Oh wow, where do I even start? “Badass – Making Users Awesome” by Kathy Sierra is a truly enlightening read. It contains ideas I’ve never heard before in the very accessible style of the “Head First” books. Sierra makes the case that in order to build a great product and a loyal customer base you …
Author Archives: Corinna Baldauf
Strengths are Weaknesses. Weaknesses are Strengths.
The title is not doublespeak, but something I’ve observed a lot lately. Starting this year, everybody at my work gets feedback every 6 months by 3-5 peers. In the conversations I’ve witnessed so far, there’s a recurring theme: Our biggest strengths from “What you do great” reappear in the “What you could try” column with …
Continue reading “Strengths are Weaknesses. Weaknesses are Strengths.”
Inspiring Organisation: Premium Cola
Recently I got to see a talk by Uwe Lübbermann. He is the “central coordinator” of Premium Cola. He founded and runs Premium Cola with a so-called “operating system”, which he has already exported to other companies. Well, companies is not really the right term, because they all work very differently from what is considered …
Why didn’t anyone ever tell me that?
After about 2 or 3 years into my agile journey there was a time when I would listen to a talk or read a book and be like “Yeah, it’s exactly like that! I wish someone had told me 3 years ago! It would have helped me a lot! Why didn’t anyone tell me that?” …
Product Owner in der agilen Transition – Podcast
[English summary: Popular podcaster Toby Baier and me talk about the Product Owner during the initial transition / adoption / ignition / <find a better word> to Scrum in his podcast series “Agiles Produktmanagement”.] Die POs unter euch kennen wahrscheinlich schon Toby Baiers Podcast “Agiles Produktmanagement”. In Folge 14 unterhält sich Toby mit mir über den “Product Owner …
Continue reading “Product Owner in der agilen Transition – Podcast”
Pink stickies considered harmful & other arcane facilitation tidbits
There are some odd tidbits of experience you pick up when you work with whiteboards and stickies for a longer period of time. Here’s a random collection of my tidbits that might be nice to know for beginners: Beware, 3m pink stickies leave pink stains on most non-whiteboard surfaces. Walls, doors, tables, … Especially when …
Continue reading “Pink stickies considered harmful & other arcane facilitation tidbits”
Ritual Dissent
At sipgate we sometimes are too nice to each other. That might sound like a luxurious “problem” if you’ve have to weather a tough company climate, but it can indeed be a problem. As in, we don’t shoot down ideas that aren’t that well thought out. Or we proceed with projects that only one person is …
Radical Gratitude Applied
2 weeks ago I read a nice piece about how to be luckier overnight: Being grateful about adverse things changes your perspective. I really liked it and have tried to do this more conciously. Admittedly, there are a few things I refuse to be grateful for in any way whatsoever, but for most nuisances in …
Open Friday – Lernende Organisation mit Open Spaces
[English summary: I’ve translated my experience reports about regular, company-wide Open Spaces into German.] Bei sipgate haben wir supergute Erfahrungen mit regelmäßigen (alle 2 Wochen) Open Spaces gemacht. Auf Englisch habe ich dazu schon mehrfach gesprochen und geschrieben. Inzwischen gibt es den kompletten Erfahrungsbericht auch auf Deutsch, bei der Informaktik Akuell. Wenn Dich nur das …
Continue reading “Open Friday – Lernende Organisation mit Open Spaces”
You can learn to present! – Public Speaking #3
Somebody has recently asked my husband (a great speaker!) for tips on how to learn public speaking. The asker was, among other things, concerned about his voice being too monotonous. My husband recommended an acting class and I agree. I’m confident that the basis of my being comfortable with public speaking was an acting class I …
Continue reading “You can learn to present! – Public Speaking #3”