The Daily Standup

How Might We Fix Product Management and Close the Skills Gap “During the pandemic, many companies experienced a surge in demand for digital services and products, leading to rapid hiring sprees. With expectations of continued growth, they expanded teams across every aspect of the product, anticipating long-term demand. Features that would have once undergone thorough discovery, prioritisation, and sizing were now being churned out at breakneck speed. Product managers, who once prioritised delivering cohesive user experiences, have increasingly become mere managers of feature factories, losing sight of the broader vision. This shift has come at a significant cost, resulting in a substantial skills gap in product management due to the diminished emphasis on developing core product development skills. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

Complex Solutions Lead To Complex Problems Humans make around 35,000 decisions daily. Help them reduce the number and capitalize on it. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

Product Management Frameworks - Tools Not Solutions Frameworks seem to get a lot of hate in the Product Management/Development discourse. Whether it’s JTBD, SWOT, Agile/Scrum, SAFe, or whatever, these structured methodologies often bear the brunt of blame when projects go off the rails. But is it really the framework’s fault, or is there something else going on? How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

Rethink Your Goals, Mission, Purpose, & Passion Boldness Courage Courtesy Creativity Critical thinking Decision-making Determination Directness Empathy Equality Fairness Fame Fearlessness Fun Generosity Good citizen Graciousness Gratitude Honesty Humbleness Humility Humor Improvisation Inclusivity Influential Justice Love Mutual respect Optimism Patience Perseverance Perspective Persuasiveness Pleasure Power Respect Respect for others Self-awareness Self-questioning Self-reliance Socialization Spirituality Striving for quality Tolerance Transparency Trustworthiness Willingness to take action How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

12 Reasons to IGNORE Your Users Feature Requests Ask yourself which of these 12 reasons might apply.

1. Not every user matches your ICP
2. The squeaky wheel shouldn’t get the grease
3. Innovation doesn’t come from consensus
4. Competitors are a terrible roadmap
5. Users don’t know what they really want
6. Feature bloat is silent but deadly
7. Product vision matters
8. Users are just plain wrong
9. Resource allocation is a zero-sum game
10. You need problems, not solutions
11. You’re not a contractor
12. They’ll forget about it soon

How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

Does Every User Story Need to Be Small? Small user stories are essential to success with agile. When it’s time to bring stories into an iteration, I always want them to be small.
But larger stories have their place as well–especially for something you're not going to work on imminently.
Suppose you have just begun work on a new product that will include a set of reports. Because this is a new product, there is nothing to be gained by writing a bunch of small user stories around each one of those reports at this point, especially since you don't yet even know all of the reports that will be needed.
At this stage of the project, having one big reporting story rather than a bunch of little ones keeps the size of the backlog more manageable. You'll have one entry in your tool instead of 15 or 20. That's much easier to manage.
Further, if you do write all the small user stories, one per report, it gives the impression that you've thought of everything. Early in a project, that's probably not true. New reports will be identified and some that are asked for initially may not be necessary.
Don’t fall into the trap of thinking every story needs to be small from the beginning. They don’t. Instead, plan for stories to shrink in size and grow in detail as they move closer to being brought into a sprint. For most teams, this will happen during the product backlog refinement meeting one or two sprints before the iteration planning where they’ll be considered.
Letting timing dictate story size will help you succeed with user stories and with agile. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

How Value Stream Management Transforms Project Managers and Agile Experts You’re leading a team of talented developers, creating features day in and day out. Yet, the outcomes are unclear. Customer satisfaction is stagnant, tech debt is piling up, and your team feels like they’re spinning their wheels in a never-ending cycle. If you’ve been here before, you’ve experienced the grind of being a “feature factory.” But what if there was a way to shift from simply delivering features to delivering meaningful value consistently? Enter Value Stream Management (VSM), a game changer for project managers and agile experts. VSM is more than a buzzword. It’s a transformative approach that can completely change the way you and your team operate. By focusing on delivering real value and improving how work flows through your organization, it allows you to prioritize what truly matters: customer outcomes and business results. But before we dive deeper into how VSM can transform your work, let’s explore the triggers that make it essential.
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Why are product managers still using agile? Ah, Agile — the buzzword that just won’t quit. It’s been the darling of software development for years, promising flexibility, speed, and a better way to build products. But here’s a cheeky thought…why are product managers still using Agile? Don’t get me wrong, agility is essential. But sometimes, it feels like we’re trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, especially when it comes to product management. We continue to attempt to fit a delivery focused methodology into outcome-based work… and we seem to never learn our lesson. The limitations for Agile are prevalent for discovery, an overlooked part of product management for many years. How does agile help to support a workstream that is primarily focused on research? Can it? How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

The Mindset of Highly Attractive People What makes someone attractive? Someone sent me an article that was perfectly WRONG! It is time for us to review and do an assessment of what truly invites beauty. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/

How to Give Feedback to High Performers on Your Team No one is perfect and that applies to high performers on your team too. They may be doing excellent work or exceeding your expectations, but that doesn’t make them flawless or leave them with no room for improvement or areas of growth. How to connect with AgileDad: - [website] https://www.agiledad.com/ - [instagram] https://www.instagram.com/agile_coach/ - [facebook] https://www.facebook.com/RealAgileDad/ - [Linkedin] https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehenson/