Agile-Spain Google Hangout

Yesterday (15th of January 2013) we had our first Google Hangout with the Agile Spain community. It was just an experiment, in order to check if we can take advantage of that technology, and it was a great success.

Agile Spain is a very active an healthy community, that has sub-communities in a lot of regions and cities. We have two big events every year, Agile Open Space (AOS) and Conference Agile Spain (CAS), and it allows that a lot of people with interest in Agile, from different parts of the country (and the world) gather together twice a year. So, the community works.

Marc Florit suggested in the Agile Spain list that we could use Google Hangout, based on the experience that some of us are having with xALEc. So, Jaume Jornet, took the proposal and organised the event with Google Hangout On Air.

We decided to try the Fishbowl format, because Hangout allows maximum 10 people in the room. As long as the event was "On Air", it was also broadcasted in YouTube. We agreed that maximum 9 people would be in the room, having always an empty chair. If anybody watching the event in YouTube was willing to contribute, he could join the Hangout and somebody would disconnect to leave a chair available.

The Fishbowl worked like a charm. Maybe 15 or 20 people joined the conversation (I didn't counted them) and a lot of people watched the event live and some others the recorded video afterwards.

The content of the session was initially thought as just an experiment. I explained the xALEc experience and suggested some uses of the Hangouts. Luckily, Xavi Gost suggested to talk about our recent agile experiences and that gave real content to the event.

I could see people from all around Spain, even from Peru. Some of them aren't as lucky as I am and don't have a local community. I'm sure that this opportunity will make our dear community even stronger.

That's not all. Today Carlos Iglesias suggested a new Hangout, to talk about Agile Contracts, and his suggestion immediately got answer on the list. In few hours the event was organised and at 13:00 the Hangout took place. I could not attend, but I've watched the recorded session. Amazing.

This community rocks.

You can have a look at the first Agile Spain Google Hangout on Youtube.
You can read comments in spanish in Antonio Martinez's blog.

2012 on the rear-view mirror

I've been reviewing last year, to learn things for the future and improve it in all the ways I can and I have a few lessons learned.

You can always change 

This year I switched from Linux to Mac as my personal OS. I'm not particularly happy, but it's been an experience, and it's good to challenge yourself from time to time. 

I changed my job, left my friends at Omatech (cooool company!) and joined Thomson-Reuters. 

I started taking English lessons and I joined a Postgraduate in Agile Methods. Back to school!

I learned Scala programming language.

I've learnt about the Core Protocols.

I've learnt about the power of LEGO.

I've started blogging and tweeting mainly in English.

I've ceased blogging about all the books I read.

The more I invest in Agile, the happier I am

This year I've joined a lot of activities from the Agile-Barcelona Community (my second family now). They run at least one event every week! But I also joined a Gamestorming meetup and events on NoSQL, Scala and whatever.

I attended Lean Camp, AOS2012 in Zaragoza, ALE2012, NoSQL Matters and Barcelona Testing Open Space. 

I organized a couple of events with Agile Barcelona and co-facilitated the Global Day of Code Retreat.

I've volunteered two translating projects, but I couldn't keep up.

I've read 13 books, only one was fiction, and only two were non-English.

The broader my horizon is, the better

I've got in touch with people outside my company, and it has allowed me to know a lot about how other companies (and minds) work apart of mine. 

I've met awesome people from Agile-Spain who have a lot to share and who have a lot in common to me.

I've met people from Agile-Lean Europe Earth, from France, Belgium, Romania, Finland, Italy, Portugal, South-Africa, Netherlands, Germany, Canada, ...

Every week I have a conversation with some of these guys (the xALEc), and it's a great experience.

All the time I invest in Agile, or personal development, is taken from somewhere else

This is a negative. During my Chrismas break I've come aware of the time I'm not devoting to my kids and wife. It's not an issue yet, but I'll have to find the balance.

Your body has to be able to follow your mind

Another negative. I have a physical problem that comes back from time to time (my slipped disc), and I know I have to do a lot of exercise to avoid complications. Everybody should do exercise, but I must do it in order to have an ordinary life. Sometimes a forget priorities.

Personal feedback is hard to receive

This year, for the first time, the team had a session of retrospective where all of us provided personal feedback to everyone. I heard things about me that surprised me, but I'll have to address them:

Sometimes I'm dogmatic and closed to other's ideas. I have to be more patient. I have to be aware of the tone and language I use (sometimes too strong). I have a lack of Vital Agility.

That abridged feedback I received is going to be my focus on the following weeks.

I don't have any other "new year resolution". Just, change the world.

I'm very grateful to my wife, for supporting me. And to all the people who wants to share their knowledge and experience. Thank you all.

How to kill your Retrospective Debt

The expression technical debt is widely used among the software development community. The debt is some work that should have been performed but, for any reason, there was no time to do it. Some alternative solution was found and now we are living with it. The idea of debt is that you'll have to pay for it in the future, and you'll pay more the later you pay, maybe because the code will become harder to maintain.

Sometimes you find a group (maybe a team) where there's a lot of conflict, unsolved problems or difficult communication. Maybe they have been doing retrospectives but the hard topics have never been raised. Maybe there's a lack of trust and transparency and everybody seems burnout. You have to address it, and it's not easy (if possible at all).

If all these problems had been addressed when they appeared, maybe the tension would not be that hard. If the retrospectives had worked maybe the team would feel more motivated. As long as there are things that could have been addressed in retrospectives and weren't.

I'll call it Retrospective Debt. The later the team address the problem, the harder to fix. It's a debt that the team is going to pay later. What to do?

There's no unique solution for all teams, but I'm sure that doing exactly the same they were doing won't fix anything. Maintaining the same retrospectives won't work. And a single action won't fix anything. And it won't be quick. So, faith and patience.

Maybe you'll have to think in the five dysfunctions of a team, perform some dynamics in the team like a Lego game, introduce the Core Protocols,  perform retrospectives in a different way, use some clever coaching techniques or just have some beers.

Start as soon as possible, draw a plan, address people problems. Don't look for metrics, please.

And above all, don't let your Retrospective Debt grow.

Global Day of Code Retreat 2012

Last year I was in the Global Day of Code Retreat in Barcelona, held in Runroom (their former office), organized by Agile-Barcelona and facilitated by Jaume Jornet. It was a great experience, and I learned a lot, not only about programming, but about teamwork and sharing.
This year the event was planned again in Runroom, but for difficult dates: public holidays and the Barcelona Developers Conference were difficult rivals. And this time I was a facilitator.

I agreed to co-facilitate the event with José E. Rodríguez Huerta and I joined the facilitators group and attended a training using Google Hangout. In the training we were people form New Zeland, Sweden and Australia, with an amazing trainer: Jim Hurne. The organization of the event, the sessions, the connections with other cities, and the focus of the exercises were all good lessons.

Then I started contacting with the groups around Spain that were having the same event to organize live connections.

Everybody was distilling an energy that was impossible to not be infected.

The day of the event 11 guys showed up in Barcelona (30 had confirmed), and we opened a Hangout during all day so we could be chatting with other cities. Valencia (Ricardo), Madrid (Juanma), Bilbao (Jorge), Berlin (Greg) and Viena (Michael) were some of our connections. We followed the schedule and had sessions with interesting restrictions (ping pong, no conditional, ask don't tell,...) and the programmers used Ruby, C#, Python, Java, C++ and JavaScript.

The retrospective was interesting. They suggested:

• Having a retrospective reviewing the code someone has writer
• Choose a language to use everybody in some iterations (and learn the basics of language beforehand)
• Try a randori, maybe with this language.
• More on legacy code.
• And choose a cool mechanism for the raffle 

Out of their confort zone. No pressure for getting the problem done. Try new things. Pair with new people. Thinking in a different way.

This crazy idea from Corey Haines deserves my respect. So many people crazy to become better professionals. And having fun.

Big Thank You.