Category: Failure

  • How Kanban visualisations and conversations enable process improvement

    After deciding to adopt a new process a key challenge is to actually start doing it. This is the story of how a team I’m working with decided to carry out code reviews as part of our process, and how our kanban board helped us. The kanban board helped us visualise this new step in our…

  • Conversations for double-loop mindset changes with Kanban

    You can watch the video of my talkfrom the Lean Software Systems Consortium (LSSC12) conference in Boston earlier this month. Visualising work is a key part of the Kanban Method. In many situations it can lead to people realising there are problems or opportunities for improvement, which can be successfully accomplished by simply changing behaviour…

  • The Art of Handling Elephants in the Room

    When we spot and elephant in the room, or an undiscussable topic that isn’t being addressed, it is tempting to tackle it head on.  However, just naming the elephant or telling people that they’re not discussing an undiscussable topic  is rarely a productive approach. Having spotted an elephant in the room it is tempting to shout…

  • Management Improvement Carnival #140

    I’m hosting this edition of Jon Hunter’s Curious Cat Management Improvement Carnival. It’s been published three times a month since 2006. Here’s my round-up of interesting management-related posts from the last month with a focus on the psychology of change and software development philosophies. Change Artist Challenge #7: Being Fully Absent by Gerald Weinberg For…

  • How could we mistake-proof our thinking?

    How could ideas from psychology, lean, systems thinking and behavioural economics help us design systems which are better able to detect and correct error, so that we could ‘mistake-proof’ our own (and others’) thinking? We know that it is common for humans to feel that they are right.  As Kathryn Schulz (@wrongologist!) says in her…