Agile Otter Blog

Messages from the past have a way of reaching into the future and getting your attention. This week everyone is talking "apocalypse." This is because of an ancient mayan calendar which quits tracking time on Dec 21st. The joke (I hope we all know it's a joke) is that it stops because that's when time ends. Of course, my calendars used to run out every year (before Google Calendar). The word "apocalypse," according to my sources, was a theatrical term. It referred to the moment when the curtain was pulled back and all was revealed. When I learned that, the title of the biblical book "Revelations" finally made sense, as did more of the text within. Today I'm facing my own apocalypse. An ancient message (from two years ago) has come back and presented itself to me. I like this team. They're good people, and they understand their business. They write quite a lot of code, and they get along. There is nothing to dislike, and much anyone...

I've had a side-project that started because I've been working with dual-role (and one triple-role) Scrum Masters lately. I appreciate how hard it is for them to be good at several things simultaneously. Once I started collecting techniques for them, I figured I should publish it somehow. I was thinking of a blog, but Joshua Kerievsky (our leader at IndustrialLogic ) had mentioned possibly using something like LeanPub. I really need to learn to release a product early and use feedback to guide it to be something that really addresses a market need. I've invested some odd hours here and there on this, and have gotten some friends to look it over. Sadly, most of them who are dual-role SMs haven't had time. Still, here is a chance for me to learn in a lean startup kind of way, releasing early and often, and let the market help me develop the product further. I'm interested in hearing what you think of the cover, and the idea in general. I've not...

I approached my second (their third) day of #ACCUS after a full night's sleep. The evening social time was great, because it involved some fine people. I had two sessions, one each in the first and last timeslots of the day. Pairing Styles The first was a little workshop to identify and evaluate pairing styles. I was there to collect data primarily, and I did. We mapped the styles I had identified and added to them. The best part was the conversation among the attendees as we tried to evaluate them. The emergent thesis is that styles are not inherently good or bad, but that they reveal the relationship of the partners. All styles could be energizing, or could be draining, depending primarily on: The involvement they bring to the session The degree to which they both focus on the code instead of each other The degree to which each recognizes the contribution of the other The Coaching Oracle Deck This idea was based on Brian Eno's famous Oblique Strategies  concept...

They're here! Now that I have extra decks of Agile In A Flash ,  I want to give them away in person as a door prize or in a contest of some sort.  The problem is that I'm located in the far NW 'burbs of Chicagoland.  I can get to Chicago or I can get to Milwaukee, maybe out to Rockland or some points in-between.  Invite me, and I'll see what I can do! I love hanging out with software developers of all types but prefer the meetings to be about agile, some programming language, or Linux.  I might even score some other goodies to hand out. Talk to me. If you want to talk to me about coaching your team, I might bring a copy to the interview, but I want the community to have dibs.