When I give my talk “Thank God it’s Open Friday!” people always tell me how much they liked hearing about our failures on the way to a solution that works well for us. It’s surprising to me, because our previous trials with a slack day are only loosely related to the very successful end result.… Continue reading Talking about failure – Long Way to Lean #1
Author: corinna
Mass Interviews – Menlo #7
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] Menlo does a lot of things different from other companies, Hiring for example. And I don’t mean “different” as in Google, i.e. you get grilled by a succession of 6 people or get interviewed by a good-sized portion of… Continue reading Mass Interviews – Menlo #7
Walkies – Menlo #6
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] At one point during Menlo Innovations history, the employees decided they would like to stretch their legs and shake up routine by a short walk. Ever since, at 3 pm people gather for “walkies”. A 5-10 minute walk around… Continue reading Walkies – Menlo #6
Sketchnotes from XP Days 2015
Last week I was at XP Days in Karlsruhe, a very nice mix of talks, workshops and Open Space. I’m not very happy with the resulting sketchnotes, but I thought they may serve as examples of what happens when I’ve got too much or too little space left on my piece of paper: Too much… Continue reading Sketchnotes from XP Days 2015
Replace Rewards or What are you celebrating? – Menlo #5
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] There is an interesting passage in “Joy, Inc.” about change saying that when you take away one reward system you have to replace it with a different reward system – one that encourages the behaviours you’d like to see… Continue reading Replace Rewards or What are you celebrating? – Menlo #5
Estimation: Back to Hours – Menlo #4
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] At sipgate most teams estimate in Story Points. It was what you did back in the day when we started with Scrum and we’re used to it now. It works well enough for us. I’m not a great fan… Continue reading Estimation: Back to Hours – Menlo #4
Watching Users – Rebuttal
Have you seen this cartoon lately? With the caption “How it feels to watch a user test your product for the first time” I laughed when I first saw it. I’m pretty sure I’ve retweetet it from this guy (his source (their source)). Ever since, I can’t shake the feeling that I betrayed my User… Continue reading Watching Users – Rebuttal
Scaling through Pairing – Menlo #3
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] It’s quite common for my colleagues and me to pair. Not just developers, but also UX & dev, PO & UX, Customer Support & PO, … There are many combinations and I usually feel quite smug about our level… Continue reading Scaling through Pairing – Menlo #3
High Tech Anthropologists – Menlo #2
[This post is part of a series about Menlo Innovations, the company described in “Joy, Inc.“] Menlo Innovations is an agency, which means that they do software projects for other companies whose domain they know nothing about. Still they manage to deliver what end users need, to delight them even. How do Menlonians do that,… Continue reading High Tech Anthropologists – Menlo #2
Favorite Quotes from Joy, Inc. – Menlo #1
What a blast! We (sipgate) just hosted Richard Sheridan, CEO of Menlo Innovations and author of “Joy, Inc.”. Both, the real life Rich and his book are very entertaining and inspiring. So much so, that I’ll write a small series. I want to help spread the word about: Planning Origami (Became a 1-pager, not a… Continue reading Favorite Quotes from Joy, Inc. – Menlo #1