An alternative to trackers using timers. It works by periodically asking what you are working on. This way you don’t have to toggle timers when you switch tasks.
I’ve been using clockly to track the time of all my projects for a long time, and it’s helped me to increase my productivity. It is extremely simple to use and comes with a free trial period.
– an USB headphone, that I can use to talk on Skype when I work with remote people.
– charger for my MacBook pro
– a physical book. I spend at least 1 hour every day on a train, when I usually read a lot. Although I prefer reading in my kindle, I always have a physical book with me as backup.
– Jimmy Cards, to use with teams or individuals.
– a device to do digital banking. (For when I need to make large payments I can’t do on my phone.) I always have a spare one with me.
– a clicker for presentations (Logitec)
– in ear plugs for listening to music on the train or my bike.
– Deborah Hartmanns Fearless Journey cards (based on Linda Risings Fear-less change book.
– My Macbook pro with gothic Snowwhite. (I have this picture to make sure I recognise my Macbook)
– Jurgen Appelo’s delegation poker cards.
– A small pack of glass cleaners.
– two adapters so I can work on my laptop with a second screen.
– my kindle.
– my scarf. As a coach, trainer, presenter, my voice is my most precious instrument, you will hardly see me outside without my scarf. Yes even in the summer, I’m very sensitive to wind.
– My kisika (yellow jack), as I drive with my bicycle to the trainstation and I want to set an example for my kids, I will always wear this. (I just realised, left out my bike helmet because it was not in my rucksack. )
– moving motivator cards (also from Jurgen Appelo)
– a small set of gongs. They take up very limited space and at least once a week I can use them when I did not expect it.
– post it’s and Stattys. There is not a meeting that I don’t use them. (I prefer Stattys over post it’s)
– a small solar charger for my phone. (I just realised my cable was actually in use when I took the picture)
– a marker.
– a small notebook
– something I use on plane or train to block light on my eye so I can sleep.
– my Iphone 5S (I agree with Bart, I never buy the first form factor of a new device)
– the phone is inside a small cover that also contains the cards I take with me.
– a wireless trackball (that I can use also todo presentations with)
– a handshoe mouse: the last two device or some of the many mouses I use. Since I invested in that I no longer have trouble from a RSI that had started.
This are just the things I always take with me.
When I go abroad I also take:
– a powerstrip, so I can connect many devices in my hotel.
– a small bag full of international connectors
– a neck pillow for the airplane
– passport
– a digital photo camera (Canon)
What I don’t take might be as interesting:
– I hardly have cash with me.
One of the ways I am coaching companies, is that I offer what I call free mini agile training sessions.
These are brownbag sessions, something I learned from Linda & Mary Lynn great book: Fearless Change
Today these are 1 hour (optional) sessions for anyone in the company that wants to learn about agile.
Depending on how much time I spend at the company, I do them once a week or ever x weeks.
Sometimes they are workshops I am doing for a long time, sometimes they are try out’s of something new.
This is an example of a such a try out-session.
I show a picture of a kanban board similar to the one below:
(I took a different one, so I can keep mine for my exercise 😉 )
Scrum Board
I gave everyone post-its and a 5 to 10 minute timebox to write down what they saw.
Then everyone could present one post-it and in a round-robin way we went around the table. (After we have done one round, we turn again, until most people have no post-it’s left anymore.
Depending on how many idea’s there are, we look at all of them.
Every time a person presented a post-it. I asked everyone if it was a fact or an interpretation.
let me give you an example: – people are already working on the second story before the first is finished.
> actually the first lane is a priority lane, that is working with support tickets.
Ok, I admit that is hard to figure out from a picture that is not complete. let’s look at a next one.
– Alex is working on too many stuff.
mm the fact is, there are 3 post it’s with a small post it Alex on it.
In this case, the team leaves a post it in the WIP colum, untill the next stand up. Yet they do a blue Done sticky, when finished. Alex is actually only working on one thing.
by this time people start realize that seeing facts is really hard.
yet at the same time they do miss a lot of obvious facts. So obvious that we ignore them.
The board uses black tape to make the squares. this might seem trivial and not important, untill I tell you that this is the black team and the color of the tape is making the difference on the boards.
Other facts: some post it’s are yellow, others are green.
Extra:
When I did the tryout of this exercise, we had a team member joining this workshop rather late.
This turned out very fortunate, as I told this person the exercise and when he presented his post it’s, I asked the already present team members to replay the exercise with him.
It was very nice to see what they had already learned from the previous time.
When I tweeted about the exercise, I was reminded of the ladder of Inference
An adapted version of the exercise could be, to not only select fact or interpretation, yet to see if you can come up with post it’s for all 7 layers of the ladder. As a first exercise for team members that have to learn about the difference between fact and interpretations this was already cool.
I show this list of topics, to show that a small workshop that is only loosely facilitated, can bring up many interesting topics, where the students choose themselves in what they are interested in.
For me, the power of training from the back of the room
Looking at a burn-up chart one can’t say:
A,B,C,D,E
On a burn-up chart you measure amount of work on a vertical axis. What measure you can use?
A,B,C,D,E
What is a difference between a burn-up and a burn-down chart?
A,B,C,D,E
Yes, Pawel decided to pull a trick on you, as all of the answers are correct.
Most of answers can be found in his post about burn-up charts: and the rest is stuff that is true for both burn-ups and burn-downs.
This last reference can be used as a reference to the questions, may render some of the answers for the last question false. Pawel used as a reference the classic version of burn-down charts.In fact, this may be the biggest lesson: how can you improve your burn-downs.
