Agile Coaches' Corner Dan Neumann at AgileThought

This week, Dan Neumann and Justin Thatil are joined by their colleague, Mike Guiler. In this episode, they explore how a Product Manager shifts from just management to leadership and how this transformation influences the role. Dan, Justin, and Mike discuss tools and strategies, including OKRs, Story Mapping, and Hackathons, among others.
 
Key Takeaways
Product management must study the market and users, becoming customer-centric and ensuring it is still viable for the business at the same time.
It takes more than one individual to effectively perform the discovery function. It's a Team effort (Product Designer, Product Owner, and a Technical member).
Discovery and design sessions are opportunities for Teams to unlock the art of the possible.
The Team has to learn from rapid feedback while ensuring steps are taken to not hurt organizational reputation.
A Product Manager must first understand how to help the Team approach a particular problem. A great way is to identify OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) and focus on the target market the Team is going after. Once the Team is aligned, the job can be done.
A Product Manager sets an objective for the Team and allows them to work autonomously toward reaching it.
Story Mapping: A Product Manager’s ally on the journey to product discovery.
Story Mapping is an easy way to frame what the Team is trying to achieve and the tool that might be the most efficient for that purpose.
Story Mapping can also help identify the target persona for which the Team is building a particular feature.
There is tremendous value in having the Team involved in Story Mapping and, as a result, immersed in and knowledgeable about the problem at hand.
Hackathons are a great way to keep a Team motivated.
Allow the engineers to explore; you will keep them engaged and motivated.
 
Mentioned in this Episode:
Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution: A Handbook for Entrepreneurs, by Uri Levine
Inspired: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love (Silicon Valley Product Group), by Marty Cagan
 
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This week, Dan Neumann and Justin Thatil are joined by Mike Guiler to continue the conversation that started in the last episode, where it was discussed how organizations can support their Managers. This time, they explore how Managers can help their Teams to shift to a more Agile approach.
 
In today’s episode, Mike, Justin, and Dan dive deep into the reasons managers must be prepared to accompany their people in changing to Agile, sharing information, and asking the right questions to ensure the Team’s involvement.
 
Key Takeaways
When an Organization is shifting it is crucial to know what was the Perceived Value Proposition made by the Manager.
A Manager as a Leader wants his Team to be informed and involved in the upcoming changes.
A Manager must trust and value his Team’s opinions.
A Manager must be willing to share information as well as show curiosity about his Team’s points of view about the Organization and its objectives.
A Manager needs to support and empower Teams.
In the Agile Method, words matter. There is significance in the different frameworks and mindset that come with Agile.
A Manager needs to invest in creating amazing relationships with both the business and the technology sides of the organization.
A Manager fosters communication and connectivity among all levels of the organization.
Clarifying the roles, responsibilities, and what it means to be successful is a crucial part of a Manager’s obligations.
“Leadership is communicating people their worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves.” — Captain David Marquet
A leader helps their Team to upscale, so they are not stuck with the tools they already have to rapidly create value, which needs new tools, mindset, and engineering approaches.
 
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This week, Dan Neumann and Justin Thatil are joined by Mike Guiler to explore how organizations can better support their managers. In this episode, they discuss two adoption patterns, the grassroots and the top-down approach, and the distinction between being a Manager and a Leader.
 
Key Takeaways
The grassroots adoption pattern and the top-down approach in an Agile Organization:
Grassroots starts at a Team level.
The top-down approach begins with the boss.
If an Agile Team is self-managing: What does a Manager do?
A Manager must decide whether he wants to be just a Manager or a Leader because these are different roles. Leaders set clear objectives; they are not so focused on the daily chores but on the higher business-valued conversations. A Leader cares about how to build the environment.
A Manager needs to work his way to becoming a Leader and less about assigning tasks to Team members. A leader’s work should come from a mentorship place, sharing his knowledge and experience for the Team to explore (instead of being told what to do).
An Organization can support a Manager embracing Leadership and becoming a servant leader.
A Leader evaluates options and consults them with the Team; a leader does not impose practices. Communication is more valuable than processes and tools.
The organization must have a plan in mind but check first how the Team responds.
A Leader’s job is to establish the vision, shifting away from the “how.”
While the Team is busy executing the hypothesis, the Leader is thinking about the next step.
The Alignment of OKRs is vital for an Organization.
Ensuring that OKRs match the plans for the product and what the business wants to achieve is fundamental for companies. This way, everyone knows what’s most important.
How role descriptions are set up (performance reviews, salary adjustments) can influence the leader’s job.
 
Mentioned in this Episode:
Who Moved My Cheese?, by Spencer Johnson
What Got You Here Won’t Get You There, by Marshall Goldsmith and Mark Reiter
Team of Teams, by General Stanley McChrystal
 
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This week, Dan Neumann is joined by an external guest: Seth Maust, President and Founder of Five Star Life, an organization that aims to change perceptions of education, sports, and culture. Seth began 20 years ago researching why so many children were dropping out of school because they did not value education and ultimately did not value themselves. Five Star Life focuses on dismantling this root issue by ingraining a different curriculum they created that guides students in developing successful mindsets.
 
Key Takeaways
Five Star Life focuses on attacking the root cause of student dropout.
Children are not motivated to continue their studies because they don’t believe in the current education system.
A good education teaches students how to think (not what to think).
A successful life begins with the right mindset.
Create new habits.
It is a 28-week investment.
The Five Star Life system teaches students to think critically.
The application of the learned knowledge is fundamental.
Students learn to handle conflict the right way.
Choose your hard! Ignoring conflict is hard, and confronting conflict is too.
Motivation is the result of vision.
What is the first step that you can take to achieve your goal?
Focus on taking small, incremental steps.
An excellent way to start is to make an image of what you want to achieve and pin it somewhere you can see it daily.
First, you must create a vision and then goals, but most of all, you must truly believe it will happen. When you attach emotion to an image, belief is born.
Everything you are now is the result of subconscious programming.
Unless you consciously choose to keep developing, you will remain what you are and you will repeat the same cycles.
 
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This week, your host, Justin Thatil, is joined by three of his colleagues, Mike Guiler, Jim Beale, and Mariano Oliveti.


In this episode, they explore the topic of accountability in Agile Teams and organizations. These four Agilists share their insights and experience on the role of accountability while explaining the value of tools such as OKRs and KPIs and the influence of a true leader in encouraging Teams by involving them in the whole process, trusting them, and enabling them to be self-directed and reliant.
 
Key Takeaways
Why is accountability so important? How do we keep accountability in an organization?
Accountability is needed to identify who will be in charge of each task.
Accountability should start at the top but needs to be emphasized at all levels of the organization.
OKR (Objectives and key results) is a goal-setting framework that assists in keeping the Team accountable and provides a way to measure the outcomes.
KPIs are key performance indicators that also contribute to keeping accountability. KPIs measure a team's performance to ensure they are on track to meet their project objectives.
Leaders encourage accountability in Teams.
If a leader is willing to engage with a Team, he will share goals with them and the journey to achieve them.
Leaders need to value the involvement of every member and encourage self-driven work.
Keeping people informed of the “why” motivates them, while the “what” will only give them tasks.
A good leader holds his Team accountable and empowers them to make decisions. Overall, a leader trusts his Team.
 
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This week, Dan Neumann and Justin Thatil are joined by Mariano Oliveti and Erica Menendez to discuss DevOps, mainly how it contributes to creating safety and providing feedback during an Agile product journey.
 
In this episode, they share their knowledge about how DevOps eases the work and ensures value delivery. Listen to this conversation among Agilists for actionable suggestions and amazing real-life examples of Agile Teams benefiting from DevOps.
 
Key Takeaways
The problems DevOps can help to solve:
DevOps can help solve inefficiencies such as the ones resulting from introducing a lot of bugs into the code or when there is a lack of Team Collaboration.
DevOps helps to break down the silos.
DevOps is a real time saver.
Opportunities that DevOps gives:
DevOps provides the opportunity for automation, testing early, and keeping a repeatable and reliable process that will work.
DevOps ensures that, at the end of the day, the result is a product that was built in an efficient way.
Employees working with DevOps are generally happier and more satisfied with their work, especially when automation makes their tasks easier to achieve and grants them the time to invest in the things that really matter.
Applying DevOps infrastructure allows us to scale in a repeatable manner.
DevOps is also a way to find what is wrong even before the customer does.
Starting with DevOps is free.
Begin with what you have and grow from there. Big changes are rough!
The more you work with DevOps, the better you will get at it.
 
Mentioned in this Episode:
ACF Coaching Certification
 
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