J. T. Pedersen

Is It Agile or Software Anthropology?

JT — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:50:18 +0000

Monday night I had the opportunity to attend an Agile Groupies meeting. It’s a semi-regular gathering of folks (developers, business analysts, product managers, etc.) interested in a specific approach, Agile, toward software development.

For those of you not familiar, Agile development focuses on smaller development teams, working on smaller deliverables, in highly iterative, somewhat less structured approach. Part of the thinking is that if you are delivering in smaller, more discrete ‘chunks’ of working product, that the overall process will be more ‘agile,’ more adaptive to ongoing change during a product’s overall life cycle. The idea is to move away from ‘heavy’ less flexible disciplines, and back toward lighter, freer, approaches.For this meeting, the discussion focused around panelists discussing how Business Analysts work with the development team. At a very high level, a Business Analysts (BA) represents customer needs, and formally crafts the requirement documents (we need the product to accept X as input, look like Y, and output Z).

The discussions were interesting. The challenges varied by size of the organization represented, including how well BA inputs truly communicated what needed to be done, as well as where Agile methods frequently had been seen to fail.

What I’ve found is that Agile development meetings tend to migrate into a discussion of how organizations communicate internally. This meeting was no exception. Key issues were quality of BA deliverables; Development’s keeping track of dependencies; mapping work against planned deliverables—either within a team or when working with other teams; and, anticipating or working around structural ‘platform’ issues.

The recurring theme though was—how individuals and teams communicate—in order to overcome their difficulties. The examples are really not significantly different than with any other software development team. The quality and completeness of BA deliverables (including acceptance specifics), development estimation and progress tracking, and including such things as user acceptance testing (or lack thereof), are the same regardless of the specific discipline(s) used within a software organization.

The key to success is clear: Smooth, rapid, delivery of a product demands effective, clear, and complete communication between all involved parties. It is better to risk over-communicating than the alternative. And, only through frequent communication can teams hope to adapt to change (they need to know about it).

Maybe we should call these Software Anthropology meetings.

(image credit: Artiom (Artem) Chernyshevych)

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Kodak’s Zi8 – Initial Experiences

JT — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 21:27:13 +0000

Today’s a quick post sharing some of my first impressions after having picked up a new Kodak Zi8 camcorder. A number of you are in marketing, use Flip cameras already, or are just considering one of these new devices.

Chris Brogan, over at www.chrisbrogan.com, was one of the first folks to create any sort of ‘spark’ for me with this new class of device. Sure, by now we’ve probably all been to events with Flip cams.

They’re neat, cool, but the ‘value’ wasn’t quite there. Part of that I attribute to having a ‘good’ digital tape camcorder and being put off by the overall process hassles (record an hour, take an hour to download, then process, then encode, then…). Odds are, if you’re not a video aficionado you’ve had the same dying desire to repeat the experience. Not.

It wasn’t until I started paying attention to Chris’ vlogs and some of his various experiences (Flip, Zx1, Zx6…) that I really appreciated their value.

My initial start was a tad slow. To be honest, knowing small format cameras are subject to jitteriness, I had hoped for more from the embedded image stabilization software. Direct play back of handheld video using the supplied HDMI cable to my flat screen HDTV, didn’t impress me. But, I’ve evolved since then. In part, I’ve found new ways to hold the camera to help reduce jitteriness; it’s still a small camera though.

The next epiphany was getting the current version of Pinnacle Studio software. I tried making videos with some free offerings, and the free offerings are pretty incredible…but they still left me wanting. So, I picked up PS 14. Let’s just say, it makes making video—and posting to YouTube—the closest thing to a breeze you’ll experience today.

Here are two thoughts for you. One, it might not rival the quality a ‘formal’ camcorder can offer…it’s not expected to. (Though, use a small tripod and you’ll be hard-pressed to tell the difference.) If your ‘nice’ camera’s to big a pain to use, and you never have it with you, it doesn’t matter how nice it is. Second,

I’ve done more, had more fun with this camera in the past week alone (puppy vids, school concerts) than I have in the last decade with my ‘nice’ video camera.

Okay, so here’re some quick observations, then I’ll let you view my first short YouTube video afterward.

They’re frequently out of stock. Ready to buy one, I checked (2) BestBuys, Amazon, Crutchfield.com, and others—no one—had one in stock. I had to stop back after being told when the next truck would show up. All the other camcorder (e.g. Flip) had 3-4 or more in stock. Just no Zi8s. So, what’s that tell you?
Really like the SD memory expansion ability. I put a 32GB card (good for something like 6 hrs video) in it.
Get a spare battery; you’ll need it. Last’s for an hour and takes as long to recharge. So you’ll definitely want a spare.
Fits in my shirt pocket.
Comes with basic video editing software in the camera. Plug in to a (PC) USB port, it’ll automatically offer to install it (or launch it). So, you’ve always got ‘something’ with you to manipulate your videos.
Creates files in .MOV format. Found with the free tools, sometimes it took two software packages to achieve what I wanted. With the Pinnacle Studio solution, it’s one-stop shop.
The more you use it, the more you’ll like it, the more you’ll use it…the sooner a big new hard drive is on your shopping list.

Ok, so not really a ‘short’ post, but if you’re in the market for this camera, and the various features it has, you won’t be disappointed.

I put together this quick little video as a sort of primer, something useful for folks (looking for this breed dog), while learning how the whole production process works.

Let me know what you think. Its early, plenty to learn expected.

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Don’t Break Your Own Pricing

JT — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 18:30:35 +0000

Came across an interesting HBR post by Anthony Tjan today, “The Pros and Cons of Bundled Pricing.” If you don’t have time to read it, Tjan discusses the respective benefits for customers and vendors, depending on which side of the fence the reader is on.

Personally, I enjoyed reading the post having sat on both sides of the fence as purchaser and provider of services, sometimes at the same time. It is a difficult dichotomy to balance especially if you are trying to negotiate for win-win relationships.

One thing I learned early on in my career is (when providing a ‘solution’) to

avoid breaking your solution pricing apart. I’ll just touch on two basic reasons today. One, is that the customer may have internally pre-defined rates they’re allowed to pay for services. Example, if you itemize having a senior developer assigned to the project and they deduce you’re charging $150/hr, they may simply say, ‘…we only pay $135/hr for that skill set.’ Second, you may elect (need) to charge a bit more for one line item, in order to subsidize another. Transparency challenges your ability to do this.

In bundled solution offerings it is not uncommon for customers to discount the value of services received because they are bundled. This leads to future problems when negotiating new contracts. To help mitigate the perceived loss of value, I have had my teams issue zero-dollar ($0.00) invoices itemizing the services provided. This helps keep it fresh in the customer’s mind that there really was effort expended to meet their needs.

This is a topic we could spend a long time mulling, one I expect to revisit down the road. So, what are you own thoughts on how to price solutions or ‘bundled’ pricing? Do you think it’s possible for both parties to benefit at the same time?

(photo credit: Herman Brinkman)

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One Trait for Effective Leaders

JT — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 22:59:31 +0000

I’ve been interviewing business leaders in preparation for my presentation at next month’s It’s a Duesy II Manufacturing Revival. I won’t give away too much before the March 17th event, but there are a few common topics that have come up.

One topic, Flexibility, was mentioned, unsolicited, in each interview. Their respective domains included Manufacturing, Finance, and Human Resources. As you may expect each brought the topic up in a different context.

From a manufacturing perspective, there is a need to be flexible in how companies are organized. Many manufacturing concerns use organizational models first developed in the post-World War II era. Companies like IBM, United Technology, Ford, GM, and the like, developed rigid, deep, hierarchical organizations. As a result, their ability to change to meet current needs was all-but beyond their grasp. Not until experiencing near-death experiences, such as with the Domestic 3, were they finally desperate enough to change.

From a human resources perspective, the need to be flexible is in contrast to more natural human instincts. Consider the December 2009, HBR article, To Be a Better Leader, Give Up Authority. The general notion here is, “…companies reliant on knowledge and innovation should abandon the traditional structure in which decision rights are reserved for people at the top.”

It is important to relax the natural tendency to tighten up, become more controlling, in times of stress. To show how much this is ingrained in our nature, consider a motorcyclist in a moment of crisis. Riding into a corner too quickly, a less experienced rider may fear they can’t make the curve. Their natural instinct is to tighten their arms, stare straight-ahead, and run right off the road. With experience and training comes the correct response: keep one’s arms limp, avoid target fixation, and look where you want to go. In most cases, the machine’s ready for the challenge, but the software becomes squishy.

From the finance perspective, it was pointed out the most effective businesses, are those with flexible leaders. These leaders always have a vision for their organizations, and they’re watching the ever-blowing winds of change. As the winds change, so do they, and their organizations remain successful and profitable.

Their messages were consistent. To be successful moving forward, leaders need to be flexible, to watch for environmental change, and avoid the desire to hunker down until economic winds blow over.

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Meetings, 4 Ways to Improve

JT — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 12:08:00 +0000

Meetings. They were romantic notions at some distant point in my past. Boy! I can’t wait until I’m important enough to attend meetings, to lead meetings. That’ll be the day! Ever have a similar thought yourself? Ever?

Then, somehow, reality found you, captured you, and enveloped you. Guess what? You’ve found yourself the victim of meetings. The silly things that seem like they’re designed to waste your precious time, ways of being ‘busy’ yet not accomplishing a darned thing. And, not even the least bit romantic.

Problem is, if you’re in the corporate world, I think a lot of this comes down to having had someone teach us, mentor us, on what a meeting should be like. Meetings are (or should be) important events. They’re invaluable for the face-to-face time we need, for getting a group of people to communicate in one time, in one place, what they’re thinking. What they’re agreeing to. At least that’s the notion.

In the vast majority of cases, meetings are ineffective because their time lines aren’t adhered to; they’re unstructured; and, the agenda’s unclear. Worse, action items are undocumented and easily sloughed off after the fact. Finally, most are just too long.

A few thoughts:

Keep meetings focused, have an agenda.
Schedule them for as long as you need. Just because your calendaring tool’s defaults to 60 minute increments, doesn’t mean your meeting needs to be.
Use oddball start times. Two reasons:
- One, people often remember them…because…they’re unusual times.
- More important, if someone’s been in a prior meeting of 60 or (ugh) 120 minutes, they’re going to need to refresh themselves. Be kind, be considerate, give them 10 or 15 minutes past the hour before coming to your meeting. They’re going to do it anyway, so why not save everyone the grief of incessantly late starts?
Be flexible. If you don’t need to meet this week, then don’t.

Colleagues know I’m not perfect in running my own meetings. There’s always room for improvement. But following even a couple of these ideas may well give you above average performance.

I’d love to hear a few of your own examples, case studies, and the like. Its a great topic and likely one we can all benefit from thinking about.

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Moving an Idea Through Product Development

JT — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 02:17:02 +0000

Ann Arbor SPARK hosts a monthly series, Starting Your Own New Business. The day-long seminar includes presenters on finance, accounting, marketing, product development, and other topics related to launching one’s own business. Below, is the high-level presentation delivered Friday, February 19, 2010.

This high-level presentation discusses what are perhaps the most key topics important for successfully moving the Idea for a product, through development, and ensuring it survives to reach fruition. The target audience is new entrepreneurs considering business for themselves.

Moving An Idea Through Product Development (2 05)

View more presentations from JT Pedersen.

Starting Your Own Business

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Dead Pecker’s Corner

JT — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 22:59:02 +0000

Leadership opportunities can be found in all kinds of places. Sometimes they pop up in the most unusual of circumstances and you adopt the role without even thinking about it.

Not too long ago, I led a group of motorcyclists on a ride. We started out in downtown Asheville, North Carolina. Traffic was heavy enough that even with GPS, safely and correctly leading the group through the lump of spaghetti masquerading as a series of closely clustered interchanges proved challenging.

15 minutes, and I’ve already had to make a half-dozen impromptu leadership decisions—each one with 5 friends mentally critiquing my every move.

So about 10am in the morning, we’re somewhere north of Asheville, as our small group begins to work its way westward. We’ve left the big city rush well behind us, we’ve unwound ourselves, and eventually roll into a small town that the crush of time seems to have left alone. It’s the sort of town where everything’s almost sleepy, peaceful, with that small town ‘clean’ about it.

The main intersection has a store of some sort on one corner, a gas station on the far right corner, and sidewalks, street, and parking lots seem to be one integral piece. No rudely intruding curbs. If it weren’t for the concrete sidewalk, you’d not be able to tell where the road ended and parking lots began. It’s the sort of town where everyone is mindful, polite, and big curbs aren’t needed for the sake of enforcing civil obedience.

It really had been an absolutely beautiful morning so far. The days at this year’s HSTA Sport Touring Association Rendezvous had quickly become routine: ride early, because by lunch time the energy in the clouds would build up, darken, and the second half of the day would have you riding through a very dense atmosphere…the sort of density you wear as opposed to just ride through.

So here we are, blue skies, some fluffy white clouds, and the heat of the day just starting to make itself known. We’ve all fueled up and rolled our rides off to the side, out of the way. Relaxing, standing in the hot sun, I note there’s this group of men sitting across the street, lining a stone wall, sitting under the only readily available shade to be had.

After a bit, keeping to ourselves by the bikes, it occurs to me: Why am I standing in the sun like this, I’ll just mind my business, and go sit down on that wall under the trees.

So it’s only about 30 feet from our bikes to the shade. As I meander over and start sitting down, one of the fellas starts trying to stop me from taking a seat. “Hey, you don’t want to sit here…” He’s the chap, fifth from the left in the picture.

Sometimes, you just need to take a risk.

So here I am, sitting a couple feet from the last guy in the line, and this friendly looking fellow stops in front of me. Leaning over, just loud enough for the others to hear, he says, “I tried to stop you from sitting here. You know what they call this don’t you?” Looking down the row to my right, I see this line of older guys all leaning past the one in front, looking at me. “No. What?”

They call it Dead Peckers’ Corner.

I just couldn’t contain myself. I burst out laughing. It only took a second, looking at these older guys, to see just what he meant. We introduced ourselves briefly; I sorely wish I could remember the chap’s name. These guys were all here, enjoying themselves, sitting, chatting, and enjoying the morning.

This chap, we’ll call him Bob, proceeds to tell me how the oldest among them is well through his 80s. Bob seems downright proud to let me know it’s the locals who’ve labeled the corner Dead Peckers’ Corner on their behalf. So there lays part of the story.

Now, see, it’s real comfortable in the shade…

I called across the street and invited another of our riding party to come on over. After all, it’s comfortable and cool, why stand in the sun? So, we’ve all been laughing, and he comes on over. Sure enough he takes a seat and up pops Bob, “I tried to stop your friend… You know what they call this here place now, don’t you?” “No, what?” A whole new round of laughter burst out welcoming the new member to the club.

One, by one, we encouraged all but one of the group to come join us. Each time, the cycle repeated itself. I figured if we all seemed to be having such a good time, I’d eventually get the entire group to come have a seat. Yep. Except for that one hold out, Hal.

So, here’s four of us, all sitting on a wall with silly smiles on our faces. “Hey, HAL, come on over!” Now, at this point, why he’s still standing all alone in the sun I’ll never know. Sure enough, with a hint of guardedness on his face, Hal comes on over…

It was a truly special moment for all of us. We got to enjoy a nice seat in the shade, join a respected local club, have a friendly joke at our own expense, and a great laugh. It wasn’t just me, I suspect there’s a reason I’ve had a few requests for the picture…

If it weren’t for being willing to take a risk, albeit a teensy-weensy one, along with the ability to convince others to follow, a great time that was…would have never been. Being a leader isn’t just about title and position. Most often, it’s about seeing an opportunity and being open to take advantage of it.

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Confirmation That I Kick Ass

JT — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 23:17:09 +0000

[Hey! They made me:)] I’m rather tickled actually. This week I received word that Alltop has added this blog (www.jtpedersen.net) to their Leadership section.

This is something of a big deal for me, personally. It shows you’re not alone in feeling there’s content here worth reading…adding value.

So, here’s my thanks to Alltop, to Guy Kawasaki & Team, for including www.jtpedersen.net in an increasingly important site.

Cheers!

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It’s a Duesy II-Manufacturing Revival Conference

JT — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 19:21:36 +0000

I’m pleased to let everyone know, March 17, I will be speaking at the It’s a Duesy II Manufacturing Revival Conference. You’re encouraged to come.

Dennis Jeffrey of Tekni Consulting is the event’s organizer. Heading into 2010, we begin to catch our breaths, having simply survived 2009.

Now, is the time for revival! But, not revival just as a dictionary would describe it. One definition is, ‘…restoration to use…’ We need not to simply revive, restore, or return to pre-‘09 conditions, we need to find ways to thrive, to strengthen ourselves and move forward positively. With this in mind, I was happy to accept Dennis’ invitation to speak.

My discussion is part of the event’s Management track, focusing on Change.

The world around us continues to evolve; nothing new there. But many organizations, even as they change what they look like, have largely stayed the same inside. Social, technical, global evolution has now come so far organizations simply have no choice but to finally begin changing who they are inside.

Register Now! Early Bird Pricing until February 15th! Price is only $89/ person, group rates available.

For those of you who have followed my blog, you understand that my focus is on providing thoughtful business leadership. Come listen as I discuss areas often neglected by leaders, allowed to fall by the wayside, which are increasingly important in today’s world—areas that need to change.

In preparation for this event, I am actively interviewing business leaders and soliciting input—including yours, dear reader. I encourage you to provide your input regarding how businesses need to change in order to thrive, moving forward. Feel free to Comment, or send me an email (results@jtpedersen.net).

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What I’ve Read Lately: Linchpin

JT — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:20:15 +0000

From my perspective, Seth has written perhaps his most impactful book yet. The Linchpin is a new category of person, one who engages their personal ‘art’ in what they do, who can see the course to take when a map doesn’t exist.

This book is a mix of looking at how we think; how we decide; how we got here; and, what is going to be needed to be successful moving forward.

To become a linchpin is to become indispensable.

Seth does a good job encouraging the reader to apply their ‘art’, that ‘extra something’ you enjoy doing, to become indispensable, to leader your organization forward–regardless of your position within it. Rather than simply be a cog in the boss’ machine, do more, be more, whether you reap direct reward (e.g. $$) or not.

Along the way, you might learn a few other things. One of which, led me to post, "Mid Life Crisis Explained.”

The world has changed. Permanently. We can struggle to maintain status quo, or, at least contemplate the options Seth presents.

Recommended.