When Do You Acknowledge A Project Is Poison And What Can You Do To Find An Antidote?

There are certain software projects, that if mismanaged spiral towards mediocrity very quickly. Why do they not spiral toward a certain death? This is because in the end, most software projects deliver something. They may not deliver the product vision, but through all of the pain the team end up delivering something.

Why do I think these projects are poisonous? It's simple. In almost all cases no-one likes using or engaging with a mediocre product. Customers love using, and love sharing, products that exceed their expectations. Mediocre software deliveries rarely exceed Customer expectation and consequently rarely get used by the end Customer they were intended for. Sure there is the odd occasion that a mediocre software delivery is loved by the intended Customer base. This is rare.

Also mediocre products are rarely loved by the people that create them. If this is the case then the software delivery team will rarely promote their own work. They will rarely be proud in their work and in most cases they won't have an interest in taking ownership of their work. A sense of ownership within a software delivery team results in actually allowing the team to engage and grow with the product they they can then strive to improve to exceed expectations.

So how do you determine if your project is poisonous, and how do you deal with it spiralling towards mediocrity? A really clear indication would be if several, or indeed many, of the delivery team leave during the project lifecycle. This really should set alarm bells ringing, and theoretically trigger a response. Clearly acknowledging there is a problem is the start to finding a solution to solve it.

A group of people leaving a project is the clearest indication of a poison project. A pretty simple way of finding a possible solution in this case is to ask the people leaving what they think would solve the problem. even ask them if there changes were instigated would they consider staying? Who know's it might be the kick start needed to lift the project above mediocrity.

As an example in a previous occasion when a number of people left a project that I knew about, they mentioned that communication with marketing and stake holders was a continual problem and that no matter how much they tried to solve the problem they met brick walls that they could not overcome without further support. A simple solution here might be to sit the delivery team e.g. marketing and technology together. If this is done communication is no longer a process but rather an instinct. It is almost impossible for a team that sits together to not communicate better! If communication is an issue, remove barriers that are making it an issue. In this case what would there be to lose? Things cannot get worse!

Another means to determine if a project is heading towards mediocrity is to simply ask the people who are working on it if they are happy. If there are then it's a pretty safe bet that the project is adding to their level of well being and this typically would indicate a measure of future success on the project. If the team on a whole is down, then rest assured something is wrong with either the product or the process that is being followed to deliver it.

What can be done to fix this? Well the answer is simple again. Let the team decide how to fix it. A delivery team, in most instances, doesn't need to be directed from on high. A delivery team, if correctly staffed with the right level of experience, knows what it has to do to get something out the door. This is where the beauty of the Agile software delivery process comes into play. Agile promotes self inspection by the team who own the product and delivery process that they are working on. If things are not working correctly, then the team, not an individual, decides on the best approach to improve.

Two Sides To Every Coin

There are always two sides to every coin. I guess that is unless you have a one sided coin ;-). Firstly though, what is odd about the above coin?

So this morning I was reading about the Valve Employee Handbook. There are a lot of common sense solutions to the way the promote how they work and seemingly a lot of trust given to employees of Valve! If you have been asked to work there, seems they believe in you, and let you get on with whatever you feel you have to do to best provide value for the company. 

On the other side of the coin though, there is the environment in which trust is not felt as a necessity to empower employees to deliver a result.

Reading both of these after each other provides stark contrast of two very different working environments. I would suspect that only a sadist would be truly interested in the description of the second working environment! The reaction of the blog-sphere and on twitter would lead the casual observer to believe that most people would prefer the Valve method of getting product out the door ;-)!

Interview Tips Part 1 - Find Out What The Company Values

OK forget the above picture! Although it did make me giggle!

Recently I have had the pleasure of going through a few interview processes in order to get my career back on track. Although the interview process can be unpleasant, essentially you are selling yourself and to some that can be uncomfortable, it is definitely a challenge. If you like a challenge, to break the norm once in a while, then going through a round of interviews should help you out!

One thing I would stress is to not take the interview process lightly. Research the company that you are going to interview with. A solution that really worked for me was to find what the company values, and then think about how you would fit in with those values. A classic example are the Amazon Values. This tells you exactly what the company is looking for in all candidates. Pretty much well every company, that has an on-line presence, will have a similar page to the one at Amazon.

If the company you are interviewing with is actually serious about these values, then most of the questions that they will ask you should be able to be mapped back to them. So print out the values. See if you agree with them. If you don't, then you have to ask yourself why are you going to go for an interview with the company. It's a pretty safe bet that you won't enjoy your time there, if you are offered a job, as you disagree with the values that the company aspires to!

If you do agree with the values, then write down how you have met them and more importantly how you have lived them in previous roles, or indeed in your day to day life. If in your past roles you have not had the chance to aspire to the values, then write down how you would! Then read what you have written a couple of times to see if you actually believe in what you have said. Again if you don't then you have to think to yourself, would you enjoy your time with the company you are interviewing with.

If the company is serious about the values, that it is openly promoting, then most of the interview questions that you are asked should be directly mappable back to the values that you have studied. As you have highlighted how you have managed to aspire to these you invariably have a coherent and simple answer to provide in an interview. By studying what values a company aspires to, and determining if you believe in them, you are essentially able to find out the types of questions you might have to answer and you are then able to find the best situation, you have previously been involved in, that demonstrates how you personally aspire to that value.

If in the interview you don't get questions that relate to the published company values, then in my opinion you have to ask yourself whether that company is actually serious about them. Are their published values simply lip service that attention is never paid to. If you feel this is the case, then you again have to ask yourself whether you would be comfortable working in an environment like that. 

OK just because in a single interview you are not asked about anything that maps to the company values doesn't mean that the entire company doesn't aspire to them. You are typically interviewed by members of the team that you are going to work with though, so it might be an indication that the particular team doesn't aspire to them. Remember an interview is not a one way process. Sure you are going there to sell yourself, however the company that you are interviewing with should also be selling itself to you as well. If you don't get a great feel through the interview process, again you need to ask yourself, would you feel comfortable working there. 

Interviewing is not necessarily an easy or comfortable process. If you are not a natural sales person, then going out and selling yourself is not a trivial thing. It can be a very hard slog! Knowing, and understanding, the values of the company that you are interviewing with will at least help you know if you would be comfortable working there. It should also give you an insight into the questions that should be asked in the interview process. If questions are not asked in the interview, that can be mapped to promoted company values, then this should provide an indication as to whether the published core values are simply lip service, or actually aspired to. All great personal indicators to highlight if you would feel comfortable working in a company.

Next up STAR answers to questions ..... but this is another blog coming soon!

When Process Is Valued Over Innovation You Are In Trouble

If you deliver products to Customers in a market that driven wildly by innovation, lets say for example Internet services, if your delivery mechanism is bound tightly by process you are in trouble. This is as innovation cannot be governed strictly by process. It is not possible to simply say "Do something innovative next week". Sure you can allow someone the time to try and be innovative but this doesn't mean they will be.

Innovation is not something that can easily be measured and it is a continual process. You don't be innovative for a week and then spend the next 6 months delivering the innovation. Innovation means being able to adapt to new ideas and concepts as they inexplicably fall in your lap from time to time. You have to be able to adjust. Of course, arguably, this is exactly what the Agile software development process allows you to do. Adapt and change the process that is used by a self organising team so they can best suit the manner that is required to deliver a product that will delight Customers.

Of course if you work in an environment where following a set process is valued more than innovation and change. Then if the market you deliver in is fuelled by change and innovation - you are in trouble. Innovation invariably results in change. change to your processes and change to your products. Innovation is all about being able to predict a Customers needs and delivering that need. Or alternatively spotting a customer trend and delivering that trend. Of course spotting trends gets you into the market at best second, but by allowing processes to change and adapt, and products to change and adapt, at least you can be in the market.

If however you are dictated to delivering your product, without room for thought and innovation, and rather by steps on a spreadsheet, then invariably by the time you deliver your product, the market you are delivering it to will have moved on and your Customers will not be interested. 

The Scrum Process Should Drive Out Fear

I was interviewing a candidate recently and the question was asked "When you don't have clear requirements from project stakeholders, what do you do?". The candidate provided an excellent example of a project he had worked on, whereby he had simply provided the stakeholders with the requirements that he was going to implement, based on the vagueness that they hold told him, and then asked for comment. He then went about working with his team, delivering and demonstrating the requirements as they were built. His reasoning was that stakeholders were not providing clear requirements because they feared making mistakes and feared that what they were attempting to do would result in failure. His process of defining and demonstrating requirements, as they were built, drove out the fear and provided a platform for the successful delivery of a product. A great response to a difficult situation and a great interview answer. One well worth remembering ;-)

This is exactly what the Scrum delivery process does. With the product owner sitting in the scrum delivery team they are able to see early in the product delivery process the difficulty, or not as it may be, to deliver certain use cases. If the scrum team, prioritised by the product owner, attempt to deliver, and demonstrate complex use cases first, then it is possible to determine if certain use cases are possible.

Alternatively it is possible to see if product complexity will be detriment to the product as a whole, i.e. by concentrating on complexity first to guarantee it is delivered might not leave enough time towards the end of a product release schedule to complete the product as a whole.

By demonstrating sprint deliveries every 2 or 4 weeks the scrum team, at the behest of the product owner can self correct and re-prioritise functionality to ensure successful delivery. This might entail demonstrating the complexity of a certain use case, resulting in the product owner rethinking and reworking a set of use cases with stakeholders. The critical thing is that fear is driven out of a project as early as possible:

• The 'northbound' stakeholders (management) get a clear indication of progress at regular intervals. they don't wait until the end of a 3-4 month software delivery cycle to get an outcome they don't want. They can see at regular time intervals progress and if issues arise, expectations can be reset. There should be less fear from management as they have a clearer indication of what can be achieved. They get this vision at a very early stage in the delivery cycle.
• The product owner can also see progress immediately as they are sitting with the delivery team, working on the hardest use cases first. This gives the ability for the product owner to assess the over all project commitment and assess at a very early stage the chance of delivery success. The product owner then has the data they need to set expectations.
• The Scrum team can drive out fear as working closely with the product owner they can assess what can be delivered at a very early stage in the software delivery cycle. This gives the power for the team to self correct and concentrate on delivering the core value of any given product in a specified time frame.

This is one of the key benefits of the Scrum process. As the team are empowered, or should be, to deliver a product that they have ownership of, they have the power to set what is achievable within a given time frame. This means, as long as 'northbound' stakeholder expectations can be managed, that the delivery team can drive out fear as they can commit to what is possible, as opposed to worrying about what is not possible.

It is worth the 'northbound' stakeholders while to work in this fashion as if they drive a team to deliver, what cannot be delivered there are two possible outcomes:

• The delivery team will simply burn out trying to achieve the impossible. On the odd occasion they may well actually deliver the impossible, but it's no way to maintain the long term health and prosperity of a team. Undoubtedly there will be a lot of recruitment after each project as teams break up with individuals moving on elsewhere.
• The delivery team will simply become demoralised. This is as they will feel that their concerns are simply being ignored. Again expect to have to manage a lot of recruitment during and after the project.

the difficulty on the product owners part is:

• knowing what is hard and
• knowing what is impossible. 

If the product owner knows this, then hopefully prioritising what is hard, at the beginning of the project can drive out the fear. If they prioritise the impossible, then a load of time is going to be wasted not delivering anything. More on this later! ;-)

Cheers

m    

I'm Finally Leaving My Current Job

I am leaving my current job at the end of April. The almost universal response when I tell people is "Well done! It's about time!". The sometimes harsher response - "Well it's about 4 years late!". I would like to think that these comments are wrong and a little misguided. Unfortunately, deep down .... in fact not even deep down, rather quite close to the surface ... I know they are reasonably correct.

Ho hum. Onwards and upwards I say! Looking forward to new opportunities elsewhere!