Keynote Agile Testing Days USA: Lean Can't Get You There - Effective Teams Can

Editor's Notes

• #3: Firstly, thank you Jose, Ina, and the rest of the Agile Testing Days team for giving me this opportunity. As part of that thanks, I have remembered to share the QR code for giving Session Feedback. At the speaker dinner the other night, Lisa Crispin and I figured out that the first time we met was at Agile 2007. [NEXT SLIDE]
• #4: I’ve spoken at other conferences since then, but I have to confess: this is my first keynote and I am Incredibly Anxious.
• #5: Everything began to make sense! Because of course we did ATDD and I paired with programmers to write the executable specifications! And then, we’d make sure the test failed and write just enough code to make it pass. As the only non-programmer, I still had a few hats to wear because analyst/tester/UX tend to blur a bit on a team of generalists, but it was sustainable and the software we built really worked. As part of a team, I went to my first conference, Agile 2007 in Washington, DC, and as a team we applied what we learned when we got back. I attended eXtreme Tuesday club in New York (it’s still going!) I gave my first big conference talk in 2008 at Agile Toronto. I had become certain that Agile was The True Way and that it was only a matter of time until it was Everywhere. I know. It’s adorable. The next year I moved to Philadelphia and started working as an Agile Project Manager. This should have been my first clue. The second clue was that management didn’t know why it should care if the team did Agile or not. But everything seemed good. The programmers used XP and a visual management system in a scrummish way... though the analysts were across the pond and releases took up to two weeks to test. We had dedicated testers who were interested in adding automated testing... though they had been having trouble with tooling and the effort never really seemed to get momentum. I even convinced my boss that if he let me give a talk at Agile 2009, I’d bring back a ton of amazing new tools and processes. And since my co-presenter was a Gordon Pask Award winner, I was certain that I could glean even more helpful knowledge to share. Our workshop was cutting edge - we demonstrated that you could build financially successful products without estimates 3 years before Woody Zuill inaugurated the #NoEstimates hashtag. I connected with thought leaders. I dutifully collected business cards, power point presentations, demos, DIY workshops, anything I could bring back to my team. I felt invigorated... I had found my people. I suspect that for some of you this is beginning to sound familiar. Can you guess what happened next? I arrived back to work on Monday, eager to show off all that I had learned, ready to Change Things Up! I organized a lunch and learn! Sure it took a couple days to find a time where everyone could get together, but I knew they’d be excited! The moment came. Who was in the room? A few colleagues who I regularly worked with. My boss had a meeting come up. So did his boss, the one who didn’t care how what he sold got built. I shared the findings from my workshop. I shared the contact information for the people making Selenium and Cucumber, and links to tutorials on how to use them. I shared Cumulative Flow Diagrams and cycle time diagrams. I shared every plugin trying to make Jira manageable! And their reaction? “Oh. That’s neat. Not really sure how that will work here though.” I was gutted. I didn’t know why no one listened to me, why no one else seemed to care about improving things. I didn’t understand why some team members seemed outright confrontational. My morale suffered. I felt utterly alone. This does not need to happen to you.
• #22: Now I’d like to say I’m brilliant, but the tools already exist. But like any good consultant, I have done the reading for you.
• #25: Good news: in most social-change campaigns it is not necessary to win over the other side. Often activists have the mistaken idea that they need to win everyone to their side (which invites despair) or that we need to change the industry or other people actively fighting against us (again inviting despair)
• #26: Your task is mobilisation. Of the people who are sympathetic, the ones who don’t know they need to care, those that are maybe even a tiny bit hostile no protective of the status quo. When organisers bring an optimistic attitude, instead of one of despair, it is a lot easier to get people on board.
• #40: You need a story. Perhaps you are not a great story teller. Perhaps someone else is.
• #42: Who is affected?
• #45: Were there important, interesting debates about where people are on the spectrum?
• #48: Can we show that we are measurably moving some segment of people over to our side?
• #49: There are many ways to support a campaign, from lobbying managers to marching in the streets - Google To designing the signs
• #51: Fill out your Spectrum of Allies. Get Specific. Not just “Dev” but “Inferno Squad.” Not management, but Pat McGee. It is a huge win if you can get a group that was slightly hostile to move into neutrality. It is a huge win if you can get the group/wedge next to your end of the spectrum to move into activism. This is not an all or nothing game.
• #53: For the folks who are quiet, listen to the buzz. That will be you. There is room for quiet.