Food for Agile Thought #349: 4 Deadly Sins of Work Culture, Right-Sizing Your Stories, Engineering Culture, Little Scrum Islands

Welcome to the 349th edition of the ‘Food for Agile Thought’ newsletter, shared with 35,462 peers. My name is Stefan Wolpers.

This week, we share the impact of a 2014 change in engineering culture at Uber by ‘creating cross-functional program teams and introducing platform teams.’ Moreover, we reflect on why your little, happy Scrum island isn’t enough to achieve business agility, and we combine two powerful coaching tools for agile practitioners to learn from each other. Also, Adam Grant interviews Jenny Chatman on the effects of toxicity, mediocracy, bureaucracy, and anarchy.

Then, we detail how to address the leadership’s need for more predictability by ‘right-sizing’ work items to one- or two-day stories; we delve into the details of product-centric companies, and we listen to Lenny Rachitsky interviewing Teresa Torres on ‘automating continuous discovery, the opportunity solution tree framework, making a case for user research, [and] common interviewing mistakes.’

Finally, we refer to the many advantages of using our own products internally, pointing to examples from Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft. Also, we explain how the ‘5 Whys’ practice works and its benefits, and we enjoy a hearty laugh when Yuri Malishenko applies the IKEA metaphor to Scrum.

PS: 🗞 Did you miss past issues? No worries, here we go: 347, 348.

🏆 Tip of the Week

Gergely Orosz shares the impact of a 2014 change in engineering culture at Uber by ‘creating cross-functional program teams and introducing platform teams:’ "The Platform and Program Split at Uber."

➿ Agile & Scrum

• Leading Agile reflects on why your little, happy Scrum island isn’t enough to achieve business agility: "Why an Agile Delivery Model Isn’t Always Enough."

• Agile Alliance: Jakob Schmidt Soerensen, Bo Bjerregaard, and Maryanne Kmit share lessons learned on how to help Scrum Masters learn from each other by combining two powerful coaching tools: "Uncover the unknown with Gemba Troika Consulting."
  
  

• 🎙 TED Talks: Adam Grant interviews Jenny Chatman on the effects of toxicity, mediocracy, bureaucracy, and anarchy: "The 4 Deadly Sins of Work Culture,"

🎓 🖥 💯 🇩🇪 Hands-on Agile #43: Outcome-Based Product Planning with Jeff Gothelf — July 14, 2022

Roadmapping is a flawed concept in the age of Agile. Maps, by their definition, are linear and we don't build linear products and services any more. We build continuous systems. Nevertheless, we have to be able to create and provide some plans for our teams, leaders and customers to set expectations about the ongoing improvements and future of the services we build. How do we communicate that effectively in a continuous world? How do we ensure the voice of the customer is included in these plans?

In this talk, Jeff Gothelf will discuss the concept of outcome-based product planning. Using specific examples and detailed tools, Jeff will show how taking a customer-centric look at product strategy and creating continuously improving plans ensures the teams maintain their agility, customer-focus and ultimately, the success of their product.

Learn more: 🖥 💯 🇩🇪 Hands-on Agile #43: Outcome-Based Product Planning with Jeff Gothelf — July 14, 2022.

👉 From time to time, we can offer last-minute seats for Professional Scrum training classes at cost to individuals who do not have access to a corporate training budget. If you like to be notified about these opportunities, please apply here.

🎯 Product

• Johanna Rothman details how to address the leadership’s need for more predictability by ‘right-sizing’ work items to one- or two-day stories: "How to Right-Size Your Stories for Better Predictability."

• 🎙 Lenny Rachitsky interviews Teresa Torres on ‘automating continuous discovery, the opportunity solution tree framework, making a case for user research, [and] common interviewing mistakes:’ "Teresa Torres on how to interview customers […]."

• 📺 Medium: Ant Murphy delves into the details of product-centric companies: "What Product-Led Companies Look Like."

🛠 Concepts, Tools & Measuring

• DZone: Zevi Reinitz refers to the many advantages of using your own products internally, pointing to examples from Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft: "Why You Should Be Obsessed With Dogfooding."
  
  

• Medium: Jason Yip explains how the practice works and what its benefits are: "Some thoughts on ‘5 Whys’."

✂️ Cutting Room Floor

• 😂 Yuri Malishenko applies the IKEA metaphor to Scrum: "If Scrum framework was a piece of furniture that an organization attempted."
  
  

📅 Training Classes, Meetups & Events

Upcoming classes and events:

• 🖥 💯 🇬🇧 July 14 — Live Virtual Meetup: Hands-on Agile #43: Outcome-Based Product Planning w/ Jeff Gothelf (English)
• 🖥 🇩🇪 Aug 29-30 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Scrum Master Training (PSM I; German)
• 🖥 🇬🇧 Sep 6-9 — Live Virtual Class: Advanced Professional Scrum Master Training (PSM II; English)
• 🖥 🇩🇪 Sep 26-27 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Agile Leadership Essentials Training (PAL-E; German)

See all upcoming classes here.

📺 Youtube Channel

• Janna Bastow: Hands-on Agile #42: Lean Roadmapping and OKRs.

Your Opinion Matters

Would you like to suggest a post for next week's edition or provide general feedback? You can reply to this email, or contact stefan@age-of-product.com.

If you like the newsletter, please forward it to a friend or colleague—it would mean a lot to me! 🙏

If you want to receive even more news, just follow @AgeOfProduct or @StefanW on Twitter for your daily dose.

Last, but not least: If you are a first time reader of this newsletter, click here to subscribe and join 35,462 peers.

Best,