The cure is worse than the disease:Systems Thinking

Recently I read this news about the Indian Govt waiving loan as the farmers couldn't pay. I thought aloud in my mind, what a disastrous decision by the government!

This is not the first time I have read such a piece of news. A couple of years ago, there was big news about farmers committing suicide as they couldn't pay the loan, so, the government went ahead and waived their loan. 

If the government keeps waiving loans like the one in the news, they are never going to solve the farmer's problem, even worse, they would push the farmers into more trouble in the years to come.

Do you want to understand why this is a problem ? There is a law in Systems thinking

The cure is worse than the disease

It means that many a times the cure that is applied is not only ineffective but leads to causing issues that are worse than the current problem. 

In the above case of waiving the farmer's loan, the short-sightedness of the govt leads to short term improvement but never looks at the root causes leading to farmers financial problems. 

Each time, the loan is waived, the farmers will go back, doing exactly what they were doing earlier, which in turn creates the same set of results/problems in the years to come. 

The government aids, waiver programs makes the system weaker leading to more dependency on the government.  The govt needs to do a root-cause analysis to identify the causes behind the financial problems at a system level before recommending any solution.

I am just worried that the waiver programs will harm more farmers and their families in the coming years, due to the stupidity of such short-sighted solutions.

A systems thinker need to look at the longer-term solution to empower the system, so that root causes are addressed rather than identifying short-term quick solutions. 

If you are keen to learn more about Systems Thinking and understand the laws, please register for my upcoming Certified LeSS Practitioner course. Details below:

Sydney: July 10th, 11th and 12th. Register here

Melbourne: Aug 21st, 22nd and 23rd. Register here

Fascinating LAST Conference 2017

Today I had the opportunity to speak at the LAST conference and what a fascinating event. I have been attending the LAST conference since it took birth several years ago in Melbourne, and each year it had made the impact on hundreds of Agilists across the city.

People like Craig Brown, Ed Wong, Peter lam are working with the agile community around to make it not only valuable but affordable as well.

LAST is also expanding to Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra. Check this link out for more details.

During today's session, I shared about the 5 relationships of the Product owner(PO), including the difference between clarification and prioritisation role of a PO.

Here is the picture that explains the 5 relationships. I have made this available under Creative Commons with Attribution.

If you are keen to deep dive into Large-Scale Scrum and learn more about the topics on scaling, feel free to register for my upcoming courses in the following cities:

Sydney: July 10th, 11th and 12th. Register here

Melbourne: Aug 21st, 22nd and 23rd. Register here

Please don't hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions.

3 days of CLP Fun and Learning: Thank you Sydney

Returned from Sydney last week after successfully completing the 3 days of Certified LeSS Practitioner(CLP) program. It is a privilege to lead, facilitate, share and learn while training highly experienced and committed individuals.

All the 3 days included a lot of open discussions, interactions and enabling the teams to apply Systems Thinking while descaling the complexities of the organisations.

Here are some selected pix:

Causal Loop Modelling

Mindmapping

A lot of learning

Discussions, interactions, exercises and challenges to solve

Do you want to be part of another fun filled learning as part of Certified LeSS Practitioner Course in Melbourne ?

Please register for the upcoming CLP Course: From principles to practices starting Aug 21st for 3 days. The link to register is here.

Feel free to reach out with any questions.

Learn the rules before bending it..

A couple of months ago and, during one of the meet ups, some one asked me why the organizations are still struggling to implement Scrum? This question made me think a bit, and of course, thousand answers went past my mind within 0.9 seconds. But one answer that stood out in my mind was Shu-ha-ri principle.

We all know Shu-ha-ri, so, I won't explain it here, but wanted to share my observations since the last few years before delving into the answer. 

Since the last few years, I have made it as a practice to ask 3 questions to audience (in meet ups, trainings, etc) 

Question 1: How many of you are implementing Scrum in your organisations ?

Typically all hands go up

Question 2: How many of you have read Scrum guide ?

Mostly, 5% of the hands go up

Question 3: How many of you are implementing Scrum as per the Scrum guide ?

Till date, it has been none.

So far, I might have done this poll with at least 300 people. Sometimes, I also probe, how are you doing Scrum? 

Answers would be something like, 

• We have an Iteration Manager(idea taken from XP)
• 2 product owners for the same product as one PO cannot handle (I call it Un-Scrum)
• We also have WIP limits(one idea picked up from Kanban - Un-Kanban)
• We do regular retrospectives and showcases(not sure who popularised showcases)
• Our team has Kaizen mentality(juicy Japanese term)

I am sure all of us would have seen a mix and match of ideas taken from Scrum, Kanban, XP, Lean, etc. being called "Scrum," which might look like Fred Carno's circus.

May be there is nothing wrong with mixing and matching as long as we know what is the outcome of mixing.

Now going back to Shu-ha-ri principle, it is recommended that we apply the rules as per the recommendations first, before bending(modifying) the rules. 

In the context of this post, if the teams are planning try Scrum, they need to follow the rules as per Scrum guide before bending the rules.

Unfortunately, teams start bending the rules first for various reasons even before learning the rules.  

As long as the teams and organizations continue doing the mishmash of ideas without even trying one of the ideas properly, we will be exactly where we are 20 years from now, probably with new jargons, new frameworks, more colorful post-its.

What has been your observation? Do you see what I see?

Causal Loop Modelling - Dos and Don'ts: Systems Thinking

People who are new to Causal Loop Modelling(CLDs) get carried away with this new tool and start using this everywhere like a kid getting excited with the new toy. 

In this whole process of excitement, they forget the intricate practices and ideas surrounding this tool, ending up losing the value. 

Guess what; this is part of the journey. While I was new to CLDs, I got excited and made several mistakes during the initial days. Luckily, I had some great mentors who corrected the mistakes and taught me how to catch myself in this whole process. 

Here are some of the lessons and based on my own experiences; some Dos and Don'ts to be aware while modeling.

First and the foremost mistake is to think CLD which will throw the solution at you. One needs to remember that CLDs are just modeling tools to represent the mental models of the system. At the end of the modeling solution, you won't have a solution to a problem. It is just your mental model.

Second, modeling alone. 

Third, the model is as useful as the thought process involved in it, which in turn depends on the agents involved impacting the leverage points of the system. 

Fourth, ability to step back and look from different views

Fifth, ability to separate what we are experiencing/seeing from the causal/effect relationships.

Sixth, my favorite, don't do CLDs when you are going through emotions :-) 

Seventh, saying my CLD is better than yours. Don't say that. As I said before, each CLD is not only context dependent but also depends on the mental models of the participants. There are no right or wrong models.

Eighth, trying to draw a perfect CLD and trying to figure out the right notation. 

Ninth, it could take months to understand some of the intricate details. One needs to practice consistently.

Here are some of the CLDs drawn by the participants from the previous courses. Remember this is the first time many of them have heard about CLDs but they did a great job with constant coaching.

How can I learn more about CLDs ?

During the 3 days Certified LeSS Practitioner(CLP) course, I cover extensively about CLDs and Systems Thinking. Participants will also get a chance to do hands-on exercises using CLDs.

Of course, one cannot expect to become an expert in a day. But with constant practice and guidance, you can do it.

Upcoming CLP in Melbourne is scheduled coming month, Aug 21st, 22nd and 23rd.

You can register for the course with this link.

Google's 20% Innovation time and culture of courage

I was listening to Eric Schmidt's podcast today, and he was sharing about various experiments Google took to bring the cultural change @scale.

When organisations are "small" like in a startup environment, it is easier to manage the culture as compared to large organisations. Successful organisations seem to give a lot of importance to consciously building the right culture.

While Google was expanding rapidly, the leadership saw the teams buckling under the pressure of software deliveries thus sacrificing experimental culture, in turn, the innovation. I am sure you all agree that it might be happening in many of your companies as you are reading this post.

You might have noticed that I have highlighted two words in the above paragraph: bucklingand innovation. Google's top leadership observed the developers "buckling" under pressure as a sign of a culture in which the teams don't have the courage to speak up.

Google wanted a culture where engineers can look into the eyes of their managers and speak courageously about the importance of experimentations and innovation. The introduction of 20% of innovation time seems to be one of the ideas that were tried to inculcate the courageous culture in the system to empower the engineers.

There are many lessons that we can learn from this story:

1. Successful organisations consciously manage the culture
2. 20% of innovation time was part of the hundreds of experiments Google tried and failed at it. It showed employees that it is ok to fail but important to persist and continue the experimentation
3. I know many companies copied the 20% innovation time idea when it was published and also, I don't think they never understood the context behind this idea.
4. Experimentation, empowering the teams and creating a fail safe environment seems to be some of the foundational ideas that Google's leadership encourages in their company. Question: How many leaders in your company have consciously brought such changes and encouraging the experimentation culture ?
5. Don't copy practices from other companies as they are context dependent.

Now let me the switch topic to a bit of selling mode as there are a lot of similarities in what Large-Scale Scrum(LeSS) recommends and most of the successful companies follow. The process of experimentation is highly encouraged in LeSS. In fact, LeSS is built on top of 600 experiments. Failing fast, learning fast and building a resilient systems is the core of LeSS.

I would be covering in-depth LeSS and its experimentation culture based on the empirical process control and Systems Thinking in my upcoming Certified LeSS Practitioner course in Melbourne from Aug 21st for 3 days. Please register for the course here and only a few seats left.

What is one important skill needed to be an effective Systems Thinker ?

Recently someone reached out to ask me specifically about Systems Modelling, and during the discussion, I asked, if he has heard of Systems Thinking? He mentioned that he has an excellent book on Systems Thinking. 

The answer reminded me of humor associated with Continuous Integration(CI). A programmer was asked about CI, and he said, they have Jenkins. The bottomline is, CI is not about Jenkins but a mindset.

Coming back to my original discussion about Systems Thinking, it is not about having a good book or having a lot of knowledge, but the ability to thinking in Systems. 

My observation has been that the essential skill needed to be an effective Systems Thinker is to be vulnerable. 

Being vulnerable to expose one's mental model to the world, and at the same time, the ability to accept the others. As long as one holds on to their mental models as facts rather than observations/perceptions, one will get chained in their mind unable to perceive the complexity involved in the System. 

Exposing the mental model is not easy. Depending on the context and the environment, people could ridicule, question your mental models. The bonus skill needed is, the ability to handle such situations and engaging in conversation refining your mental model to learn more about the System. 

If you are keen to learn more about Systems Thinking in the context of Product Development and its applicability, you can register for my upcoming LeSS course in Melbourne, scheduled next week. Here is the link to register for the course.

Things that are remarkable never meet spec

Recently came across the following notice on a notice board of a private tutor branch. Especially the point that I have underlined caught my attention.

It looks like the teachers here are rewarding the kids to complete the work keeping "accuracy" as the goal. There is nothing wrong with that, and parents love their kids if they can solve all the maths problems with no mistakes and get 100/100 in schools, colleges and A grades in universities.

However, what we all need to be concerned about is, the type of system/culture we are building for the future generation. We seem to be not encouraging the kids to learn from failures nor giving them a safe to fail environment. We are not telling them, it's ok to make mistakes. The teachers, parents are forcing them to be accurate and perfect.

These are the same kids, when they grow up will end up becoming managers in the large organisations, and start asking for "accurate" estimates(just like how the teachers in the above pictures are asking for pre-determined time and accurate goals), predictable plans, etc.

As I said before, there is nothing wrong in asking for someone to be perfect and asking for predictable plans. However, one needs to realise the consequences of the same on the system, which typically ends up sacrificing innovation and agility.

We are no more in the industrial era and, we don't need dollars, political power to topple large organisations. We just need someone with a good idea, a macbook, an airbnb bedroom and access to a wifi.

As we know, the creative ideas won't come up with a predefined plan. Organisations need to start embracing fuzziness and acknowledge the complexity surrounding us, empower employees to be resilient through decentralised co-ordination to enable agility and innovation.

Seth Godin in his book Linchpin says,

Art is never defect-free. Things that are remarkable never meet spec, because that would make them standardised, not worth talking about.

Before I end this post, let me ask you this, do you believe that the current reward based perfection focussed education system is laying a good foundation and, preparing future leaders to lead innovative organisations?

Upcoming Sydney LeSS Course: March 26th - 28th, 2018

Happy to announce my upcoming Certified LeSS Practitioner(CLP) course in Sydney starting from March 26th till 28th 2018.

The 3 days CLP is highly interactive session with in depth Q &As, discussions, including a lot of hands-on activities. Several highly informative videos and talks which are carefully selected from thousands are discussed during the 3 days of experiential learning.

Here is what participants say attending my courses:

• Great Delivery, Great Examples, Group chat worked excellent, Great Videos
• Great Informal Style, Boosting collaboration
• The open discussions and listening to others discussing their case studies was fantastic

Teams from large telecom, financial, insurance, defense, retail and members from the top management consultancy firms have attended the courses so far. Team members with various roles from programmers, PMs, Testers,BAs, Agile coaches to senior management have received immense benefits by attending this course.

You can enroll for the upcoming Sydney course through this link here

Here are some of the pictures from various courses and activities

People will deep dive into conversations on LeSS principles, which includes Queuing Theory, Systems Thinking, Lean Thinking, etc.

Here is the link to register for the upcoming course.

Feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions.

Note: Group discounts available in addition to hardship.

Next Certified LeSS Practitioner course in Melbourne: April 23rd - 25th,2018

Happy to announce the Melbourne Certified LeSS Practitioner(CLP) course. The dates are April 23rd - 25th, 2018.

It is highly experiential and 3 days of fun filled learning.

As @Rasoul Babhban, one of the participants from the earlier Melbourne course says, you will learn, release and unlearn a lot of things over 3 days. You will uncover the popular myths about product development and will get an in-depth understanding, learning how to apply the rules, principles of Large-Scale Scrum(LeSS) on product development environment.

How to find a mentor ?

I landed in London last night and would be spending the next five days meeting the other LeSS trainers, and attending the LeSS conference.

My good friend @Vijay Dafal, who is London learned about my trip, and we caught up for lunch today. We met after nearly ten years or so. We used to work at Valtech before.

We took a trip down memory lane for a while and how we are continuing our journey learning and practicing Agile. Both agreed that It was Craig Larman who made a lot of difference in our lives. 

After returning to my hotel, I pondered a bit about how I ended up having Craig as my mentor. Thought would jot down few thoughts about characteristics of a good mentor based on my personal experiences:

1. Learning in every interaction: Mentors will make you learn during every conversation. They will neither waste their time nor yours. If you are not learning from your mentor during each conversation, think twice. 
2. Challenge the status quo: They will make you uncomfortable by challenging your ideas and status quo. 
3. Mentees commitment: Mentor's effectiveness depends on mentees commitment as well. If you throw the towel as they make you uncomfortable, then the relationship won't work.  

I used to run mentoring programs in organisations, and my data shows that only one out of ten mentees are truly committed to completing the assignments and learning. In one of the instances, I had asked mentees to read some books, and one of them came back and said, it is silly to read books as they are not in uni anymore. 

Many believe that, once they start their careers in corporates, it is the end of the journey in learning/to read books. It is an unfortunate truth. 

4. They will give away everything they know: Mentors will not hide anything, and they don't feel insecure. If you feel your mentor is not willing to share the sources of their ideas then, your mentor has a long way to go. Don't follow them.

Ask your prospective mentor the origin of their ideas, and if they keep harping, it is their idea, and they are not willing to share the books/research, then change the mentor. If you feel, your mentor is insecure in sharing the origin of their ideas, then abandon them and run. 

5. Humble and respectful: Even though mentors will challenge your ideas and make you uncomfortable, deep down in their heart, they are kind, humble and respectful. 

Sometimes I see some master chefs program on TV. Some of these so called "Master chefs" are so arrogant and have seen them publicly humiliate the participants. I personally don't think they are the good mentors/role models. 

There is a thin line between being assertive, questioning status quo and being arrogant. I am sure you will feel the difference while dealing with the right mentor. 

6. Your life will be impacted drastically and positively over a period of several years.

Before I end this post, let me ask you this:

Who are your mentors?  Do you want to add anything else that I might have missed to this list?

If you have not registered for the LeSS conference London, you still have time. Register now

Here are my upcoming Certified LeSS Practitioner courses in Australia:

Sydney: March 26th - 28th. Register here

Melbourne: April 23rd - 25th. Register here

LeSS Trainers meetup - London

As we are getting ready for tomorrow's LeSS conference in London, LeSS trainers across the globe met the day before and had in-depth discussions on various topics related to LeSS.

This is my first LeSS trainer's meetup, and it is inspiring to see the wealth of knowledge and experience, trainers across the globe are bringing it to the table. 

I will be sharing a lot of new and exciting updates in the coming days.

I am looking forward to hearing experts share their LeSS implementation experiences from different parts of the world.