OMS Consulting Partners, LLC

Thank you Christen McLemore!   https://www.linkedin.com/in/christenmclemore/

ScrumAlliance is making a valiant effort to help people know what it takes do achieve the benefits of REAL Agile... "Sustainable Business Agility is a mindset shift that happens throughout an organization over time, which enables the business to adapt quickly to constant change in the market and new technologies."

JJ Sutherland recently published his book "The Scrum Fieldbook", and it contains some incredible nuggets of wisdom, which we'll share with you over the coming days and weeks, here is a favorite on a good gauge on one aspect of the culture where you work... "Examine your organizations response to failure.   Is it a valuable learning opportunity or a time to point fingers?"   - JJ Sutherland in his new book

Some good new materials from ScrumAlliance, focused on behavioral and culture change - the 'tough' part of Agile Transformation... https://sustainableagility.org/sustainableagility/home

Sports heroes like Michael Jordan inspire us to think that there might be such a thing as a 'clutch' pressure performer who improves when the heat is on... Our minds fool us into thinking we are doing better work when we are under pressure... But it's all a huge myth... Take a look at this ~3 minute clip from a National Geographic series called "Brain Games" and check out "Performing Under Pressure" by Hendrie Weisinger https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jgP-wKQOrU And be sure to check out this book: https://www.amazon.com/Performing-Under-Pressure-Science-Matters/dp/0804136726 From Performing Under Pressure... The Bottom line - pressure is the enemy of success:  It undermines performance and helps us fail. Pressure adversely impacts our cognitive success Pressure downgrades our behavioral skills In pressure moments, most people perform below their capability The influence of pressure on derailing your performance is often d...

Gil Broza nails it with this article "Imposing Agile is a Non-Starter" Author of "The Human Side of Agile" and "The Agile Mind-Set" as well as a visionary trainer (and one of my favorite Agilists), reminds us that we can only coach the willing, or as Jeff Sutherland (co-creator of Scrum) says,  "Agile innovation depends on having a cadre of eager participants"  http://3pvantage.com/imposing-agile-is-a-non-starter/ While you are at it, do yourself a favor and pick up a copy of one of Gil's books, or better yet, attend one of his upcoming training sessions! Thanks Gil!! Looking for experience-based training to help you grow as an Agile leader? The single remaining session of “ Practical Agile Leadership ” in 2019 is in Boston this November, and the price is going up on Sunday. Join me for two immersive days of pragmatic guidance. Here is what a past attendee had to say: The content focused purely on the Agile ...

(from  guest blogger,  Matthew Davison) When I think about good user stories, I get excited...probably too excited. I like to think of them as menu items – a general summary, with enough detail to give an idea about the food, but not a recipe with instructions. But what if a restaurant has no clue what type of diners they serve? What if their clientele were all just "users"? What are the risks? Imagine my menu lists a "rice dish" and my understanding of the customer went something like this:                 As a user                 I want a rice dish                 So that I can satisfy my appetite Would you be surprised if the diner ended up with a rice cake? Are you sure the customer would be satisfied? Now , imagine the followi...

A 'who's who' of corporate giants, part of the "Business Roundtable" say giving the shareholder the maximum money at the expense of everyone and everything else is becoming a thing of the past...? The Agile model puts the stakeholder (including the customer) at the center of the equation, not the shareholder, with a key responsibility of the Product Owner to represent ALL stakeholders in a balanced/prioritized fashion. Is this just a Public Relations move, or is there real teeth to this?? Could this be a real move of corporate America towards a more Agile mindset? https://www.fastcompany.com/90391743/top-ceo-group-business-roundtable-drops-shareholder-primacy

Harvard Business Review article - when our brains decide to trust... Agile Principle #5:   Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done. Harvard Business Review Article on when our brains decide to trust:     https://hbr.org/2019/07/how-our-brains-decide-when-to-trust Excerpt: Trust is the enabler of global business — without it, most market transactions would be impossible. It is also a hallmark of high-performing organizations. Employees in high-trust companies are more productive, are more satisfied with their jobs, put in greater discretionary effort, are less likely to search for new jobs, and even are healthier than those working in low-trust companies. Businesses that build trust among their customers are rewarded with greater loyalty and higher sales. And negotiators who build trust with each other are more likely to find value...

Thank you  Natalia Babaeva @scrumgenius! https://medium.com/swlh/how-to-explain-agile-and-scrum-to-your-grandpa-in-5-mins-and-to-better-understand-both-yourself-3792748fa085

This should be an interesting one... https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190809005432/en/Project-Management-Institute-Announces-Acquisition-Disciplined-Agile According to the announcement... " The DA toolkit is the world’s only comprehensive agile body of knowledge (BOK)".   Hmmm... will this be the newer, even more fast food version of SAFe?  Or will PMI get it right? 

In the news recently, JIRA maker Atlassian announced they will no longer be tolerant, nor reward 'brilliant jerks' - those who may be hyper-talented while disregarding or even harming good team dynamics, you can read more about that here: https://www.news.com.au/finance/work/at-work/atlassian-ditches-brilliant-jerks-in-performance-review-overhaul/news-story/82a5e2abba1939f51d68ae81db8f05bd Further, research at Carnegie Mellon shows that a group of team players will always out perform a group if high achieving individuals: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20190807-the-science-of-creating-a-dream-team This also parallels the ideal that "heroism" in Agile is an Anti-pattern.  What do you think?

https://www.lean.org/LeanPost/Posting.cfm?LeanPostId=1068 A few excerpts: When you think about the systems you need in place for your organization to move forward, consider Gall’s Law: “A complex system that works most likely evolved from a simple system that worked. A complex system designed that way from scratch can never be made to work. You must start over with a simple working system.” ******** Several years ago I met someone who suggested to me that leaders who create joyful environments are invariably systems thinkers. This is juxtaposed with those who try to create hero-based cultures that are laden with personality-based antics rather than simple, measurable systems. ********* This happens all the time in the software industry. We are littered with the A-player myth mentality. If quality sucks, the team let us down. It couldn’t possibly be that we didn’t accurately predict how much work there was before we set the impossible schedule. If the team misses a ...

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-like-working-professionals-jason-hornberger-mba Excerpt: The best way to describe any job, which is worth paying money to other people to do, is taking something that is complicated and making it seem easy.  If I would have had the skill to build my own house, I probably would not have paid someone else to do it. If I could cook incredible food and do it in a short time time frame without having to clean it up, I probably would not go out to restaurants. There are lots of examples, but the essence of any service, is taking a task that is complicated or hard or time consuming, and making it look easy. That is why it is worth paying someone else to do it.

More amazing stuff from Henrik Kniberg... Co-author of Lean Mindset and creator of "Product Owner in a Nutshell". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj5y-6AoYfM

Agile Peeps! Help support this AMAZING new book being written by Geoff Watts... There are lots of resources on Product Owners and Scrum Masters, but the actual Team is under represented, until now! https://lnkd.in/gf3BbU2 hashtag # geoffwatts hashtag # newbook hashtag # agile hashtag # support hashtag # help

Guest post by Dan Greenberg Are you scrambling to get ready for your big demo? Ask yourself these three questions: Are you about to "present" your product to a big group of people, some of whom are really important bigwigs that you want to impress? Are you nervous? Have you rehearsed? If you answered yes to any of the above, you and your organization have got a problem. The first question I'd ask is - who told us we had to hold this ceremony? Certainly not the  Scrum Guide , where a CTRL-F (or command-F for you mac users) of "demo" only turns up one result, a small bullet point (one of 8) underneath the heading of a ceremony that is actually called a "Sprint Review", where it reads that the development team "demon strates  the work that has been done and answers any questions about the product increment." How did we decide that one bullet point out of eight was now the title and purpose of the entire ceremony, especially when th...

Can someone help me name this Agile-Anti Pattern? "We keep hearing the same problems mentioned over and over in retrospectives. So they are a waste of time, let's stop having retrospectives (or at least limit them to 15 minutes)." 

Being an Agilist (Scrum Master or Coach) as a vocation is challenging and phenomonally personally rewarding.  Fortunately, it's also financially rewarding! Here's what Indeed says are the top paying jobs in the US in 2019.  NOTE:  The actual number for Agile Coach Salary, in my experience, is TOO LOW.  :-) If you can have both, why not??

Just bought this laptop sticker, thank you to Agile Memes!    https://twitter.com/agile_memes  

A classic...

Thank you Joshua! https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6553338155314094080

Guest post from Dan Greenberg “We need to define success.” Have you heard that one? It happens all the time at bureaucratic corporate organizations who love creating measuring sticks to help them figure out whether everything is okay or not. Before beginning anything, corporate junkies always insist we define what a successful outcome will look like. I take issue with this. First off, life is far more complex than a black-and-white this worked or it didn’t outcome. I propose something else entirely: Start doing some project At regular intervals, get everyone involved with the project (working on it, has some interest in it being successful, cares about it, etc.) into a room together and ask them all “is this project going well?” or “could anything be improved?” (This group of people includes all customers by the way.) For those who think it’s not going well or that it could be improved, ask them what they think is going wrong or what they think could be impr...