Johanna Rothman

APRIL 6, 2023

This morning, I read Dwayne Phillips' A New Writing Project at Home. I have the same problem, although my independent consulting book is NOT YET DONE. (Those capitals are for me, not you.) The book isn't done yet because I'm waiting for other people (indexer, cover designer, layout person) to finish their work. (At some point, a book uses a serial lifecycle.

Consulting 79

Consulting Books Management Management 79

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 20, 2023

Do you struggle with writing? You'd like to write more and faster, but things are just not working for you. I can help. I have opened the Q2 2023 Free Your Inner Writer workshop for registration. If you want to write easier and faster, read the book. If you want my support in your writing, take the workshop. (If you haven't yet bought the book, I'll give you a copy as part of the workshop.

Workshop 77

Workshop Books Consulting Management 77

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 16, 2023

At a recent client, a senior leader, Tim, said, “We realize we can't do everything, but we don't know how to get a handle on what we need to do.” We talked about what they measured and how long it took them to make decisions. (See Why Minimize Management Decision Time.) Tim explained that they measured schedule variance, because all the projects took so long.

Roadmap 85

Roadmap Workshop Agile Consulting 85

Johanna Rothman

FEBRUARY 27, 2023

Meetings. We all have them. Most of us hate them. When I ask why, here are some of the responses I hear: They take too much time away from our “real work.” It's too hard to find time to meet. Our calendars are too full. We can't find a place to meet. If we're back in the office, we have no meeting rooms. Or, we have some remote people, so we need several “places” to meet and the technology to support all those places.

Information 115

Information Workshop Testing Management 115

Johanna Rothman

FEBRUARY 14, 2023

If you, as I, write frequently, you might wonder where is the “best” place to publish your writing. You might think social media, especially Medium or LinkedIn, is the “best” in terms of eyeballs. (That's people to the rest of us.) That's possible the day, or maybe the week, you publish the piece. That's because social media is all about “instant” eyeballs.

Branding 94

Branding Consulting Workshop Technology 94

Johanna Rothman

JANUARY 17, 2023

I'm reviewing experience report proposals for the XP 2023 conference. While I see potential in many of these proposals, I don't see enough proposals that make me say, “Yes! I want to read this report! And see the speaker!” (Yes, I react in exclamation marks when I read a terrific proposal.). Experience reports allow us to learn from each other, from the successes and the failures and everything in between.

Agile 18

Agile Books Consulting Blog 18

Johanna Rothman

JANUARY 6, 2023

Random Feature Roadmap for One Program. Several people on social media have denigrated the terms “project manager” and “program manager.” These people claim there is no need for either role in an effective team, especially an agile team because the team can manage its own deliverables. While some agile teams can manage their own deliverables, that's not the only role for a project or program manager.

Management 108

Management Management Agile Roadmap 108

Johanna Rothman

DECEMBER 14, 2022

Jim, a relatively new manager said, “I don't have nearly enough time. I'm in meetings all the time. And I still need to do some of my previous technical work. I feel stretched from one end of the work day to the other.” We spoke for a few minutes. I asked him to eyeball the Management Time Sheet (link is to the google sheet) and see where he spent his time.

Leadership 77

Leadership Management Management Agile 77

Johanna Rothman

DECEMBER 2, 2022

On the ANE panel last night, an agile coach asked, “What's my path forward as an agile coach? What do I do next?” That's a great question and one each coach might ask, to make sure they continue to add value to the client. (Internal or external, all coaches have clients.). I said that if the coach wanted to move up the hierarchy in the organization, the coach needed some form of management experience.

Agile 109

Agile Roadmap Consulting Management 109

Johanna Rothman

NOVEMBER 18, 2022

If we want more ease and better results, we need to be able to change when the world changes. Yet, we don't always notice these changes, so we don't create options and experiment. Too often, we feel as if the world drags us down. We double-down on what we've been doing. Instead, we need to generate options and see where we might experiment. When we do, and we learn something, we might feel better about our circumstances and become more open to change.

Management 95

Management Management Books Consulting 95

Johanna Rothman

OCTOBER 28, 2022

I don't know of anyone who likes layoffs. However, they are one tool in your management toolbox. But so many layoffs don't return the results the managers expect. Worse, the layoffs alienate the previous employees and the survivors. And the customers? If your customers can tell you laid people off, you won't get the business results you want. You can conduct a reasonable layoff and have that layoff make sense for everyone concerned.

Management 82

Management Management Reference Consulting 82

Johanna Rothman

OCTOBER 25, 2022

Any time we mess with people's money, status, or ability to work, we create emotions—for ourselves and the other person. As managers, when we offer a job or a promotion, those emotions tend to be happy. But layoffs? Those emotions are rarely happy—for anyone. If we try to bury those feelings, we might appear as if we don't care. If we think of ourselves, we become drama kings and queens.

Management 88

Management Management Differentiation Banking 88

Johanna Rothman

OCTOBER 20, 2022

Do you know what to say when it's time to lay people off? The first time I had to lay someone off, I had no idea what to say. However, if you have a reasonable context, you (or HR and you) can create a script you can use to make a layoff a respectful and relatively kind experience. With a congruent conversation, you might even be able to maintain a healthy collegial relationship with the person you have to lay off.

Management 96

Management Management Reference Consulting 96

Johanna Rothman

SEPTEMBER 21, 2022

Do you struggle with writing? You'd like to write more and faster, but things are just not working for you. I can help. Free Your Inner Nonfiction Writer is out everywhere, in ebook and paper. That means I've redone all the videos for my Free Your Inner Writer workshop. I have just three openings remaining for the Q4 2022 workshop. If you want to write easier and faster, read the book.

Workshop 16

Workshop Books Consulting Management 16

Johanna Rothman

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

Most managers I see feel a ton of pressure for delivery. The managers need to “deliver” more projects, products, and features. That pressure rolls down to the teams. Too often, the team hears, “Can you just do a little more?” That often leads to the so-called “quiet quitting” problem. The problem isn't quiet quitting.

Feedback Loop 114

Feedback Loop Management Management Agile 114

Johanna Rothman

SEPTEMBER 3, 2022

I started this series by sharing my status of too much WIP (Work in Progress). My WIP was making me slightly crazed and I explained how I worked to reduce it. In case you're wondering, here's my current status: 3 presentations still on the list (I completed 2, including the one I recorded). The online workshop videos are complete. When Teachable settles down, I can start to upload.

Development 89

Development Workshop Agile Feedback Loop 89

Johanna Rothman

SEPTEMBER 2, 2022

I hate the fact that I let my WIP get this high—and I'm glad I'm working it down. (I wrote why I let my WIP get this high on my other blog in the post, What Would It Take for You to Fail to Success? ). My status today: Finished one more presentation and need to record it. 3 presentations still on the list. Just under 1000 words on the book, and I'm pleased with them.

User Experience 21

User Experience Books Presentation Blog 21

Johanna Rothman

AUGUST 31, 2022

I'm halfway through this week of working through my too-high WIP. So far, I exposed my WIP and talked about how I planned to use continuous flow in Part 1. Part 2 was about cycle time and using Cost of Delay to make easier decisions. Today is about why I don't use a real backlog because I get interruptions. I want to make those interruptions easier to manage.

Development 118

Development Workshop Roadmap Management 118

Johanna Rothman

AUGUST 25, 2022

I see too many teams feel frustrated because their managers say the work takes “too long.” (The team feedback loop is the inside of the onion for how agile the organization can be. See Multiple Short Feedback Loops Support Innovation.). The longer the work takes, the more pressure managers exert on the team and the product leader. (Teams and product leaders might exert pressure on themselves, too.

Feedback Loop 86

Feedback Loop Agile Management Management 86

Johanna Rothman

AUGUST 11, 2022

Many agile teams and product leaders assume they can make many product decisions on their own. They do have some constraints, such as “this kind of customer” and “these kinds of problems.” However, as the teams work together and explore the product, they assume they can decide on the designs and architecture. Product leaders assume they can plan and replan the product backlog, based on the team's learning.

Feedback Loop 101

Feedback Loop Leadership Agile Information 101

Johanna Rothman

AUGUST 2, 2022

A project portfolio manager contacted me via LinkedIn. The question: How can this portfolio team start to manage the project portfolio when the organization has 600 projects? Right now, the portfolio team is supposed to read the status decks for each of those 600, to understand each project's status. How to start? That's an impossible task. A project portfolio team cannot decide when they're supposed to evaluate 600 projects.

Management 90

Management Management Consulting Strategy 90

Johanna Rothman

JUNE 30, 2022

Do your senior leaders want more predictability about when your team can finish its work? Perfect prediction is impossible, and sometimes, even reasonable prediction is quite difficult (with apologies to Yogi Berra). However, agile teams have one specific “tool” to create better predictability: right-sizing their stories. When a team right-sizes their work, they can create better predictions based on past experience.

Roadmap 25

Roadmap Agile Definition Management 25

Johanna Rothman

JUNE 17, 2022

In Part 1 , I said that product roadmaps are not like car roadmaps. But even car roadmaps showed places of interest—options—for the driver and passengers. If I stretch that analogy a little, managers need to see where we are predictable for the next bit of time, and the options we see for the future. We need to update those options as we learn more.

Roadmap 94

Roadmap Management Management Agile 94

Johanna Rothman

JUNE 13, 2022

In Part 1 , I said that customers need a different kind of roadmap than teams do. Teams need the focusing details now and a way to look forward. But, depending on where your product is in the market, your customers might want or need different information. Let's start there. One thing to remember: you might not need a customer-facing roadmap at all if you release often enough.

Roadmap 118

Roadmap Strategy Product Strategy Information 118

Johanna Rothman

JUNE 9, 2022

Resource Efficiency. A senior manager said, “We give our resources everything they could need: technology, tools, even some training. Why are they so slow?” I asked, “How many projects are they working on?” “Each resource has at least two projects so they stay productive and efficient.” These managers have created a resource efficiency culture, not a flow efficiency culture, as in the image above.

Books 73

Books Management Management Consulting 73

Johanna Rothman

JUNE 7, 2022

As I said in Part 1 , teams use backlogs and roadmaps to know what's now and what's next. Teams use backlogs for the day-to-day tactical decisions. And when teams can see what's next, they can keep the strategic decisions in mind. What do teams need to know about the product now to focus their work? Which users are first, for now. The functionality the team wants feedback on, for now.

Roadmap 95

Roadmap Agile Consulting Management 95

Johanna Rothman

MAY 23, 2022

Before the pandemic, Jenny, the VP of Engineering, insisted that the engineering staff needed to work in the Boston area. She expected that people would mostly work in the office, and they did. However, during the pandemic, Jenny changed her mind. She said that as long as teams had sufficient hours of overlap, she didn't care where the managers hired people.

Agile 76

Agile Workshop Engineering Management 76

Johanna Rothman

MAY 11, 2022

We often think that finishing a story from the backlog is “just” tactical. However, the more often we deliver in short feedback loops, the more often we can make strategic decisions. Finishing a story creates a new decision point, for both the product and the corporate strategy. The more often we iterate strategically, the more we exhibit business agility.

Feedback Loop 93

Feedback Loop Strategy Agile Roadmap 93

Johanna Rothman

APRIL 26, 2022

Writers have a problem product development teams don't have: Imposter Syndrome. That's when you think you're a fraud. Even though you have experience and expertise. Fear drives Imposter Syndrome. Too often, writers let the fear win. You don't have to succumb to that fear—you can fool that fear with writing. The more you write and publish, the less you allow your Imposter Syndrome to win.

Workshop 113

Workshop Consulting Management Management 113

Johanna Rothman

APRIL 4, 2022

Technology gets old. While we know that intellectually, we might not know it as it pertains to us. Here's a story about how technology changes one day at a time and everything is okay—until it's not. (Don't want the long sad story? Go to Here's What You Missed.). A Short History of My Site. I started my site back in 1995. I hand-crafted the HTML, possibly in PageMill or whatever we used for our sites back then.

Blog 57

Blog Technology Feedback Loop Strategy 57

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 29, 2022

Joanie, a new VP Engineering, joined the company a couple of weeks ago. Her boss, the CEO, wants to know how long it will take engineering to finish all the projects. Joanie asked the various leaders these questions for every project in progress: When did you start this project? Are you still working on this project? If so, how long do you think this project will take?

Development 121

Development Agile Management Management 121

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 24, 2022

Do you ever struggle with knowing if you should split stories? Or wondering if you have a valuable minimum? Jeffrey Frederick and Squirrel offered a signal for a too-small minimum in their podcast, MVP Cubed. That signal was when people became bored with the work. Let me add some additional tests: When the team can't decide on one specific user. (“As a user” is not sufficient.

Testing 74

Testing Demo Consulting Management 74

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 21, 2022

Thinking about bringing your writing skills to the next level? Want to write and finish? You can. You can learn what works for you. Enroll in my Q2 2022 Writing Workshop 1: Free Your Inner Writer & Sell Your Nonfiction Ideas. You write. I support you with personal feedback on your writing. In addition, we have optional group coaching that helps you learn from other writers.

Workshop 85

Workshop Consulting Management Management 85

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 8, 2022

Integrated System Program. The larger your product, the more likely you have components teams. I often see component teams because of the architecture of the product. In this first image, the Integrated System Program, the rest of the product uses the Platform of Common Services as components. Also, the teams find it tempting to think of the common GUI and API as components.

Agile 115

Agile Feedback Loop Definition Management 115

Johanna Rothman

MARCH 2, 2022

Continuing the series on dependencies… Maybe you don't have the problem where the team creates internal dependencies with their process. And you don't have to wait for someone outside the team to approve your work—an organizational process. But you do have a combination of platform/component teams and feature teams. I see this most often in products similar to the Integrated System Program kind of product.

Testing 120

Testing Management Management Consulting 120

Johanna Rothman

FEBRUARY 24, 2022

Small-World Network. Does your organization have an enterprise architect or Chief Product Person? We create these positions to check that the teams don't try to implement something “wrong.” However, a single person in this position creates bottlenecks and dependencies. (A committee might create even tighter bottlenecks.) Those dependencies slow the work.

Enterprise 116

Enterprise Agile Management Management 116

Johanna Rothman

FEBRUARY 23, 2022

Even when managers try to create cross-functional teams, the teams still have dependencies. Dependencies slow and make finishing the work more difficult. Too many teams have a built-in dependency creator—code review. When we take time to perform code review after we write the code (or the tests), we create dependencies between the people on the team.

Testing 90

Testing Consulting Management Management 90