Podcast Get Agile

“Agile has crossed the chasm,” said Lyssa Adkins during the conversation with Tomasz Wykowski in Dublin. It was almost five years ago so they’re returning to this conversation to define Agile’s landscape and see how it evolved over the last few years. Lyssa, the co-founder of Agile Coaching Institute, currently focuses on helping leaders understand the changes happening around them. Listen to their conversation to learn why she avoids working with the leadership team from the agile perspective, why she doesn’t do what she’s often asked for, and what she does instead.

Tomasz and Lyssa also discuss how Agile has evolved over the years, and how the nature of the change has changed as well. They’re looking for potential new areas to apply patterns created in software development and how it impacts what Agile Coaches do and focus on.

The war in Ukraine often leads to frustration and feeling of powerlessness. This special episode of the Get Agile podcast was recorded less than 48h after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita discusses with Christopher Avery how the Responsibility Process can be applied to address anxiety caused by a conflict between what we want and what we have. Listen to their conversation to learn how to avoid laying blame, justifying, or feeling guilt and understand what you want to take full Responsibility instead.

Menlo Innovation has created a unique culture of teamwork, collaboration, communication, and relationship. This led to specific practices, such as the whole company working only in pairs, having one stand-up for the 50-60 people that last 13 minutes, high-tech anthropologist observing users, visual planning, and extreme interviewing. But in March 2020 everything has changed, as the whole company was moved to the virtual world.

In this interview, Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita talks with Richard Sheridan, CEO of Menlo Innovations on how the company succeeded in the pandemic world. Join them to learn about experiments Menlonian did, how they adapted their practices to the new reality, what worked, and what didn’t.

Many managers hold assumptions that stop their companies from changing the way they operate. Pandemic, climate change, and other recent disruptions have challenged these assumptions, making supply chains fragile, introducing chaos in stable environments, and forcing companies to question their core business practices. Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita discusses with Robin Dymond, Certified Scrum Trainer how the Agile movement can help non-software firms, including construction and oil & gas companies, go through the profound change – how to create more adaptive and more resilient organizations, how and where to start, how to reach leaders from these companies, and how to build trust with them.

How do we change organizations? How do we change ourselves? Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita and Linda Rising, author, lecturer and independent consultant discuss why change is hard, how companies can introduce it by running small experiments and why they can’t create a schedule for transformation. Listen to their conversation to understand why running around with checklists won’t help you much, what to do instead and what are critical factors for successful change.

Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita and Scott Dunn, Certified Scrum Trainer discuss company culture and why it often leads to failure of Agile adoption. Learn what you need to know about the culture as a leader, how to understand where you currently are using Competing Values Framework, how to create a vision of where you want to be, and finally, how to design the experiments that will help in the change. As the company culture changes, so does the leader’s role, moving from ‘expert’ to ‘coach and facilitator’.

In this episode, Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita interviews Jurgen Appelo, creator of the Management 3.0 movement. Join them to hear ideas behind the versatile organization and how organizations can thrive in the post-covid world. Learn why companies should abandon the product approach and focus on designing a consistent experience for their users, how to ensure collaboration between organizational departments, what are the challenges of tools such as OKRs, and how to avoid them. You’ll also find out why Jurgen thinks that stable teams are no longer optimal solution for companies and what’s the alternative.

Join Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita and Angela Johnson, Certified Scrum Trainer from Collaborative Leadership Team. Find out why Scrum is missing many Agile practices like User Stories, Velocity or Definition of Ready, why Scrum courses are more about unlearning than learning, and why starting using Scrum can be Scary. Finally, learn what A-word and Project Management Hangover are.

Join Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita and Lisette Sutherland, Director of Collaboration Superpowers. Learn do and don’ts of working efficiently in a remote environment. Find out why the future is becoming a hybrid working environment and how to prepare for it.

Join Tomasz Wykowski from ProCognita and Nicole Fleming, Training From the Back of the Room Certified Trainer and Certifier. Learn about brain-based learning and how to make your training more effective and engaging. Find out how to move from the stage to be a guide for your participants. Discover principles behind the Training from the Back of the Room approach and how to move your physical courses into the virtual world.