Welcome speakers @jtf and @ds after the break!

I’ve seen lots of pictures of the front cover on twitter, not so many of the back cover for some reason… 🙂

There we are!

https://troubleshootingagile.com (in case you were looking for the podcast 🙂 )

Q for the audience: Are you trying to make a transformation, but frustrated?

Q for the audience: Are you trying to make a transformation, but frustrated?

@jtf Absolutely.

If I want to be pathological, it may be that I'm already pathological.

I have been with my company for two years and I still don’t understand what culture the company has - I think I know what they want to be, which is Generative.

Partially bureaucratic, partially generative

But there is a lot of Bureaucracy and Pathological “siloes”

I think I know what they want to be, which is Generative. < lots of people want to get there… but how?

I like the “put the book down” forget the framework and stop doing things by numbers message

That hits home @jtf… “ceremonies only work if people are bought into them”…

If corporate culture is known for making decisions by consensus / not stepping on toes / distributed decision making.... which of the three cultures would that fall into? Bureaucratic?

If corporate culture is known for making decisions by consensus / not stepping on toes / distributed decision making.... which of the three cultures would that fall into? Bureaucratic?

The Bureau of the Consensus?

but the key question @lucas.rettig is how do you get "buy-in"? Keep listening, we have more

@nuwayser i'd claim that's squarely bureaucratic - defensive reasoning and low trust means people "follow the rules" of being nice (plus what @jtf just said)

Source of that 2x2 matrix image: https://stratechery.com/2013/the-uncanny-valley-of-a-functional-organization/

Source of that 2x2 matrix image: https://stratechery.com/2013/the-uncanny-valley-of-a-functional-organization/

get ready! hands on keyboard

Get ready to type!

telepathy about to be demonstrated

Ready?

HOW should we decide where should DOES be next year?

Dallas

How should we make that decision?

vote

Dot vote

Decide by focusing on the outcome of increasing the size of the ITRev community

dot vote

poll

Greek island

let's decide this by RFC and consent decision

List pros and cons of diferent locations

We want a fun location that can handle a large conference.

Dot Voting

To make it available to all, let's look at the distribution of all people

Lean Coffee it

Vote

By committee!

convo

the most senior person should decide… kidding

Just pick the cheapest proposal, right?

Where is the mean of timezones of participants?

Let Gene decide 🙂

Whiteboard with requirements

@cindy_vineberg was the person we saw

prep the options, short list them, present to the team, listen to them, make a decision based on them

Definitely Dallas

Well done @katarzyna.karpinska!

Bottom Up "pair prgramming" conversation

u cheated Kasia

u cheated Kasia

😄

London

Ditto what @stijn.liesenborghs said. Must be the shoes

Ready for questions…

Ready for questions…

🙂

@lucas.rettig "the most senior person should decide… kidding" - that is not an invalid decisionmaking rule actually! The key thing is to be curious and transparent as you decide, but you definitely don't have to have everyone (or anyone!) agree

@lucas.rettig "the most senior person should decide… kidding" - that is not an invalid decisionmaking rule actually! The key thing is to be curious and transparent as you decide, but you definitely don't have to have everyone (or anyone!) agree

What does the customer want?

Nothing destroys a culture like gaps between behavior espoused and behavior demonstrated

What do you want the archieve? What location get your closer / closest to that goal?

I really like the collaborative way. But sometimes it is hard to get results, or decisions made. Any advice there?

I really like the collaborative way. But sometimes it is hard to get results, or decisions made. Any advice there?

actually @tom.sheeran we'd say humans can't avoid the gap between "espoused theory" and "theory-in-use" - but that the methods we're going to show you help you course correct constantly

One of the must underdeveloped skills is courageous authenticity within leadership. And make no mistake, it is a skill.

One of the must underdeveloped skills is courageous authenticity within leadership. And make no mistake, it is a skill.

keep listening @stijn.liesenborghs - we have specific advice to give you, but you'll need a pen and paper - follow along!

@ds Violent agreement here

PAPER and a PEN? Who has those in 2020?

@ann.marie.99 you can cheat a bit and use a computer if you really want. but it's not OK to do only in your head - much less valuable

@ann.marie.99 you can cheat a bit and use a computer if you really want. but it's not OK to do only in your head - much less valuable

and @stijn.liesenborghs you might like our upcoming workshop on "Mining for Conflict" where we go into more detail on how to overcome those obstacles to collaboration - see https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/resources/

“You don’t need every word” < removing excuses

How to do this within groups? (like 5-10 people)

How to do this within groups? (like 5-10 people)

This is fun @jtf @ds

(3) I’ve read the book and have done the exercise already.

(3) I’ve read the book and have done the exercise already.

I thought it was PAPER and BREAD?

@u.yilmaz you can start by doing the conversational analysis yourself, which will help you improve - and then you can introduce to the others as @jtf suggested. but NO EXCUSES - you can improve all by yourself, don't need to wait!

@u.yilmaz you can start by doing the conversational analysis yourself, which will help you improve - and then you can introduce to the others as @jtf suggested. but NO EXCUSES - you can improve all by yourself, don't need to wait!

These slides will be available after if you want to read the conversations more slowly and follow along. (And the conversation is in the book too.)

How do you introduce the 4Rs to an executive audience? What reactions do you get and how do you deal with them?

How do you introduce the 4Rs to an executive audience? What reactions do you get and how do you deal with them?

Pro-tip: it is easier to spot (or think you spot) these problems in someone else… and when you do? Just assume you’re making the same mistake at the same time.

Transparency and productivity. So critical to get to having vulnerable conversations with coworkers on different teams. Versus everyone holding their cards close to their chest and giving the in meeting "YES we will do that" and knowing full well they have no plans to follow through.

This is awesome.

#NorbertvsQuinn - who will win?!

But it is not about winning. Both have to win for the greater good.

@joachimsammer great question, we do this all the time. The most common response is "this sounds great, you should show all those other people (in my team or that other team or at my customer) how to do this". What we then do are roleplays like the one you're hearing, and the aha moment is when the execs realise that the situation is (partly) their fault, and they can do something different to change it.

Those feet in the background 👣 😎

@genek101 virtual conferences ➡️ more opportunities for audience participation!

@genek101 virtual conferences ➡️ more opportunities for audience participation!

Thank you @ds @jtf

Thank you @ds @jtf

on Amazon, ordering the book

on Amazon, ordering the book

you do the 4R exercise as part of self-analysis/ introspection, right?

you do the 4R exercise as part of self-analysis/ introspection, right?

sure @joachimsammer! We're glad to discuss further too with you (and anyone else) - options for finding us and discussing further coming up on screen shortly

@gerald.turaray_devops sure, but you can also do it with a trusted friend - really helps for roleplay - or even with the person you are having the conversation with, if you feel brave

@gerald.turaray_devops sure, but you can also do it with a trusted friend - really helps for roleplay - or even with the person you are having the conversation with, if you feel brave

Great presentation!

Please get in touch with us at https://conversationaltransformation.com

Indeed, great convo!

we'd love to hear from any of you!

👏

great stuff!

also we have a workshop coming up next week - see https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/resources/

Nice

Thanks! Great stuff

👏

Fri 3 July on Mining For Conflict - much more detail and more personalised than we were able to go into here - https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/resources/

Great book if you don't have a copy yet! https://itrevolution.com/agile-conversations/

I have to go now but want to repeat we love hearing from listeners/readers and discussing these topics, so do get in touch at https://www.conversationaltransformation.com/

Thank you @jtf and @ds -- I will be buying this from my local bookshop Politics & Prose in DC

Thank you @jtf and @ds -- I will be buying this from my local bookshop Politics & Prose in DC

Great example of non empowerment (sign - light bulb)

Thanks! I've been wanting to use that metaphor for 10 years 🙂

“don’t just change the lightbulb; change the dang sign.” < great message!

@tal: your low-context message reminds me a lot of Nudge and the power of default rules.

@tal: your low-context message reminds me a lot of Nudge and the power of default rules.

Our CI/CD pipeline embodies our recommended practices @tal • How do you share this properly between teams without tying them together or force them to use something shared?

Our CI/CD pipeline embodies our recommended practices @tal • How do you share this properly between teams without tying them together or force them to use something shared?

I LOVE the signs on the floor of Paddington Station. I noticed this when I was there for the first time a couple of years ago.

I'm immediately distracted by why the meaning of "A.B.A." is "Always Be Documenting..." :thinking_face:

@tal your LinkedIn profile wins Modesty Award of the Day

good responses to excuses to not document... sounds like an Agile Conversations problem!

👋

Oops... I said "nobody likes documentation" when I meant "nobody likes TO WRITE documentation".

💡 : people might enjoy writing documentation more if they got readership stats! What about getting visibility into documentation page views?

💡 : people might enjoy writing documentation more if they got readership stats! What about getting visibility into documentation page views?

I actually quite enjoy it... 🙂

”if l doc this l can go on to more interesting stuff” is totes more common than “if l doc somebody else can do my job and l’ll be useless” - NOT

@tal - How do you organise documentation so people can find it? I’ve worked in lots of places with wiki’s polluted with out of date docs. Do you need a librarian?

@tal - How do you organise documentation so people can find it? I’ve worked in lots of places with wiki’s polluted with out of date docs. Do you need a librarian?

Love the blank screen examples 😄

@tal Have you seen organizations publish a "documentation workflow" similar to a development workflow?

out of date documentation can be like that sign with the old track name

out of date documentation can be like that sign with the old track name

alert doc template = post mortem template?

alert doc template = post mortem template?

“write for your 4 am self” is a good way to think about your audience!

The most read StackOverflow article 😆 I've read that at least a dozen times

The most read StackOverflow article 😆 I've read that at least a dozen times

Sometimes it is hard to define what to put in your doc repo (confluence) and what is your git repo (readme)

Sometimes it is hard to define what to put in your doc repo (confluence) and what is your git repo (readme)

Any ideas?

@tal how often (or how do you) best leverage Slack for documentation? Any workflows or suggestions you want to share?

@tal how often (or how do you) best leverage Slack for documentation? Any workflows or suggestions you want to share?

put your docs into git

put your docs into git

markdown in git works fine

markdown in git works fine

Also, Architectural Decision Records (ADRs) in git are very powerful

Also, Architectural Decision Records (ADRs) in git are very powerful

❤️ Stone Soup. My favorite kind. 🙂

Who else hates or is dreadful of #BlankScreen ? (Low Context DevOps: 3 Ways to End Knowledge Frustration (Stack Overflow))

👏 @tal

@tal Thanks for the brilliant talk!

amazing talk 👏 thank you @tal

"dark mode blank screen" :rolling_on_the_floor_laughing:

thx for the talk

👏@tal

Thanks everyone! I'll be here all day for Q&A!

@tal Thank you for the wonderful talk! Loved every point in it

Thanks - enjoyed that talk a lot 🙂

Thanks @tal that was a great reminder of the need to spread knowledge rather than hoard it 🙂

Thanks @tal that was a great reminder of the need to spread knowledge rather than hoard it 🙂

@tal Thank you! Enjoyed the talk 🙂

👏:skin-tone-5:

@tal Thanks, I like the point about documentation and linking it where it is needed.

@mik do you have a good way to identify how many value streams you have in your software production?

@mik do you have a good way to identify how many value streams you have in your software production?

@mik Do you also would say that each development/devops team should have it's own value stream? So that they can have full control about their value stream end to end?

hi @rene.lippert - This is Carmen DeArdo who is a Flow Advisor at Tasktop who is helping answer any questions. What we find is that most customers have both external and internal product value streams and actually have more internal value streams (e.g. platform teams) which should include the Integrated IT Pipeline.

Yes the Integrated IT pipeline may be the most important product a company has however most times it is not treated as a product and not architected for flow.

When @mik references core backend services, is he referring to infrastructure or traditional application data backend services?

In this case, it's the latter. However in general, the bottleneck could be anywhere including a dependent system or value stream.

Many times when a company "slays the monolith" it's not prioritized to unlock the maximum business value. So a lot of money is invested in some new product but the true bottleneck could be a legacy back end system whose work (or improvement in doing work - i.e. Debt) is not being prioritized.

Ok, I recently moved from application to more of an engineering role to provide a solutions architecture view to my organization, and i have found a lot of waste across all teams in a value stream is in the wait states for data movement, infrastructure deployment, boundary resolution, etc.

"Stop starting, start finishing". This fixes so many barriers to Flow.

Absolutely! It's where work waits - people keep busy. IN creative work we can't see this inventory build up. Identifying wait states is key to understanding where to invest to improve flow.

Also commit to the work before accepting the work - i.e. do you have the resources to finish?

I have seen teams being able to get on with stuff more recently because they are more difficult to interrupt.

I love that quote which came from @dominica - I use it a lot in coaching. Too much starting new work and not enough finishing.

However, sometimes things queue up because it's more difficult to do things which really are easier face to face

“start finishing”

Being remote makes having work visible and accurate in the tooling even more important.

Yep - we would see a lot of things start but the people and resources available to finish weren’t available so people start on the next thing

Right. Too much WIP then leads to the the other thieves taking hold. Unplanned work is another thief. Then work gets neglected.

@cdeardo - do you typically advise your clients to start documenting and tagging all of the work that they do to start getting to some of these metrics? or is that something you all do as part of the engagement?

My biggest problem in the organisation is not tracking work and the invisible work. I am not sure but it really might be a conclusion that this psychological safety is not there. Is there a good way to understand if I do have a psychological safety problem?

Yes we coach to be able to track all 4 types of work; features, defects but also risk and debt.

Yes we coach to be able to track all 4 types of work; features, defects but also risk and debt.

These map to value generation and value protection.

@lucas.rettig I'd recommend just get them to start recording all the work first. That's a big change for most teams! Then move on to tagging.

Features generate value. Defects and Risks protect value.

Debt also generates value by investing in future flow improvements. Many times there is little or no visibility or priority to this type work which can start the debt sprial if one is not careful.

I’m still not comfortable with calling this work “Debt”.

The positive language of “technical improvement” resonates much better with my senior execs

The positive language of “technical improvement” resonates much better with my senior execs

The decisions we made 20 years ago were right at the time

We just know better ways of working now and can improve

Not with mine. They think that's tech people messing around.

Yeah Debt refers to any improvement - People, Process or Technology. I know at one point Mik and Gene had a discussion about a 5th time of work called Continuous Improvement. But the decision was made to call all this work Debt.

'Debt' implies there's interest due ...

'Debt' implies there's interest due ...

So it could be Tech Debt but also WoW (ways of working)

"Improvement" improves how the value is delivered (BSSH)

Exactly. For my context at least I have to talk about that class of work with positive language.

(And using Viz where it’s hardcoded to “Debt” might be problematic :))

Well Debt can lead to more defects if the code base is fragile which leads to less investment in features. Left unchecked the Debt Spiral can take up all a team's capacity addressing defects instead of new feature work.

100% - and there are cases where the tech is ok

And not in a debt spiral

But where improvement work can make radical differences

In speed to market

right - it's all about making the information visible so the right conversation can take place.

Exactly

:)

The team itself knows best how to utilize the metrics. Like a Deming Quality Circle.

I coach on how to model and what patterns we see. But the experiments for improvements have to come from the team itself.

Great talk @mik Pointing leadership your way. 🙂

👏

Thx @mik!!

That's an interesting point. There are times when debt is impeding flow, but other times when flow can be improved by some more positive work. maybe that's "investment" rather than paying down debt?

That's an interesting point. There are times when debt is impeding flow, but other times when flow can be improved by some more positive work. maybe that's "investment" rather than paying down debt?

👏 Thanks @mik - insightful talk

Thanks so much!

👏

Thx, great talk!

@mik will also be following up but there's more info available here also https://flowframework.org/faq/

Thanks

Thanks, Mik!

Great talk @mik and thanks @cdeardo

thanks @mik

Thanks Mik, interesting talk 🙂

👏

Thanks @cdeardo and good to see you again.

Thanks @bryan.finster - ditto!

Thanks @mik!

@cdeardo is speaking tomorrow with @nicole.bryan at 1325 BST!

🎤 Hello DevOps people! I'll be here during my talk Leading Smart People, posting the books I reference as I go along, so you don't need to take notes :) Please feel free to ask questions along the way 😀

Thanks @jessicam - nice to almost see you! I am also facilitating a Lean Coffee starting soon. See the #lean-coffee channel for more details.

@mail832 are you talking about Impression Management

@mail832 are you talking about Impression Management

Thanks everyone. I will exit now since @mail832 will be starting. Thanks for your participation!

at some point in it l mean:)

I can see this talk by @mail832 coming up in the #bof-leadership discussion

Great book about leading: Keith Ferrazi's Leading Without Authority too

📖 Autonomy, Mastery, Purpose, the ingredients for intrinsic motivation, are from Drive by Dan Pink 📺 or if you only have 20 mins, his TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_the_puzzle_of_motivation)

📖 Autonomy, Mastery, Purpose, the ingredients for intrinsic motivation, are from Drive by Dan Pink 📺 or if you only have 20 mins, his TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_the_puzzle_of_motivation)

@mail832 you touched on it already - the dark side of Psychological Safety as studied by Prof Dr Amy Edmondson - the negative behaviour of not speaking up for fear of appearing Incompetent, Ignorant, Negative or Intrusive. (I add “fear of appearing unprofessional” too) which kills PS in teams. (Which is why we measure it with alarms in our software) let

@mail832 you touched on it already - the dark side of Psychological Safety as studied by Prof Dr Amy Edmondson - the negative behaviour of not speaking up for fear of appearing Incompetent, Ignorant, Negative or Intrusive. (I add “fear of appearing unprofessional” too) which kills PS in teams. (Which is why we measure it with alarms in our software) let

@mail832: what kind of material was covered in the “coaching training”? That sounds really interesting.

@mail832: what kind of material was covered in the “coaching training”? That sounds really interesting.

@mail832 There’s a couple of videos on Impression Management on http://www.psychologicalsafety.works/resources but happy to send you more

[...] -> my favorite "powerful question"

> If we do that, will you feel proud of it? Love this powerful question, @mail832 :thumbsup:

@mail832 - approx how much time do your product mgrs spend with stakeholders vs the dev team?

@mail832 - approx how much time do your product mgrs spend with stakeholders vs the dev team?

“don’t build things, solve problems” < :thumbsup:

You’re describing Psychological Safety and EQ through practical product ownership - very cool

"I want to use OpenShift" -> "What does your application do?"

Strategy Debt: Stop Starting & Start Finishing

Strategy Debt: Stop Starting & Start Finishing

“Strategy Debt” - nice

My org has a goal right now of "Adding dashboards and monitoring" and its bothered me for months, but I couldnt figure out why. That focus on the reasoning behind the monitoring and dashboards is a lot more helpful. Good thoughts.

My org has a goal right now of "Adding dashboards and monitoring" and its bothered me for months, but I couldnt figure out why. That focus on the reasoning behind the monitoring and dashboards is a lot more helpful. Good thoughts.

:woman-running: runs for cover after mentioning 'debt'

“how are we adding value along the way?” < ➕ 1️⃣

📖 Two books about OKRs: • Measure What Matters by John Doerr • Radical Focus by Christina Wodtke

📖 Two books about OKRs: • Measure What Matters by John Doerr • Radical Focus by Christina Wodtke

(Confession: I have read neither of these. Most of what I know about OKRs is from working with people who know more than I do.)

And here's something I SHOULD have said in the bit about OKRs. The team doing the work should develop the OKRs. Ideally in conversation/collaboration with the stakeholder (the person who best understands the need, not necessarily the person who signs off), or if that's logistically tricky, could be that the team absorbs as much context as they can, comes up with a set of OKRs and brings them back to the stakeholder for feedback, maybe iterates a couple of times. That way, you have the team bought into what they're trying to achieve, makes it less likely to slip into "build the thing" thinking.

And here's something I SHOULD have said in the bit about OKRs. The team doing the work should develop the OKRs. Ideally in conversation/collaboration with the stakeholder (the person who best understands the need, not necessarily the person who signs off), or if that's logistically tricky, could be that the team absorbs as much context as they can, comes up with a set of OKRs and brings them back to the stakeholder for feedback, maybe iterates a couple of times. That way, you have the team bought into what they're trying to achieve, makes it less likely to slip into "build the thing" thinking.

TFW the speaker prepares meta-notes and uploads them in real time 🙂

Serious l'ésprit d'éscalier after I recorded this talk. Straight away I was making notes of the things I should have said 😬

📖 The four types of risk are from Inspired by Marty Cagan. It's a great read about product management generally.

@genek101 yet another great way to implement virtual conferences! ☝️ thought-provoking and interactive

@GeneK Yes, I'm doing an upcoming conference that way as well and looking forward to increased interaction

it's an interesting and valuable angle to consider designers etc. as identifiers and mitigators of risk

This is a great heuristic :D learning vs cost

This is a great heuristic :D learning vs cost

@mail832: this message around trusting conversations and joint design could be right out Agile Conversations! ❤️

👏

“people will want to follow you… and that’s leadership” < +1

Great talk @mail832

@mail832 thank you - loved it

👏

Thanks for the talk @mail832, very interesting.

@mail832 that was excellent - thank you 🙏 👏

@mail832 -- that was a great talk!

An amazing talk. Thanks 👏

really appreciated the comments as we went through

👏

@mail832 one I'll be recommending elsewhere at Nationwide - thanks

This is all very, very thought provoking - especially the realisation that these are all questions that I'm already asking my team... in not-very direct ways! Thank you, so much @mail832! 👏

great stuff 👏

High fives!

Great talk @mail832 with lots of practical advice - my fave is "If we do that, will you feel proud of it?" 👏👏

👏

Thank you everyone! Glad to hear you found it useful 💚

Fantastic talk, thanks

Great talk @mail832, resonated well. Writing meaningful OKRs is a real challenge.

Excellent - thank you!

@mail832 fantastic content, plan to use a lot of this with our entire organization !

Feel free to DM me, or we can maybe pick up some of these conversations in #bof-leadership and #bof-project-to-product

Hey @mail832, just saw your talk; good stuff inside. Especially I like the question What's the cost of getting it wrong?

everyone, you were a great audience!

Thanks @tal for your presentation. It is very applicable to some issues we're having. Do you have any suggestions for getting various teams to agree to a single platform for documentation? We've got some using Confluence, others using markdown in gitlab, others standing up web pages (and of course, some doing nothing at all).

Thanks @tal for your presentation. It is very applicable to some issues we're having. Do you have any suggestions for getting various teams to agree to a single platform for documentation? We've got some using Confluence, others using markdown in gitlab, others standing up web pages (and of course, some doing nothing at all).