1. Not talking to those affected (AKA Ivory tower design) Solves only management problems, makes more work no gain for most people Change — Finding the ideas at the intersection of multiple groups’ pain points makes it way easier to get traction. …

I push it out of Sushi with my chopsticks. It’s overpowering. This doesn’t mean you need to hate Cucumber. Be careful of thinking: I don’t like X, so X is wrong. Likewise, we make the mistake of thinking that others’ opinions mean they think ours are invalid. If it works…

Learning and Improvement - Tell me about a recent improvement in how you work? - How do new ideas and improvements get surfaced in this company? - What does collaboration look like between teams here? - How do you handle outages and incidents? - How does this company create Focus…

We used to meet in a room, but now we’re on zoom. Many replace the old ways with digital tools without much change. The power is in the new possibilities if we unlock them. Working Asynchronous has vast potential. Being able to work independently and at different times without scheduling. …

As much as possible, put different departments on different floors or buildings and, ideally, time zones. Encourage the debating of unproductive topics. e.g., what’s the best way of estimating, tabs vs. spaces, or is method X agile or not Make each team as large and specialized as possible. Don’t allow anyone to do anything they aren’t perfectly trained for. Generalists are the enemy. Show people how little you trust them; by requiring all security and permission requests to be approved by outsourced IT people.

Particularly individual measurement in a complex environment. Since results come from the interactions between people, this is more important than how any single part performs. Measuring individual parts starts at the wrong end. It creates too much tension 💢 E.g., I’m less likely to help you if it negatively impacts…

The Information needed for Good Decision making is Hard Telling people they have authority to make decisions is the easy part, but it’s not enough. I’ve heard leads say: “They’re autonomous, they can figure it out!” Please don’t desert your teams like this. “Decentralize the authority for decision making AND the information needed to make good decisions.” — Donald G Reinertsen What kind of Information is needed? 📌

This common question makes two assumptions: I know the answer without context There is a single best option. Why is context Important? 🔑 Without context, you can’t predict what works. You know who has this context? The team. They’re in it daily. …

Picture that boring standup. Someone droning on about irrelevant tasks that won’t affect you. What’s the point of knowing what everyone does when you don’t work together on it? You’re not a team. Without purpose, you’re just a group. 📦 A reporting line has no built-in shared purpose. That type…