Monthly Archives: March 2014

Senex Rex at Work: February 2014

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You may be interested in what Senex Rex does. Our mission is to help clients become highly profitable long term. When our clients make more money, they have greater freedom to innovate and their employees and shareholders have more freedom to enjoy life. We happen to think agility helps in many cases, so we often teach and coach agile theory and practice. Few contractors teach clients how to sustainably retain and improve agility; we specialize in that. We have many other tools in our tool box. Here’s a snapshot of the work Senex Rex did in February 2014. Continue reading→

Exponential Case Study: 3 Benefits from Agility

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Senex Rex case studies help clients better understand the benefits and challenges of agility. Here is a perspective from Pablo Martin Rodriguez-Bertorello, Chief Innovation Officer of Exponential. Senex Rex trained Exponential’s executives, managers, engineers and product management staff to deeply understand agile theory and practice, so Exponential could stand alone with no further external training or coaching. Our mission is to effect permanent change, not maintain change. We are proudest when we leave the building and our clients advance rapidly on their own. —Dan Greening, Senex Rex Managing Director

Exponential adopted Scrum in July 2014, and rapidly achieved three great outcomes. We dramatically increased the rate we completed features, reduced our bug density and reduced our release duration. These outcomes followed a mass company training by Senex Rex, and deep executive commitment. No external coaching following Senex Rex training was required. Continue reading→

Talk: Risk-Reduction Metrics for Agile Organizations

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Join us at the Lean Kanban North America 2014 conference. I will be speaking on the Managing Risk Track, May 7, 2014 from 2:20pm to 3:45pm.

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Agile and lean processes make it easier for organizations to measure company and team performance, assess risk and opportunity, and adapt. My colleagues and I have used delivery rate, concept-to-cash lead-time, architectural foresight, specialist dependency, forecast horizon and experiment invalidation rate to identify risk, and focus risk-reduction and learning efforts. With greater knowledge, we can eliminate low-opportunity options early and more deeply explore higher-opportunity options to maximize value. We have used these metrics to diagnose agility problems in teams and organizations, to motivate groups to improve, to assess coaching contributions, and to decide where to spend coaching resources. We face many problems in using measurement and feedback to drive change. Manager misuse or misunderstanding of metrics can lead organizations to get worse. Teams or people that mistrust or misunderstand managers often game metrics. And yet, what we can’t measure, we can’t manage. So part of a successful metrics program must involve creating and sustaining a collaborative, trusting and trustworthy culture.

Troy Magennis: 2013 Brickell Key Award Winner for KanbanSim

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troy-magennis-hiking-croppedWe feel a little embarrassed that we didn’t announce Troy Magennis was one of two Brickell Key award winners, when it happened in 2013. This award is granted to people who have shown outstanding achievement, leadership and contribution to the Kanban Community. Continue reading→

Smart and Lazy: Our best generals!

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400px-Kurt_von_Hammerstein-Equord

 

“I divide my officers into four groups: smart, diligent, stupid, and lazy. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are smart and diligent—their place is the General Staff. Some are stupid and lazy—they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Some are both smart and lazy; they are qualified for the highest leadership duties, because they possess the intellectual clarity and the composure necessary for difficult decisions. Beware of those who are stupid and diligent—they must not be entrusted with any responsibility because they always cause mischief.”
—Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord (1933)

Born September 26, 1878, Kurt Gebhard Adolf Philipp Freiherr von Hammerstein-Equord was a German general who served for a period as Commander-in-Chief of the Reichswehr. He is famous for being an ardent opponent of Hitler and the Nazi regime. He died on April 25, 1943 [Wikipedia]