One of the most cherished concepts of the Agile Manifesto is valuing individuals and interactions over processes and tools. Within this idea is the implicit assumption that individuals innately know how to interact. Dramatic lessons from aviation suggest otherwise. During the mid-1960s the frequent crashes of perfectly good aircraft alarmed the world’s airlines. Investigators discovered nothing lacking in the pilot’s “stick and rudder” skills; these accidents were the result of the flight crew’s inability to work as a team. Steve Adolph shares four leadership roles necessary for well managed communications in software development—Sheltering to create quiet, focused time needed to get the job done; Supporting to cover the backs of others; Boundary Spanning to connect the silos of communications; and Drum Beating to prevent communications from grinding to a halt. Some individuals are blessed with “natural leadership” talents, but, no worries, these skills can be learned. Join Steve to discover how.

1.
AW6
Concurrent Session
11/13/2013 2:15 PM
"I Thought YOU Were Flying the Plane:
Preventing Projects from Falling Out of
the Sky"
Presented by:
Steve Adolph
WSA Consulting, Inc.
Brought to you by:
340 Corporate Way, Suite 300, Orange Park, FL 32073
888‐268‐8770 ∙ 904‐278‐0524 ∙ sqeinfo@sqe.com ∙ www.sqe.com

2. Steve Adolph
WSA Consulting
An agile coach with WSA Consulting, Inc., Steve Adolph partners with
Scaled Agile and Rally Software where he pursues his passion for helping
organizations get the job done. He has been creating and managing
software development projects long enough to remember Fortran and
OS/MVT JCL. Steve’s professional career includes many exciting and
critical projects—designing call processing software for digital telephone
exchanges, design and development of leading edge network management
systems, railway signaling, and telecom billing. He has diverse experience
in job roles ranging from developer to chief engineer to CTO. Steve is
coauthor of the popular book, Patterns for Effective Use Cases.

3. But
I
thought
you
were
flying
the
plane!
Preventing
Great
Projects
from
Falling
Out
of
the
Sky

4. Steve
Adolph
steve@wsaconsulting.com

5. Eastern
Flight
401
(Dec
29
1972)

6. th
1978)
United
Flight
173
(Dec
28

7. Air
Florida
Flight
90
(Jan
13
1982)

8. Common
Theme
A
minor
situation
escalated
into
a
major
catastrophe

9. What
did
the
airlines
learn?

10.
“…not
a
deficiency
in
“s/ck
and
rudder”
skills
but
an
inability
of
the
flight
crew
to
func/on
as
a
team”
(Wiener,
Kanki,
&
Helmreich,
1995)

11. Mismatched
Perspectives:
How
Many
Generators?

12. So
what
does
this
have
to
do
with
agile
and
software
development?

13. Requirements

14. Perspec0ve
Mismatch
in
So6ware
Development
“it’s
getting
everybody
to
understand
things
in
a
similar
manner.
Get
everybody
on
the
same
page.
I
think
that’s
–
that’s
the
biggest
impediment
is
people
walk
away
with
misunderstandings
and
you
haven’t
clarified.
And
they
just
run
with
their
assumptions
or
what
the
way
they
understand
things.
And
then
we
either
have
to
go
and
correct
them
or
back
out
of
it
or
redo
um
something.
And
I
think
that’s
the
thing
that
causes
us
the
most
pain”
–
Site
1
Subject
1
follow-­‐up

15. 13

16. Converging:
Reaching
Out
14

17. Converging:
Negotiating
Consensus
15

18. The
Consensual
Perspective
16

19. Validating:
Bunkering
17

20. Validating:
Evaluating
18

21. Root
Cause
of
Failure?
“…There
just
weren’t
enough
conversations
taking
place”
site
2
subject
3

22. Tension
in
the
Process

23. Is
More
Communica0ons
Always
Be>er?
Relationship
Between
Performance
and
Communications
Frequency
(Patrashkova-­‐Volzdoska,
et
al.,
2003,
p.
266)
©
2003
IEEE

24. Projects
can
crash
because
of
faulty
social
processes
Photo
by
Seven
Resist

25. Software
development
is
a
Social
Process.
“The
design
focus
of
software
methodologies
should
be
away
from
production-­‐centered
practices
and
toward
socially-­‐centered
methodologies”
–
Sawyer
&
Guinan
1998

26. Bottom
Line:
“People
trump
process”
-­‐Alistair
Cockburn

27. What
did
the
airlines
do?

28. “Airlines
were
noticing
that
although
pilots
were
technically
competent,
their
people
skills
were
deficient.
In
other
words,
the
captain
could
fly
a
perfect
ILS
approach,
but
could
not
work
in
a
synergistic
environment
to
effectively
accomplish
tasks”

29. “Companies
were
noticing
that
although
engineers
were
technically
competent,
their
people
skills
were
deficient.
In
other
words,
they
could
design
and
implement
perfect
modules,
but
could
not
work
in
a
synergistic
environment
to
effectively
accomplish
tasks”

30. A
pilot
is
a
highly
skilled
individual…
…
whose
job
requires
them
to
work
as
an
effective
team
member.

31. “Pilot
error”
as
team
failure

32. The
Soloist

33. The
Two
Rules
of
the
Cockpit
Rule
#1The
Captain
is
always
right
Rule
#2
See
Rule
#1

34. Crew
Resource
Management
l Formal
training
program
set
up
to
concentrate
on
the
human
factor
in
aviation
l CRM
Domains
l Communications
l Situational
Awareness
l Problem
Solving/
Decision
Making
l Leadership
l Interpersonal
Skills

35. th
1989)
United
232
(July
19

36. Qantas
Flight
32

37. Scrum
as
a
Social
Process
Daily
Scrum
Sprint
2-­‐4
Weeks

38. Is
Skills
Training
Enough?
CSM
Learning
Objectives:
Learn
the
responsibilities
of
the
Scrum
Master
role
including:
•
serving
the
product
owner
and
team,
•
removing
impediments,
•
coaching
the
Product
Owner
and
team,
and
•
protecting
the
team.

39. Managing
the
Tension:
Leadership
–
Team
Processes
l Sheltering
l Supporting
l Drum
Beating
l Boundary
Spanning

40. Leadership
as
Boundary
Spanning
Photo
by
Robert
Conley

41. “Leaders
are
created
not
born”
–
Jack
Welch
former
General
Electric
CEO

42. Socio-­‐technical
Systems
“an
organization’s
objectives
are
best
met
not
by
the
optimization
of
the
technical
system
and
the
adaptation
of
the
social
system
to
it,
but
by
the
joint
optimization
of
the
technical
and
social
aspects,
thus
exploiting
the
adaptability
and
innovativeness
of
people
in
achieving
goals
instead
of
over
determining
the
manner
in
which
these
goals
should
be
achieved”
–
Albert
Cherns,

43. Culture
as
a
Competitive
Advantage
“They
can
match
our
costs,
but
they
can’t
match
our
culture”
Herb
Kelleher

44. “Personnel
attributes
and
human
relations
activities
provide
by
far
the
largest
source
of
opportunity
for
improving
software
productivity”
-­‐
(Boehm,
1984)

45. Thank
you!
Steve
Adolph
steve@steveadolph.biz