Have you ever wondered what truly drives the success of agile methodologies? Is it merely the technical benefits of speed, efficiency, and continuous improvement, or is there something more profound at play? As a CTO (I'm co-founder and CTO of Alli Connect) and a long-time practitioner of pair programming and continuous delivery, [...]
Photo by Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash My students are my best teachers. In a recent High-Performance Team Building™ class, my students asked some great questions. I had to pause, ponder, learn something new, and get back to them after class. Here’s one of those great questions, along with my response. In the [...]
Before it was an app, “slack” was already a useful word. As a verb, it meant to take things easy and even be a bit lazy, but the noun hints at its more exciting possibilities: an empty piece of time or space where unknown things can occur. A bit of surplus time in your [...]
An interview with Richard Kasperowski on High-Performance Teams Stephen Harrison: Let me introduce Richard Kasperowski. Richard and I worked together a while back and have been friends ever since. Along the way, Richard has become a recognized expert in an interesting and relevant field. SH: Richard, welcome. Thanks for taking time to chat. Richard Kasperowski: [...]
Want to Know More About High-Performance Teams? Hi, friends! We did a webinar on high-performance teams a while back. In case you missed it, here are the video and slides: I wanted to make sure we answered everyone’s questions, so here we [...]
Cue the piano: If you don't want to see me... I did a full one-eighty, crazy Thinking ‘bout the way I was - from Dua Lipa’s “Don’t Start Now” I did a full one-eighty in my teaching, coaching, and consulting work. As recently as March, I advised clients that if they care about the product [...]
Joanne Stone and I recently had a great conversation about wicked problems. I love the word wicked. It’s a wonderfully positive word in my native New England vernacular. We use it to amplify or express the superlative of an idea: a wicked good movie, wicked awesome lobster dinner, a wicked nice day at the beach. [...]
Team Communication in Times of Crisis Once upon a time, a very long time ago—also known as “February 2020”—my personal and professional life consisted of being together and communicating with other people face to face. I gave talks at conferences, business coaching sessions in my clients’ offices, and professional training in their classrooms and in [...]
Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash Continuous Integration of People: a how-to guide Share emotional connection continuously. On a regular cadence: Do an emotion check-in with your teammates on a regular rhythm. Check-in with each other at least once every 24 hours. Try more frequent check-ins, like every half-day, or even every hour. [...]
Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash Core Protocols for Remote Teams Check In frequently. Stay connected with each other emotionally. Explicitly Pass on an activity by typing or saying, “I pass.” Explicitly Check Out by typing or saying, “I’m checking out.” Manage your apps’ alerts and notifications appropriately. Ask for Help early and often. Use [...]
“I feel unsafe here!” Photo by Frank Busch on Unsplash Millennials get a bad rap for snowflake-like sensitivity and delicacy. It’s impossible to criticize anything a Millenial says or does – so the story goes. They’ll call you out on it and accuse you of creating an unsafe space. Millennial or not, sometimes [...]
Cuando era un bebé, viví con las monas durante tres meses. When I was a baby, I lived with the monkeys for three months. Photo by Tj Kolesnik on Unsplash My Spanish teacher tilted her head sideways like a puppy trying to understand the world through new eyes. My words were correct. My [...]
Want an easy tool to help you start building the best team of your life? That’s what the Team Transformation Canvas is: a practical worksheet to help you and your teammates discover the best in each other and put it into action. The canvas facilitates individual self-awareness of your current emotional state and desired [...]
The more things change, the more they stay the same. This includes the fundamentals of human nature: what motivates us, how we work together in groups, how we collaborate and communicate. The essential truths are unchanged — from the earliest human tribes just trying to survive, to the high-performance teams of today. The Core Protocols—derived [...]
Photo by You X Ventures on Unsplash Real-world cases and challenges—this is the exciting part of my work in high-performing teams. Real people have complicated and unpredictable lives and behaviors. This is where ideas get tested. For example, I recently got involved in a discussion about showing up at meetings. A team leader [...]
Photo by Thomas Drouault on Unsplash Like every good citizen, I was glad to do my civic duty. Juror service never comes at the most convenient of times, but it’s a responsibility that’s part of our social contract. When I got the call, I was happy to answer. The empaneling process was interesting, [...]
Original photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash When’s the last time you got good feedback? Not pat-on-the-back, puts-a-smile-on-your-face feedback. I mean effective feedback, feedback that helped you make a positive change in yourself. Whether from a manager responsible for reviewing your performance, a peer evaluation system, or a 360-degree exercise, giving and receiving [...]
There Was This Buzz in the Organization Richard Kasperowski interviews Johanna Rothman. Johanna is known as the Pragmatic Manager—that’s the name of her email newsletter, where she shares her thinking on practical pragmatic approaches to hiring people, looking for a job, and managing projects, programs, and portfolios. Johanna talks about the [...]
Photo by Mimi Thian on Unsplash Hands up, who loves work meetings? Stupid question? You’re probably rolling your eyes, not raising your hand in affirmation. A slew of workplace memes and Dilbert cartoons mock the stereotype of compulsory, oppressive, time-wasting endurance sessions. Everyone hates meetings. There’s definitely a problem here. According to research [...]
First Scrum Team Was the Best Team of My Life Richard Kasperowski interviews Vasco Duarte. Vasco is a long-time Agilist and the host of the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast. Vasco talks about his journey as an Agilist, starting with the time he did Scrum exactly by the book—and it turned out [...]
One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child. - Carl Jung Learning to play the pututu in Peru [...]
What Makes a Team Successful Is You Meet Your Objective Richard Kasperowski interviews DiDi Vaz. DiDi is an Agile coach working on the data sciences platform at the Broad Institute. DiDi and I chat about connection: connection to each other as teammates, and connection to your shared goals. She offers advice on [...]
Photo by Mimi Thian on Unsplash Conversation is a big part of human dynamics. How we talk, how we listen, how we communicate our intent: our interactions affect the emotional state of the people around us. During their initial work defining the Core Protocols, Jim and Michele McCarthy focused on work teams. They [...]
There’s No One Truth for How to Do Things Richard Kasperowski interviews Yuval Yeret. Yuval is an Agile coach and trainer at Agile Sparks. Yuval and Richard chat about his best team ever, which he describes as family. He offers advice to listeners working with both f2f and partially distributed teams, and [...]
The end of the year is a great time to reflect on what the last twelve months have brought you and what you’ve learned or done—and to look ahead to the promise of the coming year. It’s a blank page on which you can write whatever future you desire for yourself. A blank page can [...]
Figure Out What You Want to Do, and Do It Figure Out What You Want to Do, and Do It Richard Kasperowski interviews Abby Fichtner, the Hacker Chick. Abby is an author, speaker, and innovation ninja. Abby shares the story of her best team ever, the founding team at the Harvard [...]
Making Team Magic Happen Richard Kasperowski interviews Michael Nir, a keynote speaker and bestselling author with expertise in Lean, Agile, and Gestalt. Michael shares his experience with a team of people from different walks of life, their intention to be part of a great team, and investing the time to make [...]
What is love? Many great writers, artists, and philosophers have tried to define love over the years. They’ve all approached it from different perspectives and produced some interesting answers. I won’t compete with the romantics here. My interest is in workplace relationships and teams. After working for so long with the Core Protocols and observing teams that have high [...]
Delivering Awesome Value at High Speed Richard Kasperowski interviews Heidi Helfand, director of engineering excellence at Procore Technologies and author of the book Dynamic Reteaming: The Art and Wisdom of Changing Teams. Heidi shares her wisdom on clarity of roles, having a clear sense of purpose, and patterns of dynamic reteaming. Visit [...]
The Feeling of Belonging Richard Kasperowski interviews Dave West, product owner and CEO of Scrum.org. Dave talks about the feeling of belonging, the regular work rhythm of great teams, and remembering that everyone is human. Connect with Dave at dave.west@scrum.org and read the Scrum.org blog at https://www.scrum.org/resources/blog. Join hundreds of high-performers and subscribe to Richard’s newsletter at https://kasperowski.com. [...]
Photo by Henri Pham on Unsplash In last month’s blog, we looked at some of the reasons we find it difficult to ask that simple question, “will you help me?” I wanted to come back to Ask For Help again because despite being one of the simplest team behaviors to explain or describe, it seems [...]
Photo by Rémi Walle on Unsplash I get by with a little help from my team… Or I could have called this, Help, I need somebody, not just anybody There are lots of song lyrics and literature references about asking for help and looking for the support of others. And also about how [...]
I’ve been reflecting on some recent research into workplace motivation published in the journal Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (and reported in The New York Times) by Kathleen D. Vohs and Andrew C. Hafenbrack, which concluded that meditation was not a good thing for workplace productivity.This was surprising to me, given all the evidence about intrinsic motivation and [...]
Credit: jurvetson@Flickr Hi there! I'm so glad you visited! After you read this article, check out my courses, latest book, podcast, and other blog articles. Enjoy! Most people don’t want internal memos leaked and made public, but if you are the iconic figurehead of a ground-breaking innovator like Tesla, you probably expect to [...]
The Italian Job* My colleague mentioned, “By the way, I was thinking of Sicily, for the September conference.” Me: “Mmm… Where?” Colleague: “Southern island of Italy. Nice climate for the time of year, and I heard about a great new venue there. If you agree I’ll check it out and get back to you.” “Sure, [...]
Last month we had a look at the ‘Pass/unpass’ core protocol, used to indicate whether you are actively engaged with your teammates in an activity. Today let’s go a bit deeper into what being actively engaged when you’re part of a high-performing team means by examining two more protocols: Check In and Check Out. They are related, but [...]
Being part of a great team doesn’t mean showing up and being awesome about everything, every second of every day. Great teams aren’t formed from robotic supermen and women who never have conflicts, contradictions, or confusion – or who’ve never had a bad moment. They’re made up of everyday people who bring their whole selves [...]
My work with teams builds upon a body of knowledge developed across decades, applying the latest thinking to fundamental and well-tested theories of human behavior within groups. Repeatedly, and in many different settings and industries, the correlation plays out: High-performing teams require psychological safety. Psychological safety requires emotional intelligence at a team level. And understanding and applying [...]
Many manufacturing businesses follow a predictable rhythm of activities based on a production and distribution cycle. And Santa’s North Pole-based outfit is an excellent example. Everything builds to a single tight annual shipping window, and to ensure customer satisfaction, it’s vital that the entire team is performing at an optimal level — particularly during the run-up to [...]
Have you heard? Psychological safety is the key to high-performance teams at Google. Google is full of high-performers, both individuals and teams. Some teams at Google really stand out—they are the highest of the high-performing teams. At Google, they want all the teams to be the highest of the high-performing, so they spun up a [...]
A team is a group of two or more people aligned with a common goal. A high-performance team is a team that is objectively better than other teams doing similar work (or with a similar goal, if it’s not a work team). Objectively better means that we can measure teams and compare them to each other. Aim for objective metrics that someone outside [...]
Have you ever tandem-bicycled? Molly and I cycled across Upper Austria on a tandem this summer. We enjoyed the vistas of the Danube River with its lush green hills, medieval towns and castles, and vineyards. Tandem cycling is an incredible team experience. Being on one bike together brings us into a state of high "teamness." [...]
It seems like everyone has high-performance teams on their mind. Just this morning, I had a great conversation with a young army veteran who had led teams. He said he experienced some incredibly bad teams during his stint in the army. The teams were toxic. They were run by bullying and negativity. His team leaders complained about everything that [...]
I joined my wife, Molly, and a group of around 25 old and new friends at the Open Space Institute’s conference on Peace and High Performance. I drew this quick sketch of Harrison Owen, creator of Open Space Technology as he reminded us how easy it is to connect using Open Space: just sit in [...]
I’ve been on tour, sharing my Building Great Teams with the Core Protocols class and talk all over North America and in London. And I’m honored and grateful for the positive reviews, reflections, and connections to other people’s work. Hannes Horn writes about his experience in my half-day class on Medium . He describes [...]
Want your students or clients to really learn Agile? Then get them to teach Agile to themselves. Experience Agile is the activity I use to close my two-day Agile class. Students learn Agile by doing Agile and by teaching Agile to each other. The assignment: Design, implement, and deliver a product that teaches you everything [...]
Introducing my book, The Core Protocols: A Guide to Greatness. Here’s the blurb: Want to live in greatness? This book is your guide. The Core Protocols show you how to discover and obtain what you want, on your own, with your friends and family, and with the people you work with. Follow [...]
This is an edited transcript of my presentation at Rebel Jam, a global 24-hour long conference on positively changing business, government, education, healthcare, and the world itself. You can find my slides here. I do great things with great people I’m Richard Kasperowski. My vision is that I do great things with great people. Everything [...]
