Agile has an overemphasis on re-applying things that worked before. There’s a lack of contextual awareness. Deal with things how they are. Don’t let agile become a religion.
Be a chef, not a recipe user.
Use language that managers will understand. Changing language changes thinking.
People attach to negative pattern matches more than positive ones.
Interventions in a complex domain should be coherent, safe to fail, small, fast, and quick.
Trying to solve a different problem often finds a solution to your original problem.
The primary method of knowledge sharing is storytelling. People remember stories, not rules.
You need to understand what your users want, not what they say they want.
“When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.” - Goodhart’s Law
Cara Turner - Building Creative Teams
Creative teams interact with work in a different way. Culturally, though, creativity is not trusted. Creativity arises from the tension between things. Creativity requires tinkering, which we are hard-wired for.
Tinkering and play is fun. People are much more likely to solve problems when they’re in a positive mood. Combinatorial creativity: new combinations of people or things. Ideas stick by using them. Create rich associations and force new connections in the brain.
Choose to have a flexible mindset.
Our brains reward success, so set up a safe-to-fail environment. Frequent small successes are better because the fallout from small failures is not so bad.
You can’t motivate people, you can only remove the demotivating factors. Autonomy is very important.
Retrospectives
Regular: keep looking where you’re going; easier to experiment; lots of feedback.
Attainable goals: small goals; can add value quickly.
Reviewed: increases value of responsibility; time boxed - constraint helps focus.
Try solving the anti-problem. Often generates insights about the original problem.
Happiness at work - Alexander Kjerulf
Denmark is the happiest country in the world. Scandanavian culture is very work happy: arbejdsglæde.
The balance of positive to negative experiences at work should be more than 3:1, but not more than 10:1.
Most important factors of happiness at work:
Results
Pride, helpful, meaningful. Feel skilled. Receive praise and recognition.
Relationships
Have coffee breaks and lunch breaks for chit chat.
Speak to each other. Make a point of making eye contact and saying good morning every day.