I’m excited to say that last week’s iteration went much better than the two previous. Like Dr. Arroway’s discovery, I’m finding things that I have been telling Agile teams for years are coming back to me in this little experiment. Despite Hurricane Florence killing our power for 27 hours on Saturday, I completed both of my personal goals.
Things that worked well: I decided to break the work into much smaller tasks, (which is very standard practice for most Agile teams), and that really helped give me a sense of progress. It also forced me to really think through the week ahead on how I would achieve my goals (again, that’s a prime reason Agile teams use that technique–visualize what needs to be done, and start knocking them down). Having my “board right beside me at my desk at work (right below my actual work kanban board) kept my promises to myself right there in my face.
Things that tripped me up: One thing that didn’t work was my problem statement for the one story about coming up with a technique to cuss less.
“As a nice guy, I want to develop a technique that will keep me from cussing less in mixed company so that I don’t lose credibility and also keep my listeners engaged.”
It turns out that 1) I don’t cuss nearly as much as I think I do (at least not out loud), and 2) I mainly cuss to lighten the %&#@ing mood or to accentuate how ridiculous it looks. Still, as it was, I went through all of my acceptance criteria; I’ve come to accept that I am not Mr. Rogers. (that was hard), and now, I feel like I have my cussing under control. Nailed It.%&#@ Yeah!
So this week’s item is to focus on my stretch goal from last Sprint:
“Write a brief summary of my coaching and Agile development history and how I got where I am today, so that I can articulate my professional development clearly and efficiently. ”
As reminder, here is my “board” which includes the backlog. I have a couple of items I’ll be adding tomorrow, and I may have to do a quick reprioritization, depending on how well i do with this week’s item and shift more towards fun and personal development (hint, I need more music in my life).
| Backlog | Doing | Done |
| Create outline for Agile Coaching book. | Write a brief summary of my coaching and Agile development history and how I got where I am today. Include key milestone years. | Develop realistic exercise program |
| Learn song on the banjo | reflect on insight gained from speaking with Agile CTC reviewer | |
| create outline for writing zombie novel | Develop technique to cuss less | |
| find and develop memory improvement process regimen |
