Innovation Games® workshop

I just finished a two day workshop on Innovation Games® by Luke Hohmann of Enthiosys. In short it was great, stimulating, chaotic, and filled with lots of ideas and games to play. Most of the attendees were independent Scrum Trainers/Coaches with some additional perspectives given by two market researchers. A couple of us were embedded coaches/trainers like myself. It was a stellar group with lots of often expressed opinions! The games we played with are all described in Luke's book, Innovation Games which I certainly recommend.

All good training for agile methods include liberal amounts of experiential exercises. I was first seriously exposed to this approach when I studied with Jerry Weinberg. He called them simulations and from him I learned how precise in terms of teaching objectives they can be. Luke has taken this to even greater levels and he uses the more currently politically correct term, game, to refer to this type of exercise. These days when agile trainers gather together they often share games they are using and practice on each other.

In my view the power of games is that a well designed game will engage more of the our capabilities. Some games get the body involved - somatic involvement. We know that learning for most folks is enhanced when the body is more involved. Some games get both sides of the brain involved - right brain (random, intuitive, synthesis, subjective, wholes) as well as left brain (logical, rational analytic, objective, parts). We need both modes to solve complex problem in new ways. Some games encourage our emotions to play a more active role. Our passions can be expressed and utilized.

As we discussed in the workshop, a current constraint on successful agile projects is the difficulty of writing those stories that are the work to be done. Scrum books assume that they exist. They don't.

Surprise, surprise. For over 40 years from the engineering side I have heard 'If we could just get good requirements we could '. Typically blanks are 'Take less time', 'Have fewer bugs', 'Deliver what is needed', 'Cost less' or 'Get the design right'. This problem has not gone away. And agile has never promised that it could fix this problem. Well executed agile only promises that engineering can reliably deliver what is asked for at a known quality level at a known time.

The short time box aspects of agile allow more in-course correction to be made based on what I think of as reality based feedback. This behavior gives the impression that 'requirements' are better. That is not true. Agile projects can produce bad products faster and more reliably than more traditional techniques.

Innovation Games® as we learned them are a set of tools that can seriously help with the difficult problems of where the product is going. We experienced the ease and FUN that can be experienced as difficult problems are addressed relatively quickly and innovative potential solutions are discovered. High level plans such as roadmaps can be addressed with these techniques as well as prioritization of high level backlogs. Filtering the infinite world of the possible down to the practical world of the doable.

Some of the games are now available online for distributed teams and we got a chance to play one of them. An impressive beginning to a difficult problem.

I was impressed.

Comments

[Doug Shimp]

This was a great 2 days and some of the best training I have received in recent years. Working with Jeff and other fellow trainings really made this a deep enriching experience. It was Luke's masterful job at facilitation that really brought our interactions out. I like your focus on "we experienced the ease of and FUN"... So true

Thanks for this writeup Jeff.

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