"The longer you put off talking to your colleagues, the more likely it is, that you're going to have integration problems", says Jim Benson in his conversation with Tomasz Wykowski.

They start their conversation with The Collaboration Equation, which is “Individuals x Teams = Value. Jim explains that teams are covered by the Agile movement, and Value is discussed in Lean, but the individuals are somehow forgotten - the way they interact, work with each other, help each other, monitor their work, and are self-aware of what they lend to the team and what they gain from it.

Jim defines professionals as people wanting to do the right thing at the right time and wanting to do it better next time. He shows how Value Stream Mapping can help them improve by visualizing their work, pain points, emotions, and confusion. The moment they understand how they cause problems to others they can create their own reasons to collaborate and define the right environment to work as professionals.

You can learn more about Jim and his services at:

• https://modusinstitute.com
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimbenson/
• https://moduscooperandi.com/ 

Jim’s four books:

• The Collaborative Equation https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BHXDBG25/
• Why limit WIP https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KRJFS2Y/
• Why Plans Fail https://www.amazon.com//dp/B006S3UHGA/
• Personal Kanban https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004R1Q642/ 

Two other books mentioned by Jim during the conversation:

• Flow by  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi https://www.amazon.com//dp/0061339202
• Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374533555
• This interview was recorded during ACE! Conference (https://aceconf.com) in Krakow, Poland with support from Pragmatic Talks (https://www.pragmaticcoders.com/resources/pragmatic-talks) 

Tim’s talk from ACE! Conference 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3OfAzt4V-M.

“CI is developers' behavior, it has nothing to do with running Jenkins,” says Tim Ottinger, XP coach from Industrial Logic. 

Join Tomasz Wykowski, from ProCognita as he interviews Tim Ottinger about the ongoing relevance of Extreme Programming in modern software development. They look at the state of different XP practices, including TDD, CI/CD, User Stories, Swarming, Pairing, and Teaming. Tim explains why these behaviors are necessary for teams to iteratively develop product, and how they differ from “solo ticket processing” commonly used in software development. 

Tim discusses how XP emphasizes working together, prioritization of the work, and the delivery of end-to-end features. He explains that developers know about 1-5% of the codebase and therefore their work must focus on continuous learning. This cannot be limited to the installation of new tools but requires changes in behaviors. Tim shares insights on fostering a culture of continuous improvement and provides valuable resources for teams looking to elevate their agile practices.

You can learn more about Tim at https://www.linkedin.com/in/agileotter/, read his posts at https://agileotter.blogspot.com, and visit the Industrial Logic website at https://www.industriallogic.com/. 

The Swarm Programming article mentioned in the interview: https://www.industriallogic.com/blog/swarm-programming-with-the-swarm-board/ 

YouTube Channels mentioned by Tim:

• Dave Farley Continuous Delivery: https://www.youtube.com/@ContinuousDelivery
• Emily Bache on TDD: https://www.youtube.com/@EmilyBache-tech-coach 

This interview was recorded during ACE! Conference (https://aceconf.com) in Krakow, Poland with support from Pragmatic Talks (https://www.pragmaticcoders.com/resources/pragmatic-talks)

Tim’s talk from ACE! Conference 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3SDiRMEWLE 

Join Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita as he sits down with Alexey Kryvitsky, Certified Scrum Trainer, Certified LeSS Trainer, and co-creator of Org Topologies. Together they discuss how to avoid making the implementation of the Agile framework as an organizational goal. Alexey introduces the concept of Org Topologies as a mapping technique to help companies discover where they are, where they want to be, and how to get there. He discusses two dimensions of the map, which are the scope of capabilities and the scope of work. Then he explains each of the four levels on both axis. 

They discuss the role of the managers in driving organizational development, how they can set their goals, and how their role and responsibility will change when moving to different parts of the Org Topologies map. Alexey also gives examples of how the tool can be used to discuss where the company is and where it wants to be, and how different Agile frameworks can support this development.

Learn more about Alexey at https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexeykrivitsky/ and watch his talk from ACE! Conference at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fiY53icUqE&list=PL-u-TkA0wpjdf0mlSNQmiLYw4_r3Yn-NQ 

About Org Topologies: Org Topologies™, a visual framework-agnostic approach designed to help organizations optimize their structure and processes by focusing on thoughtful organizational design. This helps organizations gain higher levels of adaptability. It provides guides such as Elevating Structures™ to help organizations progress on their transformation journeys with a clear direction toward the target state. Find out more at https://www.orgtopologies.com/ and https://www.linkedin.com/company/orgtopologies/. 

This interview was recorded during ACE! Conference (https://aceconf.com) in Krakow, Poland with support from Pragmatic Talks (https://www.pragmaticcoders.com/resources/pragmatic-talks). 

Intent-Based Leadership is a way of leading when we give control based on technical competencies and organizational clarity. Created by David Marquet, author of “Turn the Ship Around” it was popularized in the Agile community by Jenni Jepsen. Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita interviews Jenni, on why Intent-Based Leadership works, and how to apply it.

Jenni starts with David’s story on how he learned that one man cannot think for the whole submarine crew. She explains the main concept of Intent-Based Leadership, which is to give intent and take actions, rather than ask for permission and wait. To achieve this, she says, people need to obtain both technical competencies and clarity on the goal. 

They discuss how it can be used for both leaders who want more autonomy and responsibility on their teams, and team members who’d like to change the way they’re managed. Jenni describes The Ladder of Leadership which starts with “tell me what to do” and moves up through “I see…”, “I think…”, “I’d like to do…”, and “I intend to do…”. She shows that the last step is when employees don’t have to wait for permission.

During the conversation, they look at how leaders can develop their skills and how they can understand their triggers to avoid returning to old behaviors under stress. They cover the development of competencies and how to ensure the right information is available when people are making decisions.

Jenni company page: goAgile.dk Her book: TOGETHER – How leaders involve & engage people to get great things done  https://www.amazon.com/TOGETHER-leaders-involve-engage-people/dp/B08NRP13R4

More on Ladder of Leadership: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zOqFe1nTZc David Marquet's website: https://davidmarquet.com

His book: Turn the Ship Around! https://www.amazon.com/Turn-Ship-Around-Turning-Followers/dp/B08V4TFFCK/

This interview was recorded during ACE! Conference (https://aceconf.com) in Krakow, Poland with support from Pragmatic Talks (https://www.pragmaticcoders.com/resources/pragmatic-talks)

Jenni keynote from ACE! Conference 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyg6wuRAJTs

“You need to make a distinction between which direction you’re going and what you’re going to do as a first step,” says Viktor Grgic, Certified LeSS Trainer. 

In this episode of the Get Agile podcast Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita talks with Viktor about his approach to LeSS transformations. He shares his experience in finding people responsible for organizational structure, with whom he starts conversations on the identification of the problems to solve, not the symptoms to address. Victor explains how he educates decision-makers on the root causes of the current situation and helps companies identify the starting groups. He shows how the feature team adoption map helps define the first steps in the LeSS adoption, and how the team self-designing workshops are used to define new company structure. Companies finish the workshop with both clear goal in mind and the first steps to take, or where they want to be in one year.

Viktor emphasizes why owning the change by the group is critical to the success of the transformation, and why the most difficult part of the adoption happens after the workshops.

You can learn more about Viktor at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vgrgic/  His talk from the AgileByExample 2023 conference in Warsaw, Poland: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wht5CbGFE9A 

Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita meets with Pete Behrens, a Leadership Coach and Founder of the Agile Leadership Journey (ALJ), a community devoted to improving leaders and their organizations. Together they discuss how the Agile Leadership Journey provides its members with a pragmatic approach to leadership and how leaders can think, behave, and make better decisions using different models from ALJ.

“There’s no better or worse, there’s more awareness and choice,” says Pete, explaining the Leadership Agility model. He describes three main stages of self-awareness as a leader: Expert, Achiever, and Catalyst. Together, Tomasz and Pete look at each stage's main characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses, analyzing how these leaders behave, make decisions, or create a strategy. Pete explains what hollow leadership is and how leaders shape culture. He also clarifies how reflections help leaders grow and how they can get feedback from peers, using systemic approaches such as 360 reviews, or informal feedback sessions. 

Finally, they discuss leaders' behaviors during stress and where the firefighting culture might be coming from. 

Two books mentioned by Pete:

• Managing for Excellence https://www.amazon.com/Managing-Excellence-Performance-Contemporary-Organizations/dp/0471127248
• Leadership Agility https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Agility-Mastery-Anticipating-Initiating/dp/0787979139/ 

Learn more about Agile Leadership Jurney at https://www.agileleadershipjourney.com/ and find Pete's profile at https://linkedin.com/in/petebehrens 

“Leadership is a state of mind, so everyone is a leader,” says Zuzi Sohova, Certified Scrum Trainer in her conversation with Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita. Together they discuss the role of a leader in modern organizations and how they need to change from the position of power to the position of influence.

Zuzi shares her story of becoming Scrum Master, what was her greatest challenge, and the biggest change she needed to make. She tells how coaching helped her on her path and how she now works with executives to help them find their dreams. They also discuss how confidence and courage are necessary for leaders to try new things, and how different types of leaders work with their teams.

You can learn more about Zuzi at https://procognita.com/company/team/trainers/zuzi-sochova

Find Zuzi’s books at:

• The Great ScrumMaster: https://www.amazon.com/Great-ScrumMaster-ScrumMasterWay-Addison-Wesley-Signature/dp/013465711X/

• The Agile Leader: https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Leader-Leveraging-Power-Influence/dp/0136660428/

You can read about ORSC at https://crrglobal.com/about/orsc/

How often your organization fails to deliver on the promise? How many deadlines were not met, or the goals not achieved?

"The biggest responsibility of leadership is to ensure that promises keep on working on time," says Angel Diaz-Maroto, Certified Enterprise Coach, and Certified Scrum Trainer. During his recent visit to Warsaw, Poland, he joined Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita to discuss the elements of reliable promises. Together, they look at building promises in a dynamic, agile environment, and how to create these on task, output, and outcome levels.

Angel explains how reliable promises build trust, which creates a culture of responsibility that leads to responding to customers' needs and delivering results. He shares his thoughts on how promises work with the OKR method. Building on that, they discuss how different people react to challenging and stressful targets, and what can be the consequences of creating an unrealistic goal. Finally, Angel explains how the leader can move the organization from one that fails to deliver on promises to a company that creates (and deliver on) realistic goals.

You can learn more about Angel at https://procognita.com/company/team/trainers/angel-diaz-maroto 

Two books by Fred Kofman mentioned during the conversation:

• Conscious Business https://www.amazon.com/Conscious-Business-Build-Through-Values-ebook/dp/B0034184XM
• The Meaning Revolution https://www.amazon.com/Meaning-Revolution-Power-Transcendent-Leadership/dp/1524760730 

Bob Dunham Generative Leadership website https://generateleadership.com/home/ 

Natalia Cordova and other members of the DM Agile Coaching team can be found at https://www.dmagilecoaching.com/our-team/ 

“Time is your most valuable currency,” says Peter Stevens, co-author of the “Personal Agility” book. “How you choose to spend this currency says a lot about what you care about.” In this episode of the Get Agile Podcast, Peter joins Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita to discover the patterns behind Personal Agility.

Peter explains how to discover things that really matter and how to navigate between them. He shows why it’s not a process to follow, but a set of patterns, and what are the six powerful questions to ask during the “celebrate and choose” event. They also discuss what is the role of the celebration partner, and how they can help with Personal Agility.

Last but not least, they look at how to extend Personal Agility beyond a single person to the team o organizational level, how to create alignment between stakeholders, and how to improve company effectiveness by reducing time spend on endless meetings.

You can learn more about “Personal Agility: Unlocking Purpose, Alignment and Transformation” book at https://personalagilityinstitute.org/join-the-book-launch/

And find its authors at:

• Peter B. Stevens https://linkedin.com/in/peterstev https://saat-network.ch
• Maria Materelli https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariamatarelli/ https://www.formulaink.com/

The Agile movement led to the creation of customer-focused, independent teams. In many cases, however “independence” means “we don’t need to talk to each other” and “don’t touch our code” rather than “we’re not blocked by another team”.

During the LeSS Conference in Warsaw, Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita interviewed Bas Vodde, co-creator of LeSS. They discuss the consequences of defining the product from the customer perspective versus the technology perspective, and how broader product definition impacts both the organizational structure and the need for collaboration between teams. They look at how private code limit cooperation and learning, how to maximize individual and team learning, why it’s important from the company perspective, and how developers can start building the habit of continuous knowledge creation.

Learn more about LeSS at https://less.works/, and about Bas at https://less.works/profiles/bas-vodde. The mentioned book “Debugging the development process” can be found at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Debugging-Development-Process-Practical-Strategies/dp/1556156502