Troubleshooting Agile

By A weekly problem-solving session for all things agileBusiness

Troubleshooting Agile episodes

August 18, 2021 How Should the Company Decide?
Squirrel and Jeffrey trade stories about coaching people who feel trapped by a decision seemingly outside their control—and how a recursive question can help unlock more options and a better result.
SHOW LINKS:
- Unilateral control: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/how-to-fail-by-acting-unilaterally-part-i
- Mutual learning:
https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/mutual-learning-model-part-one
- Eight behaviors: https://cdn.csu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/917018/Eight-Behaviors-for-Smarter-Teams-2.pdf
- Drive by Daniel Pink: https://www.danpink.com/books/drive/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://agileconversations.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
18 min
August 11, 2021 Growth, Loss, and Emojis
Continuing our discussion of codewords as a signal of intimacy, we look at how team cohesion changes as a team grows or shrinks, and how you can anticipate this and retain positive cultural elements as your team evolves.
SHOW LINKS:
- Alistair Cockburn communication graph: p. 6 of https://alistair.cockburn.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/A-concise-theory-of-software-development-in-pictures.pdf
- Missing Affordances of Remote Work episode: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/missing-affordances-for-remote-working
- Transcript: https://agileconversations.com/blog/growth-loss-emojis/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://agileconversations.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
12 min
August 04, 2021 Codewords and Confidants
Squirrel explains how a telephone emoji helped a coaching client and we discover how codewords help build trust.
SHOW LINKS:
- Code words tweet: https://twitter.com/douglassquirrel/status/1421016370850971650
- Alistair Cockburn communication graph: p. 6 of https://alistair.cockburn.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/A-concise-theory-of-software-development-in-pictures.pdf
- Schwarz, Eight Behaviours for Smarter Teams: https://cdn.csu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/917018/Eight-Behaviors-for-Smarter-Teams-2.pdf
-Transcript: https://agileconversations.com/blog/codewords-and-confidants/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
10 min
July 28, 2021 Don't Add More Metrics!
If you're already struggling to hit targets, don't add more! Recommendations for improving performance without overcomplication.
SHOW LINKS:
- Tilted slider: p. 139 of https://itrevolution.com/agile-conversations/
- Metrics tweet: https://twitter.com/douglassquirrel/status/1418149716584501254
- Transcript: https://agileconversations.com/blog/dont-add-more-metrics/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
13 min
July 21, 2021 Tech Lead, Team Lead, Manager, Mentor
Squirrel rants about matrix management and then Jeffrey calms him down by describing self-managing team structures that work better. They agree that multiplying responsibilities and separating them from the place where the work happens is a bad idea.
SHOW LINKS:
- How Shirt / What Shirt episode: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/the-two-shirt-solution-for-agile-chaos
- Transcript: https://agileconversations.com/blog/tech-lead-team-lead/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
16 min
July 14, 2021 DataSciOps?
Squirrel tweets about isolated data-science teams, and Jeffrey tells stories of close collaboration between engineers and data scientists, even pairing!
SHOW LINKS:
- Squirrel's tweet: https://twitter.com/douglassquirrel/status/1411980591617163267
- DataOps: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DataOps
- Patrick Debois: http://www.jedi.be/
- Transcript: https://agileconversations.com/blog/datasciops/
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
18 min
July 07, 2021 Mo’ Complaints, Mo’ Better
Squirrel and Jeffrey shock a leader they're coaching by telling him to aim to increase complaints. It turns out that Amy Edmondson, ALCOA, and Toyota all agree with this seemingly counterintuitive advice.
SHOW LINKS:
- Amy Edmondson, Teaming: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7023600-teaming
- Andon light: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack_light
- Toyota Kata: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mrother/Homepage.html
- Paul O’Neill: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_H._O%27Neill
- Idealcast episode 7: The Topography of Problems and the Importance of Distributed Problem Solving (Part 2) : https://itrevolution.com/the-idealcast-episode-7/
- Invite to the Agile Conversations Slack: https://join.slack.com/t/agile-conversations/shared_invite/zt-nuw1f84n-62CQworE~PpuR7WOUCZp4g
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
18 min
June 30, 2021 Chris Clearfield: How To Solve Impossible Problems
Our old friend Chris Clearfield explains how he helps leaders identify and fix overwhelmingly complicated organisational problems.
SHOW LINKS:
- Chris’s workshop: https://pages.chrisclearfield.com/webinar/?sc_ref=55TfdIkc52FEI1EH
- Chris’s email, site, and podcast: [email protected] , https://www.chrisclearfield.com/ , https://www.chrisclearfield.com/podcast
- Meltdown: https://www.meltdownbook.net/
- Previous episode with Chris: https://soundcloud.com/troubleshootingagile/meltdown-part-i
- Cynefin framework: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynefin_framework
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
25 min
June 23, 2021 In Praise of Avoiding Conflict
Jeffrey and Squirrel show you how to use "paradoxical agenda-setting" to help ensure a team or organisation is really committed—or to find out why commitment would be a very bad idea!
- Invite to the Agile Conversations Slack: https://join.slack.com/t/agile-conversations/shared_invite/zt-nuw1f84n-62CQworE~PpuR7WOUCZp4g
- Paradoxical Agenda-Setting: https://feelinggood.com/tag/paradoxical-agenda-setting/
- Chris Clearfield: https://www.chrisclearfield.com/podcast
- The Uncanny Valley of a Functional Organization: https://stratechery.com/2013/the-uncanny-valley-of-a-functional-organization/
- Collaboration Theater: https://twitter.com/Grundlefleck/status/1398282369577230336
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
18 min
June 16, 2021 Managing the Rapid-Fire Exec
Squirrel tells the story of an exec who operates at warp speed and leaves his director of technology behind in his wake. How can we best handle these rapid-fire questions and instant decisions? We have concrete suggestions for being productive and successful when your style doesn't match that of a stakeholder.
SHOW LINKS:
- Burying the lede: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bury_the_lede
---
Our new book, Agile Conversations, is out now! See https://conversationaltransformation.com where you can order your copy and get a free video when you join our mailing list!
We'd love to hear any thoughts, ideas, or feedback you have about the show.
Email us at [email protected]
18 min

About Troubleshooting Agile

From the publisher's feed

Troubleshooting Agile is a problem-solving session for agile teams. Jeffrey Fredrick and Douglas Squirrel look at common problems agile teams face and provide practical, immediately useful advice for…