Articles

#JAFAC2023 was wonderful!

Mar 09, 2023  ·  Brenda Leeuwenberg

One of the highlights of the Nomad8 calendar is always #JAFAC. Where we create and curate the conference we want to attend, and then relish the opportunity to share it with the Agile community. So it was especially exciting to be able to run the conference again after a 3 year break. It felt differe... continue reading

Creating High Performance Teams on Remote:af

Feb 18, 2023  ·  Sandy Mamoli

I had the great pleasure to talk to Tony Ponton in this episode of Remote:af. Tony is a former radio host and it shows! In this episode, I talk about my background as a professional athlete and software developer, and how comparing my experience as a team athlete with individual sports such as Cros... continue reading

Story Mapping agile roles

Nov 21, 2022  ·  Anthony Boobier

The problem: I often struggle with clarifying expectations; where do you start, where do you stop? Teams often end up with too much or too little detail and big gaps in what people actually do. The solution: story map your expectations I wanted something that would give my sessions a structured fr... continue reading

An Above and Below the Line Model

Oct 01, 2022  ·  Anthony Boobier

An Above and Below the Line Model An organization’s culture is expressed through the sum of its language and behaviors. Negative behaviors have a palpable impact on teams and, in turn, the culture in which that team exists; one person belittling a colleague’s idea will make the recipient think again... continue reading

Leading Responsible Adults

May 21, 2022  ·  Brenda Leeuwenberg

Back in the pre-COVID days, when we never imagined the future we now live in, I started to look into workplace culture and how it flowed through an organisation. While much has been written about this from many wiser heads than mine, my perspective was a bit unusual. It was when I sat in the toilet... continue reading

What surfing taught me about progress and change

Apr 02, 2022  ·  Paulius Tuzikas

In 2016 I had a near death experience. I remember that day like it was yesterday. It happened at a beautiful place called Costa De Caparica, Portugal. I was a beginner surfer, having only 2 lessons in my whole life. I showed up at the beach excited, with a wetsuit on and my surfboard nicely waxed. I... continue reading

The Lack of Trust Problem

Mar 04, 2022  ·  Scott Nepia

I often think I'm the luckiest person to be able to do what I do. I get to work with the smartest folk and solve gnarly problems with different teams. I get to help people do their best work together. What’s not to like? But when your job is to try and help people change the way they work, sometime... continue reading

Are you picking your team wisely?

Jan 31, 2022  ·  Sandy Mamoli

At age 15 I found myself part of a team I had nothing in common with: people were at least 10 years older, they were a lot better at playing handball and we had nothing in common except for a love of the game. I felt very alone and inadequate, and just tried to hang in there practicing harder than I... continue reading

5 Questions about Self-Selection

Sept 29, 2021  ·  Sandy Mamoli

1. What is self-selection? Self-selection is a way of letting people choose which team to work in. It is a facilitated process of letting people self-organize into small, cross-functional teams. It is the fastest and most efficient way to form stable teams and is based on a belief that people are at... continue reading

Encourage positive behaviours

Sept 08, 2021  ·  Anthony Boobier

I don’t like the way I have been seeing the term mindset used as an accusation, as a binary assessment that someone is stuck in a way of thinking that they need to be shifted out of. Mindset is not an absolute term. It’s a way of understanding and thinking about something, manifested through behavio... continue reading

Sprint Reviews are broken

Jul 08, 2021  ·  Tony O'Halloran

In 2000, Southwest Airlines Flight 1455 was transporting 142 passengers and crew from Las Vegas to Burbank airport in California. The pilot was a man named Howard Peterson. During landing, the plane approached the runway at too steep an angle and was travelling too quickly to be able to come to a ha... continue reading

Demystifying the Agile Team Facilitator

Apr 15, 2021  ·  Paulius Tuzikas

With the wave of Agile ways of working quite a few new roles have been introduced to organisations: with basic Agile we’ve added Product Owner, Agile Coach, Scrum Master. Then the famous Spotify model added some extra roles to the mix like Chapter Lead and Tribe Lead. It’s easy to get lost in the ro... continue reading