century management thought they had it covered by punishment, cruelty and basically instilling fear, so that people would work harder. The ‘power trip’. Over the years, this style is (extremely slowly) making way for a more nurturing, respectful approach where we assume people actually want to work hard and need encouragement and help, instead of reprimanding. 

Agile works based on that point of view.

And… it works. It makes perfect sense too, as instilled within every human being ( except some edge cases) is the need for connection, belonging. So we want to work to please. In most companies (expect the ones that still rule with an iron fist – sometimes with a velvet glove to cover it up) that basic drive is there. The next one that is needed, is the ability to show reality. Use courage ( from the latin: speak from the heart) to say it like it is, as you know you work in an environment where you are safe and together with your team you are working on the same goal.

Linked with that, is also the courage of being vulnerable, of knowing that you are doing the best you can and that that is enough. So no need to work yourself in to the ground, as you are here to run a marathon, not a sprint 😉

Now, look a what I just wrote, look at the ‘powers’ every individual in the team ( and outside of the team) needs:

– trust, courage, vulnerability, openness, communication, honesty, sensitivity,…

Some people go a whole life time without even understanding the concepts and the true power of these qualities. Scrum offers a framework to work on these basic principles, but more is needed, and for me, that is where a really good scrum master offers most value, in working on getting the best out of every individual in the team, so they can become a truly highly efficient team.

That is where the positivity project fits in, a project at work where we are analysing if there are certain techniques out there that can improve positivity. To improve positivity, understanding and practising vulnerability, sensitivity, communication, honesty, trust, courage are the basics!

Yours truly,

Brigitte

Just start writing and never give up.

20 Sunday Jul 2014

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I promised myself to write this blog every Sunday, but today, when I try to focus on what to write about, there is a bit of block there.

You probably know that feeling, something prevents you from getting in that moment of flow.

So I said to myself, just do it, just start writing, it will come.

In my career I have had so many times that I was thrown in the deep end and with no or very little prep had to just wing it. Scary at first, but exiting too, I must admit, I quite like it. More than that, I learn from it, not only a boost of confidence but also from an optimisation point of view, sometimes, you just have to trust your years of experience, combined with skills, healthy instincts and with pure intention, THAT is a winning combination. LEAN to the bone.

I have been very lucky to have influences from so many different fields, cultures, environments. Last Friday I got to revisit one of those environments.

In my past, I started a music channel where I interviewed Rock artists. It was called Taste iT Tv, as I wanted a little taste of what they were about, what made them tick, where does the passion come from, how do these creative, passionate and often pure people work and what makes them unique, how do they manage to inspire hundreds and thousands of people? What drives them and what do they all have in common?

Doing these interviews, I discovered one of the gifts I have, even though I don’t consider myself a ‘social’ person, as I am absolute rubbish at small talk, one thing I can do is have deep conversations with people, in a very short amount of time. People just open up to me. Why? Because my intentions are good and pure and they know I genuinely care. Respect and integrity are values I do not compromise on as they are core to who I am. And core to what I want the world to be. I truly believe that these values are the future of the human race and this world, and I will play any part I can in spreading them.

Last Friday, one of those bands I have interviewed was playing a festival near me. They were headlining one of the alternative stages. I went to meet up with them, to see how they were, talk about the future and the past and just relax and have fun, I really had a great time! I really loved it! And of course to see them play. Their live shows are always great, it’s not just the music, it’s how they interact with the audience, it is so much more…

I first interviewed The Blackout in 2006, hard to believe it’s almost 8 years ago. We hit it of immediately and that interview was one of the funniest I ever did. The guys were genuine, filled with drive, determination, hopes and dreams. They were just starting out then, but I knew they had something special. All of them are so unique but they work great together as a team. Over the years, they gained popularity, by working extremely hard and they got picked up by a label and they soared. The music ‘industry’ isn’t the best thing to promote values like respect and integrity and as is often the case, this label tried to suck the life out of this band. They got out, but not without a few scratches. Now, they have a kickstarter campaign running so they can take their future in their own hands and show the world what they can do. It takes guts, it really does, to keep going and just do it.

The Blackout are and will always be an inspiration to me, 6 guys with very different personalities, but together they have got it all, creativity, humour, kindness, strength, integrity, purity, courage, depth, loyalty. Rhys, Gavin, Snoz, Bob, Matthew and Sean, I hope the world backs their project, as they deserve it, and, leading by example, they have a few things they can give back to the world (not everything though, as there are certain things you probably shouldn’t get inspired by 😉 but those success elements, they definitely have them.

TheBlackout.net

This example of a great team, uniqueness, drive and ambition is one of those gems of inspiration I encountered through my life and it will stay with me.

Life is filled with gems along the road, make sure you can recognise them, pick them up and add them to your chest. And when you need to, open that chest and let those gems sparkle and guide you.

As I said in the beginning, sometimes, you just have to start, even if you don’t know where you are going, just start, something great will come out of it.

Thank you and goodnight!

Yours truly,
Bri
x

PS: For those of you wondering about the positivity project, it is going great! Over half the people at the office have signed up for it, I was truly overwhelmed by how many people wanted to take part. Next week we are starting the intro sessions, it’s all coming together.

Experimenting at work, the agile way.

13 Sunday Jul 2014

Posted by in Agile Scrum

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As you know, I am fascinated by the impact of positivity on performance, productivity, employee loyalty and health. But now I want to transition from doing personal experiments to doing group experiments.

I have only been at my current job for just over 3 weeks, but I knew even before I joined that this was ‘fertile soil’. There is enormous potential in the people, the mindset and culture of the company, we will thrive continuously and as we go along, we will learn and form new ways of optimising.

Last Friday, I asked if they would be up for doing a little experiment. That one question grew into agreeing to do a company wide presentation on positive psychology, that same day in the afternoon.

As opportunities arise, you grab them, so that is what I did. Having no time to prepare, did make me slightly anxious, as I wasn’t sure on what approach to take, but 10 minutes of clearing my head made me realise I don’t need preparation, I know what, the how we will define together and most important, I knew WHY.

If you are familiar with leadership analysis, you know that ‘why’ is most important question, because people relate to the way, people get motivated by the why, not by the how or what. It’s the passion that speaks.

So I gave one of the most honest and open presentations, just me and a white board. I used mind mapping to create the flow and make sure I extracted everything I wanted to say. I showed them the why from a ‘professional’ point of view, leading to the conclusion that happiness = professional, happiness = a crucial part of economic progress. And then, with the help of a timeline with a drawing of me as a kid (little stick figure in a dress with ponytails) a few jokes and lots of interactivity, I explained why it was so important to me as a person.

Throughout every ones life there are challenges, of different magnitudes. You reach crossroads of decisions where you need to choose between finding solutions and carrying on or giving up. Positivity leads to thriving, leads to potential, leads to happiness, flow and growth. Negativity leads to exhaustion, giving away control, a dead end. My story just illustrated some of those crossroads and how strong I felt about staying in control of my choices in a world of change and unexpected challenges.

That is ultimately what it is about, if you choose positivity, you choose ownership of your destiny, if you choose negativity, you give up.

The outcome was great, after that presentation, people came up to me to express how much they loved it and how they really want to get involved. There is no better feeling than that, seeing that spark, that energy, that force!

So, how will we do it? We are working on the how of the project, but we know the framework. We will use scrum to finish this positivity product. Next week, we will start sprint 0, in which we will define the end goal and start building our product backlog, our definitions of done, team contracts,… so… stay tuned.

Yours truly,
Brigitte