Product Agility
Ben Maynard
Less Method. More Meaning.The world of Product Discovery and Creation is becoming increasingly challenging due to mistakes and missed opportunities that are prevalent in agile teams, large-scale Scrum and all other agile frameworks. History has shown that when organisations try and scale their product development to more than one cross-functional team, mistakes are made that cut short many chances of getting all possible benefits.The route of this for many is the need for more attention paid to the incredible advancements in Product Management driven by hordes of professional Product People who prove that making their customers happier is not a pipe dream but a hard and fast reality.This podcast exists to explore all topics related to Product and Agility and Coaching. How do you marry the agile principles with Product discovery?Is it really possible to have hundreds of cross-functional teams (or Product Teams) all working from an effectively prioritised single Product Backlog and a dedicated Product Owner?How can you embrace continuous improvement and empirical process control for your product, people and processes?Ever wondered how to overcome the problems people face when trying to scale the Product Owner role and how it relates to Product Management and Product Teams?Baffled by how to define a product in such a way that enables Feature Teams (aka Product Teams) and why doing wrong means you will only ever be stuck with technical teams? Scrum Teams are not compatible with modern product management techniques.Want to know what Product Focus means and how the right focus makes creating a shippable product less painful?Need to get your head around how to blend modern product management techniques with Sprint Planning and Sprint Reviews to achieve Product Increments that cover the entire product?This podcast's original focus was on Scaling Scrum vs Single-Team Scrum and how organisations can reap the benefits of Scrum when working on a larger product but still keeping a single product backlog. We found many Product People liked what we said, and then the penny dropped. This isn't a podcast about scaling Scrum or the limitations of single-team Scrum.This podcast is for Product People & agile advocates who coach or get their hands dirty with Product creation.We promise there is no Taboo topic that we will not explore on your behalf. We aim to transcend the conversations about a single team, Daily Scrums, Scrum Masters and the double-diamond and bring everyone together into responsible teams dedicated to working on the entire product to make their customers happier and their lives more fulfilling.Come and join us on our improvement towards perfection, and give us your feedback (we have a strong customer focus, too), and who knows, perhaps we will discover the magic wand that we can wave over all the broken agile and sudo-products to create a more resilient and adaptable future by bringing the worlds of Product, Agility and coaching together.This podcast has the conversations and insights you need.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Feb 9, 2023 • 24min
Cracking the Code of Remote & Multi-Learning: Evgeniy Labunskiy & Denis Salnikov of Panda Docs
Send us a textEvgeniy and Denis are both Heads of Agile Practice at PandaDoc. They joined Ben to share their top tips for making remote working and learning really work.What themes did we explore?The cost of remote working vs co-locationEffective, remote, Feature teamsHow a teams geographic location can affect the part of the product they work onHere are some of the highlights00:01:24 - PandaDoc moved from complete co-location to complete remote working. What were the challenges and the journey00:04:02 - What does "Multi-learning" mean in an agile environment?00:06:06 - How has this agile power couple at PandaDocs bridged the remote working gap to make multi-learning easier00:08:39 - What is the increased cost of collaboration and conversation when working remotely?00:09:54 - The reason why working remotely can work? When we see our solo task as valuable more than teamwork00:11:32 - The secret sauce to make remote work00:13:14 - Tips for successful Feature Team Self-Design Workshops00:14:44 - What is more critical in Feature Team Self-Design? Technical or Business domain knowledge?00:15:40 - Are PandaDoc Feature Teams happier working remotely?00:17:30 - What does Evengiy believe is an effective strategy for remote teamwork? 00:19:26 - Should your teams' geographic location influence the areas of the product they work on?Guest BiosDenis Salnikov is a certified Scrum Master, Kanban Coach & Agile Coach who has been consulting, coaching, mentoring, and teaching cross-functional development teams, management, and organisations since 2014.https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsalnikov23/Evgeniy Labunski has over a decade of experience in Agile within Product Development, Enterprise & Startups. He is a strategic thinker, a skilled resolver of conflict and lives and breaths flexibility and adaptability.https://www.linkedin.com/in/labunskiy/Host Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Feb 2, 2023 • 35min
PandaDocs Agile Power Duo On Features and 5x Growth: Evgeniy Labunskiy & Denis Salnikov
Send us a textEvgeniy and Denis are both Heads of Agile Practice at PandaDoc. They joined Ben to share trials faced during the Global pandemic and when growing to five times their original size (whilst still getting their product to market). They also share how they started with Large Scale Scrum, LeSS, to achieve their dreams of Feature Teams.The big questions for me wereWhy did they embrace Feature teams (teams who can deliver all features end-to-end)? How do they get the whole organisation behind the idea of a whole organisational change? What problems have they encountered, and what are they doing now to overcome them?Here are some of the highlights00:04:05 - Who or What is Panda Doc?00:05:22 - What was the starting point for the journey of the Large Scale Scrum (LeSS) & Feature Teams? 00:10:32 - Did they choose LeSS & Feature Teams, or did they choose them?00:12:14 - Starting a LeSS Adoption with or without formal LeSS Training?00:14:13 - The negative side effect of not getting Certified LeSS Training for their adoption00:15:21 - How growth dilutes an organisation's purpose when using Feature Teams00:18:22 - Then Denis joined...00:22:16 - Top-Down and Bottom-Up Adoption00:23:49 - How 5 x Growth can affect an outstanding engineering culture00:27:00 - What effect did the Covid Pandemic & the war in Ukraine have on PandaDocGuest BiosDenis Salnikov is a certified Scrum Master, Kanban Coach & Agile Coach who has been consulting, coaching, mentoring, and teaching cross-functional development teams, management, and organisations since 2014. https://www.linkedin.com/in/dsalnikov23/Evgeniy Labunski has over a decade of experience in Agile within Product Development, Enterprise & Startups. He is a strategic thinker, a skilled resolver of conflict and lives and breaths flexibility and adaptability.https://www.linkedin.com/in/labunskiy/Host Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Jan 26, 2023 • 38min
What the f*?! Is Flight Levels (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)
In this engaging discussion, Cliff Hazell, an ex-Spotify employee and co-founder of Flight Levels Academy, dives into the essence of organizational agility. He shares the remarkable metaphor of a typewriter to illustrate why organizations often falter. The conversation tackles the legitimacy of a singular approach to agility and explores the relationship between teams and leadership. Cliff also discusses the adaptability of Flight Levels in forming partnerships with other frameworks and the impact of Gemba Sprints on real-world team insights. Tune in for some sharp insights!
Jan 19, 2023 • 28min
The Power of Quitting & Org Change Pitfalls (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)
Send us a textCliff Hazell, ex-Spotify and Co-Founder of Flight Levels with Kalus Leopold is an expert on organisational change, systems, agile and Kanban. In this practical and somewhat philosophical episode, Cliff and I explore some meaty topics that Agile Coaches, Product People, Scrum Masters, damned pretty much anyone with interest in organisational change will love.This is the second of 3 episodes that Cliff and I recorded on various topics.In this one, we speak about Organisational change pitfalls Agile Coaches and other change agents can avoid. The power of quitting in a Product environment (as well as in our personal lives). Putting the parts back together rather than being reductionist (through critiquing the words holistic and systemic and a whole lot more (see below).Should you want to skip to a specific point, this is probably useful (if chapters are not your thing)02:28 - How Cliff tuned into his biases03:24 - Diversity and Bias training challenges05:34 - Cultural norming06:25 - Ben overshares (probably)08:41 - Why it's hard for some when moving from Project to Product delivery09:23 - What were Cliff's experiences of individual change at Spotify11:03 - How a 4 x 4 matrix can help explain change resistance15:00 - Being courageously curious with the Left-Hand column technique17:24 - Why doe's being rational and applying reasoning not work when you want it to18:19 - How to create an appropriate course of action to tackle an organisational problem 19:46 - Why you should read Humble Enquiry and judge people on their intentions21:43 - Tips to avoid failure with organisational restructuresAnd all this!🧔🏻SA to Sweden was a cultural change that affected cliff, it led to people thinking his behaviour was abnormal.🧔🏻He found his understanding of the world to be incomplete as it was only through his lens🧔🏻What are some of the challenges Cliff has found with bias training? 🧔🏻Doe's just knowing our biases mean we can overcome them?🧔🏻What is the link between lions and whether we believe someone could be a great leader or software developer🧔🏻Cultural norming, how does this make individual adaptation hard?🧔🏻Can we say that biases or alwaysHost Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Jan 12, 2023 • 31min
The Problems with Top-Down and Bottom-Up Change (with Cliff Hazell, Ex Spotify and Co-Creator of Flight Levels)
Send us a textCliff Hazell, ex-Spotify and Co-Founder of Flight Levels with Klaus Leopold is an expert on organisational change, systems, agile and Kanban. In this practical and somewhat philosophical episode, Cliff and I explore some meaty topics that Agile Coaches, Product People, Scrum Masters, damned pretty much anyone with an interest in organisational change will love.This is the first of 3 episodes that Cliff and I recorded on various topics.In this one, we speak about Organisational change pitfalls Agile Coaches and other change agents can avoid. The power of quitting in a Product environment (as well as in our personal lives). Putting the parts back together rather than being reductionist (through critiquing the words holistic and systemic and a whole lot more (see below).Should you want to skip to a specific point, this is probably useful (if chapters are not your thing)02:15 - How did Ben become aware of Cliff and his work?03:03 - Who is Cliff Hazell? In his own words06:37 - Is the "Top Down and Bottom" metaphor useful when attempting organisational change?09:20 - The problems with the terms "systemic" and "holistic."11:39 - what is the big challenge when embarking on organisational change?13:48 - What is it that Cliff finds both frustrating and amusing?15:16 - The secret to Cliff's success17:32 - what are the two pitfalls when trying to be outcome focussed21:03 - What was the thing Cliff should have quit rather than carried on24:06 - When an organisation should quit talking about focus27:14 - why is it Naive to think that just training will change an organisational system?28:42 - Episode recapUseful StuffSunk cost fallacy the phenomenon whereby a person is reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial.Annie Duke - Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away Host Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Dec 9, 2022 • 5min
Festive Fun! - Find Out About our Christmas Break and Plans for 2023
Send us a textAs this year comes to an end, I thought it would be the perfect time to take a short hiatus on the podcast! In order to prepare for all of the new amazing things that are coming in January. Thank you to all of the LeSS Listeners, we hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a great New Year! Listen out for us in 2023! Host Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Dec 1, 2022 • 30min
The Dynamics of High Performance Teams With Ari Tikka
Send us a textAri has woven his thoughts on group dynamics by consolidating 70 years of research into something he believes are the team dynamics fundamentals that everyone Scrum Master should know how to leverage to help teams reach high performance WHO IS ARI?Ari provides coaching, training, and consultation for Agile Teams, Product Owners, Adoption Leaders, and executives. He has worked in the software business since 1990, including seven years of developing fault-tolerant embedded real-time systems.✨This research was done in som elunlikley contexts, you will be amazed what we in the Product Agility world can learn from coal miners.✨Were Coal miners the first Feature Teams?✨What is the "third" relationship that we can find in a team that is not between each individual but between the individuals and something else✨how can understanding thie extra entity help us to create teams whose performance sets them apart from the crowd?✨What can we develop in ourselves that enables us to be aware of this and manage the power it holds over us and others?✨We learn the first necessary step in team forming, that if missed could caause performacne improvement inertia✨What is the role of the "situational leader" and how teams thrive because of it✨✨And how this situational leadership can then lead the team to an untimely death✨How can you tell if your team is in its Teenage years?✨How the teams "internal questions" are the key to the next stages of team development✨How long does it take for teams to reach distinguiable levels of performance✨Why "Dreaming" is better than "Norming"✨How can we turn this advice to communiities?✨Team resiliacny, does it mean being hard so nothing effects your or soft so that they can dented and recover, becoming something newUSEFUL LINKSThe images Ari was showing during the episode (Team Life Cycle) - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1D_GnHqZtnp1RsSnl0PBb8aQZcsYP2JZ-?usp=sharingTeamwork and Rewarding, a blog post by Ari - https://gosei.fi/blog/teamwork-and-rewarding/More info on Ari's approach - https://gosei.fi/teHost Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
9 snips
Nov 24, 2022 • 24min
Enabling High Performing Teams With Ari Tikka
Ari Tikka, an agile coaching expert with over three decades in the software industry, dives into the often-taboo topic of team performance. He discusses how introducing new vocabulary can transform team dialogue and enhance performance. Ari reveals what types of work hinder progress and the essential conditions for enabling great team outcomes. Surprisingly, he emphasizes that coaching plays a mere 10% role in performance, while the remaining 90% is influenced by team dynamics and organizational design.
Nov 17, 2022 • 31min
What is Team Magic? - Ari Tikka
Send us a textAri Tikka - https://www.linkedin.com/in/aritikka/ has a magic wand for team performance, just what this wand was took me by surprise. Not because its actually magic but because it stands a pretty good chance of working because 1) its not actually magic 2) its based upon research 3) Ari has a rather special approach.WHO IS ARI?Ari provides coaching, training, and consultation for Agile Teams, Product Owners, Adoption Leaders, and executives. He has worked in the software business since 1990, including seven years of developing fault-tolerant embedded real-time systems.WHAT IS IN THE EPISODE?In this episode, Ari makes the case that, to achieve a great systemic, organisational performance a Team, regardless of size, is required. Focusing on 7+/-2 won't get us to where amazing performances are staged, so we spoke about🍄What is performance in a team context? 🍄Everyone knows there are two types of magic Harry Potter style (real) and Dynamo - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamo_(magician) (not real). Which is Ari's?!🍄What are group dynamics?🍄What does Ari recommend when you get to more than around eight teams? 🍄What type of Teamwork and collaboration mode has Ari seen between Product Owners🍄The problems with people who have never really experienced great teamwork leading and managing teams 🍄In small-scale software development, how does Ari see leadership being enacted? 🍄How the performance of the "smartest person" has held back our thinking on Teams 🍄 Why is it that in some organisations, the "aggressive whippers" (aka Project Managers who focus on Jira ticket management) get promoted?🍄 Ben's complete ignorance as to what Zen meditation is was exposed (Ben: "turns out its inverse floating") 🍄Is a Requirement Area - https://less.works/less/less-huge/requirement-areas in If the enablers for Teamwork are the same for communities, so what are Ari's tips for getting a community working well? USEFUL LINKSRichard HackHost Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
Nov 10, 2022 • 9min
James Mayes - Dealing with The Product Mentor Shortage: Product Elevation Talk in Ten
Send us a textJames Mayers is the Cofounder & former CEO, Mind the Product. I grabbed James for 10 minutes at the Product Elevation 2022 conference in Dublin to get his talk in Ten.Now his talk wasn't titles the "Product Mentor" shortage, but I needed something pithy to put on the thumbnail and it seemed relevant to our conversation. Here is the offical title and synopsis for his talkHow to build the best support for you AND your teamProduct mentors are in short supply, leadership mentors even more so - and real experts are always time poor. This lightning session will run through tips, tactics and hacks to help you build the support networks you needWhat James has to say on mentoring in the Product world was fascinating, thought provoking and practically useful.These descriptions are short, mostly because I am sat in the conference venue trying to keep the cycle time per episode nice and short :-)Useful LinksJame's slides from Product Elevation -https://www.slideshare.net/JamesMayes/building-support-for-product-peopleLinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmayes/Twitter – https://twitter.com/James_MayesHost Bio Ben is a seasoned expert in product agility coaching, unleashing the potential of people and products. With over a decade of experience, his focus now is product-led growth & agility in organisations of all sizes. Stay up-to-date with us on our social media📱! Ben Maynard 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/in/benmaynard-sheev/ 🐦 https://x.com/BenWMaynard 💻 https://sheev.co.uk/ Product Agility Podcast 🔗 https://www.linkedin.com/company/productagilitypod/ 💻 https://productagilitypod.co.uk/ 🖇️ https://linktr.ee/productagility Listen & Share On Spotify & iTunes Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/0lkwAYJzVSuk5zfJ1vIDZq?si=4c691fb12f124a56 iTunes - https://apple.co/3YvTX8p Want to come on the podcast? Want to be a guest or have a guest request? Let us know here https://bit.ly/49osN80
