The Quick Brown Fox

Most Common Cognitive Biases Visualised & Explained - I want to marry this post. Full Utilization and Whitespace - Or maybe this one, because damn that is an elegant explanation. What Should We Measure? - Tim is always a good read, and I certainly have metrics on my mind right now with all of my new spreadsheet-related duties.

Monday - Holiday Tuesday - This is the "off" week in terms of Scrum ceremonies, which is badly needed after last week. I worked on burndown charts (neither math nor Excel come easily to me). My meditation this morning was a form of metta . I tried to keep it in my thoughts. Quite a challenge during backlog refinement.  Wednesday - Blessedly quiet aside from some worrying impediments. Cleared up a nagging problem with some documentation. Practiced with the burndown charts.   Thursday - WE'RE HIRING SOMEONE. Oh blessed day. Hectic morning followed by quiet afternoon. Metrics reporting spreadsheet design handed off to team member with way better Excel chops. With luck, next week will not be nearly as stressful as last week.  Friday - Documentation catch-up, sympathetic ear as teams struggle to form new relationships amid a very demanding schedule.

Monday - Pulling into the close of our first sprint in the new territory. Minor success -- gotta take those where I can -- we are ordering more web cameras, so whenever we have meetings with remote people, customers, etc., we don't have to run around trying to find one of the two we have. Hooray. Meeting count: 4.5 hours. Had a headache by 10:30. Tuesday - Two stand-ups, sprint reviews, retrospectives, and wrestling with metrics reporting. Meeting count: 4.5 hours Wednesday - Had a dr appointment in the morning. Ran from stand-up to retrospective to sprint planning, had a breather to work with the sprint report and have a couple of short conversations, then two more sprint planning meetings and a documentation meeting. Meeting count: 3.5 hours Put in an hour or so working on research for ANE. I haven't been keeping track of the time I spend for them, and I suppose I ought to. Thursday - First thing in the morning a team member asks me to talk. I am not to escalate a proble...

Monday - Attended three separate sprint plannings. Brought in a lot of snacks, which led to me agreeing to give a baking lesson at a co-worker's house. Scheduled a bunch of other meetings. New teams picked names. Some of them seem to be adjusting quickly; others are going to have trouble. I am very tired.   Tuesday - Went to a doc meeting about how to divide upcoming work that crosses products. Went to four separate standups. Met with delivery lead about workload for a team member. Interviewed a Scrum Master candidate. Endured a meeting about a very slow-moving feature initiative -- lots of people seem to think it's important, yet it never seems to get the necessary traction to actually happen. Again, very tired. Scheduled my baking class at co-worker's house, which currently has ten people interested in attending. This is going to be interesting!  Wednesday - Another innocent day destroyed. My not-exactly-boss asked me to commit to another regular meeting.  ...

Monday - Kanban team member delivered impassioned plea for more support and communication from management. Spent a lot of time with a Udemy course on Excel, not something I ever thought I would need more than the basics for. It's nice to have so many resources available these days (harking back to a time when "learn this software" meant a trip to the bookstore... do they still publish "For Dummies" guides?). Had a meeting with one of the Kanban team's managers, intended to start addressing some of their systemic concerns; I think it went well. Met with the main audience for the sprint reports and discussed the intent behind the various charts and how we might provide more useful information. Very pleased with both meetings. Less pleased with what appears to be an abrupt partial about-face regarding the "reteaming" effort originally planned for next week.  Tuesday - Met with an abbreviated set of the Kanban team. Psychological safety keeps coming ...

Why the Office Needs a Typewriter Revolution - Not sure I 100% agree with this, but it's an interesting argument, and a reminder to question our assumptions.  Resources Don't Write Software - Ms Derby being awesome, as usual.  HBR article on using photographs to build team connection (Podcast) Mindfulness, Meditation, and Productivity    (Podcast) Hurry Slowly 08.   Estimating Business Value in the Shark Tank - Someone actually did this exercise at one of our user conferences, and the results were (I am told) illuminating. Unfortunately, there was no follow-up, which is where good ideas die in droves.   The Show and Tell - Some interesting guidance on doing a good sprint review.  Four Tips for Getting the Most from Your Introverted Team Members - Off-putting title, but advice seems sound