Introducing a Frontlog: Experiments in Process

adaptation, analysis, challenge, outside resource, product backlog, retrospective, scrummaster, sprint backlog, sprint planning, tactics

Here’s an SAT-style analogy for ya, partially because I like wordplay, partially because I value effort over outcome, partially because I like Simon Sinek, and partially because I dislike New Year’s Resolutions.

Backlog : Product Experiments (the what) ::
Frontlog : Process Experiments (the how) ::
Forelog : Vision Experiments (the why)

This isn’t the best analogy, since ‘the how’ per Sinek’s Golden Circle is more akin to ‘principles’, but this’ll work well enough. Continue reading Introducing a Frontlog: Experiments in Process →

Social Supply and Demand

analysis, challenge, direction, happiness, personal favourite, product backlog

Stop seeking external validation by buying disposable crap made overseas, with its sub-optimal working conditions and carbon footprint from manufacture & transportation & distribution.

How?

Start acting out your truer self and continually making your world a tiny bit better, meaningfully deepening connections with the communities of which you’re already a part.

HOW?

Please steal this idea. It could save the world. I’m serious. And I call it: Social Supply and Demand. Continue reading Social Supply and Demand →

How to Measure a Scrum Master: Effort as Meta-Metric

analysis, scrummaster

CONGRATS! You have Agile metrics that are ‘good’, or even improving: cycle time, code coverage, heck, even Sprint velocity. Now, how do you know if the Scrum Master had a part in that ‘success’? YOU DON’T. These metrics track team performance, not Scrum Master performance, thus I’m proposing “new process experiments over time” as the meta-metric uniquely aligned with the Scrum Master role, which can be a leading indicator for the other metrics. Continue reading How to Measure a Scrum Master: Effort as Meta-Metric →

The Last Metric

adaptation, analysis, challenge, direction, happiness, inspiration

Once, I dreamt I had cancer. Conversations quickly turned to what I wanted to do in life. And then I woke up. It was literally a… wake-up call. Yet what I wanted to do in life was… a lot. How would I prioritize my bucket list? How would you prioritize? I’m using what I consider the last metric: deathbed regret. I had one clear thing. And then I did it! (And it sucked!) More on that in a sec… Continue reading The Last Metric →