Books – Leading Answers

September 11, 2024October 3, 2026Agile Project Management, Books, Events, Travel

Learn to Surf: Riding the Waves of Change Impacting Project Management

As a kid, I grew up in Cornwall, UK surfing the cold Atlantic coast beaches of Newquay and Porthtowan. Next week I am excited to be in Los Angeles presenting on waves of change and hybrid approaches. This talk is particularly poignant since it will be 20 years since I gave my first PMI Global presentation on hybrid techniques, which was also in Los Angeles (Link). It’s like coming full circle from talking about something new to returning to see it mainstream. Of course, it was not really new in 2004. People have been combining agile concepts with more plan-driven approaches for much longer. Tom Gilb was doing this in the 1980s. In 2000, I helped co-author what I think […]

August 9, 2023October 3, 2026Agile Project Management, Books, Planning, Tailoring Approaches, Teams, Visual Learning

Suitability Filters – Team Discussion Tools

Suitability filters are models that offer simplified views of a decision-making process. They help people identify and discuss the variables at play and make a recommendation. The British statistician George Box said it best “All models are wrong, but some models are useful.” A good model provides insights, usually a basic view of how something works or the interactions between variables. From this perspective, models are interesting and can speed up our comprehension of something. However, the greatest benefit of models is as a group alignment tool. Visual Models Create Group Consensus Much of today’s work is knowledge work. Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) contribute their expertise and collaborate to solve problems or build new products and services. This work […]

April 14, 2023September 27, 2025Agile Project Management, Books, Exceptions, Leadership, Planning, Risk Management, Tailoring Approaches, Theory of Constraints, Warning Signs

Definition of Broken (DoB): A Tool for Improving Communications and Outcomes

Communicating project issues is challenging. Exactly when should we escalate? Who to, and how much of a chance to correct things should be given first? This is why some projects create control limits around critical parameters and develop escalation plans to communicate exceptions and agree on the next steps. However, on most small to medium size projects, these escalation plans are often missing or left to the project manager's discretion. This creates further problems if the response is too late, not far-reaching enough, or not aligned with sponsor expectations. Also, what are the expectations for communicating delays, risks and issues at the team level? Do we want to hear when something takes a couple of hours longer than planned (probably […]

January 26, 2023September 27, 2025Agile Project Management, Books

PM Illustrated Audio/Video Book Now Available

I'm excited to announce that the new PM Illustrated Audio/Video Book is now available! It's an excellent resource for visual learners studying for the PMP exam who would rather watch and listen to content rather than read it. It was a pleasure to partner with Barb Waters on this initiative. Her narration is excellent, and she brings the PM Illustrated book content to life. If you are a visual learner preparing for your PMP exam or know someone who might benefit from this different learning mode, please head to PMillustrated.com to check it out. There is also a free sample with three videos and >30 minutes of content to get a feel for the format and content before buying. Project […]

September 27, 2022October 3, 2026Agile Project Management, Books, Events, Leadership, Tailoring Approaches

Beyond Agile presentation this Friday

On Friday, September 30, I will be presenting a session on Beyond Agile at the HTEC Project Management Virtual Conference. The session is free to attend and is part of a program that also features Scott Ambler, Sanjiv Augustine, Nader Rad, and Frank Turley. You can register here. “Yes, And, And” A colleague recently described Beyond Agile as a “Yes, And, And” toolkit, and I thought it was a great way to summarize the two elements of combining hybrid agile with the Theory of Constraints, and value stream view. “Yes, And” “Yes, And” is a term from improv comedy that refers to the idea of not undermining what has come before and adding valuable new elements. For example, we can […]

August 6, 2022September 27, 2025Books, Emotional Intelligence, Leadership, Teams

Extending Servant Leadership with Host Leadership

This article talks about adding tools to the servant leader toolkit. However, let’s start by examining what servant leadership already contains. Servant leadership was popularized by Robert Greenleaf and described as a mindset and set of practices. It flips the power pyramid, so instead of the team working to serve the leader, the leader supports the team. Servant leadership is a mindset and value system which recognizes that the team members deliver the project benefits. So, the best thing a scrum master or project manager can do is serve the team and help them succeed. This maximizes the amount of value they can produce and increases the capabilities and capacity of the group. Scrum masters and project managers […]

June 22, 2022October 3, 2026Agile Project Management, Books, Emotional Intelligence, Leadership, Tailoring Approaches, Teams

From Servant Leadership to Shared Leadership

This is part one in a series on leading agile teams from the Beyond Agile book. We will examine what leadership entails and how it applies to agile teams. Then discuss the transition from servant leadership to shared leadership. EQ as a Foundation for Leadership As we saw in the previous articles about Emotional Intelligence (EQ), leadership is built on top of EQ. We need good EQ to be able to recognize and manage our own emotions. This is a prerequisite for others to consider us credible and worth listening to. So, a firm grasp of EQ, either gained intuitively or improved through study/training, brings us to the starting line with engaged stakeholders. Then leadership involves bringing this collective […]

June 18, 2022September 27, 2025Agile Project Management, Books, Certification, Visual Learning

PM illustrated – 35 PDU Bundle

Looking for some PDUs to renew your PMP credential? Curious about the agile content added to the PMP exam since you took yours? Like to try a gamified, visual-learning experience? In partnership with Peak Business, this 35-module micro-learning suite provides comprehensive coverage of the new PMP® Exam Content Outline (ECO) and an excellent overview of today’s current project management topics for those looking for a refresher. Self-Directed Learning Chart your own adventure through topics and let the platform track your progress via self-assessment quizzes and achievement badges. Starting from a one-page, birdseye overview of the whole curriculum, select topics, master domains, and see your progress via our custom Achievements Grid. Track Your Progress Using graphical summaries, cartoons, and […]

June 11, 2022October 3, 2026Books, Emotional Intelligence, Teams

The Evolution of Leadership

Thanks to Improving for inviting me to speak at the recent Improving Edge Summit. It was a great conference dedicated to leadership this year. A topic near and dear to my heart and the focus of my Leading Answers blog. My talk was on the Evolution of Leadership and featured ideas from my Beyond Agile book about how organizations are moving from Agile’s empowered-teams/Green/values-driven leadership model to Organic/plural/Teal/shared and host-leadership models. The session was recorded and I will make it available here at www.LeadingAnswers.com when it is available. We had some great attendee suggestions for the true role of leadership and explored how agile’s servant leadership can be augmented with newer shared and host-leadership approaches. We mapped agile transformations to […]

May 8, 2022October 3, 2026Agile Project Management, Books, Certification, Tailoring Approaches, Visual Learning, Warning Signs

Agile Adoption – Left to Right is the Way to Go

Agile approaches "Crossed the Chasm" a decade ago. The organizations we see adopting it today are in the "Late Majority" and "Laggard" categories of Geoffrey Moore's Technology Adoption Life Cycle. As companies adopt agile because they have to / it's now expected / the industry norm / required to stay competitive / <insert your own reason>, we see more push-back and failures than ever. Doing something because you have to, rather than because you want to, leads to shortcuts and the wrong mindset. The image below, from Ahmed Sidky, shows agile as a mindset. In the image above, agile is a mindset described by four values, defined by twelve principles and manifested through an unlimited number of practices. The correct […]