Gojko Adzic is becoming something of a celebrity around Wellington these days, and this week he’s back to deliver more bites of wisdom for a hungry Lean and Agile community.
Nomad8’s Rachael Tempest Wood and Anthony Boobier were lucky enough to talk with him recently and you can hear the conversation in the podcast below.
Prior to his almost revered status in NZ, he wasn’t doing badly internationally either, and his book Specification by Example was awarded the Jolt Award for the best book of 2012 and in 2011, he was voted by peers as the most influential agile testing professional.
So be prepared to learn something new. For example, did you know what in this modern world is most like magic and how did Gojko first start programming?
These are key questions. Not only because they reveal something about the character of this master of Impact Mapping and Specification by Example, but because of what they reveal about the way companies attempt to build software.
Gojko is a software delivery consultant who works with ambitious teams to improve the quality of their software products and processes. He specialises in agile and lean quality improvement, but in recent months he’s rediscovered the joy of programming. He’s remembered what it was like to spend days and nights hammering on a Commodore 64 and says, “It’s incredibly exciting and that’s the kind of joy I’m experiencing again. By trying out different ways of deciding what to do, how to plan, what to build and deciding prioritisation.”
Gojko has discovered that motivation is the key to performance no matter the constraints under which you are operating, and motivation can only be permanent when developers, testers and the business fully understand their vision and direction.
“There is a big disconnect between a strategy in PowerPoint and tuning product visions,” he says.
In the podcast, he explains how impact maps can be used to develop product backlogs in situations where there is precious little time to make mistakes. “[we are] incredibly constrained in terms of time – a few hours here and there makes a difference,” he explains. “We try to be very open to unexpected things.”
This period of re-acquaintance with software development has moved Gojko’s thinking. “Shipping is no longer the problem,” he says, adding that you can look up good process and practice in books and online. “But are you driving the car in the right direction? Are you using the capability for stuff that’s useful?”
Pertinent indeed. And you can hear much, much more in this podcast:
Gojko Adzic podcast. Recorded September 2014. 42:50 mins
Related Links
- Specification by Example
- Impact Mapping
- Mindmup
- User Story Mapping Jeff Patton
- Beyond Requirements Kent McDonald
- Discover to Deliver Ellen Gottesdiener & Mary Gorman
- Speclog
- 50 ideas for user stories Gojko Adzic & David Evans
- 50 ideas for testing Gojko Adzic