Food for Agile Thought #459: Challenging Assumptions, High-Performing Product Teams, Agile’s Decline, Product Strategy Discovery

Welcome to the 459th edition of the ‘Food for Agile Thought’ newsletter, shared with 42,779 peers. I am Stefan Wolpers, offering hands-on, actionable advice to agile professionals.

This week, John Cutler suggests structuring organizations to adapt and thrive amid changing conditions, while Simon Powers examines culture's impact on individuals and Agile's decline. Bob Galen emphasizes the shift from rigid frameworks to flexible, context-driven agile patterns, Ted Neward highlights common ‘manager antipatterns’ in leadership, and Gustavo Razzetti stresses intellectual humility to prevent doubling down on poor decisions.

Next, Melissa Suzuno highlights how Botify’s transition to product-trio-supported enhanced collaboration and decision-making, while Todd Lankford offers a 5-step guide for teams to prioritize user needs over excessive planning. Stephanie Leue shares her approach to building high-performing teams, and Vlad Loktev, interviewed by Lenny Rachitski, discusses leadership insights from his decade at Airbnb, emphasizing chaos, impact, and balance in product development.

Lastly, Jacob Bennett shares his structured approach to work estimation for better outcomes, and Roman Pichler introduces product strategy discovery to minimize failure risk. Also, Pim de Morree critiques hierarchical team structures, advocating for more collaborative models, and Chris Stone presents the ‘Days Since Last’ metric for driving team accountability. Finally, Paul Graham reflects on the importance of a ‘founder mode’ approach to scaling companies, challenging conventional management wisdom.

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🎓 Launch on October 23: Learn How to Master the Most Important Artifact in the Advanced Product Backlog Management Course!

👉 Please note:

• The course includes membership in my professional students' brand-new Hands-on Agile community.
• The course will only be available for sign-up until October 31, 2024!

🏆 Tip of the Week

John Cutler explores the challenges of managing assumptions and legitimacy in software development, suggesting that organizations should be structured to adapt and thrive when conditions change rather than relying on idealized models: "Boundary of Safely Challenged Assumptions."

🍋 Lemon of the Week

We are Lemon-free this week.

➿ Agile & Leadership

• Simon Powers explores how culture impacts the individual and how understanding these influences can help protect against negative effects, enhance personal well-being, and foster significant cultural change. He also points to the possible reason for Agile’s decline: "State vs Step Change – The individual inside culture."

• Bob Galen discusses the shift from rigid frameworks to more flexible pattern-based approaches in agile, emphasizing the need for experienced practitioners and context-driven solutions for sustainable and effective agility: "Coaching Frameworks or Patterns."

• Ted Neward highlights common ‘manager antipatterns,’ where companies repeatedly make mistakes in leadership roles, offering insights into identifying and addressing these dysfunctional management styles to improve team effectiveness: "Manager Antipatterns."

• Gustavo Razzetti explores why leaders often double down on bad decisions, emphasizing the importance of intellectual humility, self-awareness, and adopting a learning mindset to avoid costly mistakes: "When Leaders Double Down on Bad Decisions."

🎓 🖥 🇬🇧 Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills Class w/ PSFS Certificate — November 21, 2024

The Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills (PSFS) training by Berlin Product People is a one-day official Scrum.org class for advanced Scrum practitioners and agile coaches, including the industry-acknowledged PSFS certification. This PSFS training class is in English.

Enjoy the benefits of a live virtual immersive class with like-minded agile peers from 09:00 – 17:30 CET.

Learn more: 🖥 🇬🇧 Professional Scrum Facilitation Skills Class w/ PSFS Certificate — November 21, 2024.

Customer review: “Great experience – “You reap what you saw.” What I really liked about it was the constant usage of facilitation techniques & Liberating Structures to engage all participants & harness the collective knowledge while reaching the goal of the exercises during the workshop. Therefore, my experience was great because I could really leave with some insights from the whole group that I could apply in my daily work starting from the next day. “You reap what you saw” and in this case, it was the collective intelligence of everyone in the training class.” (Link.)

🎯 Product

• Melissa Suzuno shares how Botify successfully broke down silos by transitioning to product trios, fostering collaboration and improved decision-making, and creating a more user-focused and efficient product development process: "Product in Practice: How Botify Broke Down Silos and Moved to Product Trios."

• Medium: Todd Lankford explains that product teams often fail by focusing too much on planning rather than user needs, offering a 5-step guide to prioritize learning, adaptability, and user engagement: "The Real Reasons Why Most Product Teams Struggle to Delight Users."

• 🎙 In this podcast with Aakash Gupta, Stephanie Leue shares insights from her 15+ years in product management. She focuses on building high-performing teams by fostering trust, leveraging frameworks, and aligning around solving real user problems: "How to Build High Performing Product Teams: Lessons from 15+ Years in Product with Stephanie Leue."

• 🎙 Lenny Rachitsky interviews Vlad Loktev, who shares insights from his ten years at Airbnb. They discuss leadership, the importance of embracing chaos, prioritizing impact, and balancing speed with quality in product development and company culture: "Airbnb’s Vlad Loktev on embracing chaos, inquiry over advocacy, poking the bear, and ‘impact, impact, impact’."

🛠 Concepts, Tools & Measuring

• Medium: Jacob Bennett shares his structured approach to work estimation, emphasizing understanding requirements, breaking tasks into components, identifying risks, and iterating estimates based on new insights for better project outcomes: "How to estimate work like a senior software engineer."

• Roman Pichler introduces product strategy discovery as a systematic approach to minimize the risk of failure and maximize product success by developing an effective, well-aligned product strategy: "Product Strategy Discovery."

• Corporate Rebels: Pim de Morree argues that hierarchical team structures often harm performance, fostering conflict and reducing coordination, and advocates for flatter, more collaborative structures to unlock teams’ full potential: "Hierarchy in Teams: Why It Often Does More Harm Than Good."

• Chris Stone introduces the ‘Days Since Last’ (DSL) metric, a simple visual tool for reminding teams of essential behaviors, driving accountability, and focusing on desired outcomes by tracking time since key events: "Have you heard of DSL metrics: The Simple Metric Most Teams Don't Know About?"

🎶 Encore

• Paul Graham reflects on how conventional wisdom about scaling companies can mislead founders, advocating for a ‘founder mode’ approach, which emphasizes direct involvement and challenges traditional management practices: "Founder Mode."

📅 Training Classes, Meetups & Events

Upcoming classes and events:

• 🖥 💯 🇬🇧 Sep 5 — Live Virtual Meetup: Hands-on Agile 64: Mastering Work Intake: The Key to Sustainability and Flow (English)
• 🖥 💯 🇩🇪 Oct 1-2 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Scrum Product Owner Training (PSPO I; German)
• 🖥 💯 🇬🇧 Oct 9 — Live Virtual Meetup: Hands-on Agile 65: The Lean Tech Manifesto with Fabrice Bernhard (English)
• 🖥 💯 🇬🇧 Oct 15-16 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Scrum Master - Advanced Training (PSM II; English)
• 🖥 🇩🇪 Nov 6-7 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Scrum Product Owner Training (PSPO I; German)
• 🖥 🇬🇧 Nov 18-19 — Live Virtual Class: Professional Scrum Master - Advanced Training (PSM II; English)

See all upcoming classes here.

📺 Youtube Channel

• David Pereira: From Backlog Manager to Product Manager.

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