Published in Code & Wild·Nov 15, 2019Rails Girls London 2019Bloom & Wild sponsored Rails Girls again this year. Rails Girls is a great initiative that seeks to get more women into coding by providing free workshops in Ruby on Rails. It started back in 2013 and there’s now a community of international volunteers with events happening all over the…Ruby On Rails4 min read
Sep 24, 2018Coaching ObjectivesIt can be hard to set objectives for coaches. Linking a coaches deliverables directly to the output of a team is neither fair nor sensible yet it’s frequently used as a path of least resistance. I’ve been asked how I was measured as a test coach. Below is the set of objectives that the coaching team, which included an agile coach and myself as test coach were set, as well as an excerpt from the job description for my role. Hopefully they prove useful.Coaching1 min read
Apr 30, 2018Presentations from Agile In the City LondonI recently spoke at the Agile In the City London conference. As well as watching a number of great presentations, I also was lucky enough to be able to give two presentations and I’ve shared the slides below. The Good Testing, The Bad Testing and The Ugly Testing Improving Performance Feedback Originally published at Stephen Janaway.Agile1 min read
Aug 16, 2017How We Improved Performance Reviews — Acting On Feedbacktl;dr No-one really likes performance reviews. But giving your team members good, actionable feedback and setting clear direction with them is very important. In my team we changed how we did performance reviews. Note: This is the last post in a series on performance management and review. …Agile7 min read
Aug 9, 2017How We Improved Performance Reviews — What Happened?tl;dr No-one really likes performance reviews. But giving your team members good, actionable feedback and setting clear direction with them is very important. In my team we changed how we did performance reviews. Note: This is the third post in a series on performance management and review. …Agile7 min read
Aug 2, 2017Creating a Team CharterHaving your team all working towards a common set of goals is extremely important. However, as leaders and managers we can sometimes get far too hung up on what needs to be delivered and forget about who is actually doing the work. Forgetting about the people and focusing only…Agile6 min read
Aug 2, 2017How We Improved Performance Reviews — What We Didtl;dr No-one really likes performance reviews. But giving your team members good, actionable feedback and setting clear direction with them is very important. In my team we changed how we did performance reviews. Note: This is the second post in a series on performance management and review. If you haven’t…Agile6 min read
Jul 24, 2017Improving Performance Reviewstl;dr No-one really likes performance reviews. But giving your team members good, actionable feedback and setting clear direction with them is very important. Yearly performance reviews don’t encourage this to happen. Note: This is the first part in a multipart series of posts on performance management. In my team I…Agile6 min read
Dec 18, 2015A Christmas RetroHo, ho. ho, Merry Christmas! At this time of year it’s a great opportunity to sit down with a team and reflect on the year that has been, and to look forward to the year to come. And being Christmas then it’s also a great opportunity to look a bit…Agile6 min read