As the common context, I used that of a mid-sized organization in the health informatics sector with new ventures in its project pipeline and with several new ideas for improving its software processes. The examples were mostly drawn from this context and organized as HBR style cases. The cases addressed project staging, incremental development, pair programming, code inspections, role of evidence, and test-driven development.

The event was a repeat of an earlier course I gave in June for for Siemens in Erlangen, Germany. But I changed the materials and format significantly to fit the new  interaction style and  in response to the feedback I have received after the Erlangen version. I divided the material into 5 modules, incorporated smaller examples, and added take-home exercises for each module. I also frequently used LiveMeeting’s poll feature to engage the audience. All in all, I think the format worked very well, surprisingly with very few technology glitches. The tech support supplied by host was very good.

The course description is available here. If you were a participant and haven’t filled out the course evaluation form, you can find it here. I have opened this post for comments: if you have any, well, what are you waiting for? Do fire.

http://agile2010.agilealliance.org

 The letter writer states that he has been researching the reasons of “our” (or “my”?) economic crisis and states that he’s found a strong indicator of what kind of management behavior the future wants. Apparently it’s not exactly what my editorial describes (never mind my editorial was not about management behavior at all). The letter writer attaches the same connotation to the term “superprofessionalism” — which I coined to describe a set of behavioral traits that represent a sort of high-order professional conduct — as the false, shallow stardom associated with the kind of people featured in reality TV series like Supermodel, The Apprentice, or  The Bachelor.  (For a synopsis, the traits mentioned in the editorial are: focus on individual responsibility, acute awareness, brutal honesty, heightened sense of fairness, resilience under pressure, attention to detail in perspective, and pragmatism first). He alleges, those kinds of media programs and my article represent the last dying attempts to revive an old-economy thinking in which all-knowing individuals hold and dispense all power. He adds that my article advocates individual and central decision making at the expense of group decision making, and is counter to holistic team behavior and denies the emergence of information and collective intelligence from decentralized interactions in social networks. But the best stretch is when he puts the blame for the current economic crisis on the kind of thinking my writing encourages, like, say brutal honesty (he in particular picks on this trait, stating that it’s socially unacceptable).

Oh? Interesting perspective, although it beats me completely how any of that can be inferred from my editorial. If it could, that perspective would represent a truly curious internal paradox on my part, given my links to the the agile software development community and in light of my previous column on the role of diversity in software development.  But one can never underestimate the intellectual depth of those who can with great facility read the sub-sub-subtext between the lines. Honestly, can anyone detect any nuances in that writing,  implanted with the idea to recreate or preserve old-world power? And me at the center of the conspiracy?

Cheers

To subscribe to my posts, click on the icon at  the top right corner.