Today I want to talk with you about energising
the Agile Way of Working brand.
Sadly, the Agile Way of Working movement
seems to be temporarily on the wane. The adoption rate of AWOW has not risen in
line with expectations. It’s stuck in the doldrums between Scylla and Charybdis.
Which makes for frowns all around.
But, me being me, I didn’t leave it at
that. That’s a challenge, right there! Let’s go for it! Let’s turn those frowns
upside-down
As result, I searched for a way to help the
Agile@Scale crowd out, and I eventually came up with ten amazing pieces of incredible
advice on how to easily make ‘Agile Way of Working’ truly something worth
having around.
So, here we have it:
First, change its name from the Agile Way of Working to the Agile Way of Whacking Off (Agile WOWO), you know, a touchy-feely way to “sex up” requirements. Bush and Blair style.
Epics will be referred to as Dodgy Dossiers, User Stories will become Curated Jokes and Sprints will become Streaks.
People working on Streaks will be known as Streakers, chapter members will be known as Schleppers and guild members will be known as Schmucks, everyone else will be referred to as Bernie or Helen.
Every morning Dodgy Dossier Owners must repeat the term “Agile Operating Model” until they puke their guts out.
All Scrum and Kanban boards are be replaced with life-sized wack-a-mole models.
Only those kitted out as My Little Pony or Princess Line can use coloured post-it notes.
Anyone caught using the names Google, Spotify, Netflix or Zappos.com will be denied the oxygen of publicity.
Anyone evidenced repeating the terms “by design”, “learning journey” and “minimum viable product” will be denied the oxygen of oxygen.
Anyone caught using comic images of rockets, astronauts or planets (including the sun) anywhere in their “content” will be forever referred to as a feckin space-cadet.
If you can’t defecate rainbows on demand then you have no right being involved in Agile at Scale or the Agile Way of Whacking Off.
There you have it. Ten jolly and sensible
policies for a happy world of Agile at Scale and Agile WOWO.
Many thanks for reading,
This is Martyn Jones of goodstrat.com – THE
GOOD STRATEGY COMPANY
Until next time.
Contact me at martyn dot jones at goodstrat
dot com
This is the first in a series of management talking points. The name Leadership 7s has been influenced by the great game of rugby, which is was the emblematic game of my youth and a passion of the home country of my Mom and Dad, Wales.
In fact, much of what I learned about
leadership in my formative years came from fundamentally social influences such
as rugby union.
So, today I want to address seven talking
points that deal with aspects of leadership, coaching and management.
Just because it’s there, it doesn’t mean it has to be done. Just because you can, it doesn’t mean that you should. Just because you believe you are right, doesn’t mean that you are not wrong.
It doesn’t matter where you are in the world, the view of the UK government doesn’t get any better.
Edinburgh, London, Brussels, Beijing or Washington. It’s increasingly obvious that Theresa May and her cabinet are a painfully embarrassing and unfunny joke.
They stand as an obdurate aberration where once there had been some semblance of cultured diplomacy, breadth and depth of intelligence and strategic thinking. They defy the laws of reason, good sense and decency. They are the Keystone Cops, the Chuckle Brothers and the Carry On Camping of governance. Continue reading →
In my opinion, Brexit, any Brexit, could spell economic, political and social disaster for the UK. Brexit could ensure the demise of the Good Friday Agreement, with seriously damaging consequences. It could see the independence of Scotland – not necessarily a bad thing for Scotland, but yet another unintended consequence of Brexit. And, it could significantly deteriorate the rights and conditions of workers in the UK.
So, I wish to put a Brexit question to Jeremy Corbyn.
Will the working people in the UK be better off if the UK leaves the European Union?
Bornheim, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany – 25th August 2017
When you offer people all of the benefits of the single market and the customs union, but without any of the EU bureaucracy, constraints and costs, what happens?
We ran an experimental consultation last year in the UK just to demonstrate what happens when bat-shit-crazy mad-cow Britain has a chance to throw a spanner in the works. Some people will inevitably believe the boloney whilst others will use it as a mere tool in a simple-minded and obtuse attempt to rationalise their own irrationality and misanthropy. Nobody can throw a spanner in the works quite like the Brits.
The prevailing conventional wisdom is that innovative technologies and their novel use are having an effect on many peoples’ lives. Indeed, the fascination with the possibilities offered by social media, the internet and the age of data is becoming all pervasive. Of course, not all is goodness and light. Some aspects, such as Denial of Service attacks, phishing without a permit and creatively-ambiguous chimping, mark the down side of this story. Continue reading →