R U OK – Sustainable pace in the workplace and Stress Busters
Earlier this month, I was asked to present for R U OK day at one of our clients sites.
Menu
New at the Blog
Our experts talk about what it means to solve complex client problems with 21st century frameworks and practices.
5 tips for executives getting started with agile
Getting started with agile can be daunting. So what are the real questions you should be asking? It all starts with teams and understanding that agile is not just for software or the people that report to you.
How to survive the Zombie Scrum Apocalypse
Well, at first sight Zombie Scrum seems to be normal Scrum. But it lacks a beating heart.
Agile Strategic Planning for Executives
Can you predict the future? Can it really be planned in the 21st century? In the face of relentless technological change, disruptive forces in industry after industry, global competition, and so on, strategic planning often seems like pointless wishful thinking.
Couples Counseling for Scrum Teams – Global Scrum Gathering Austin 2019
In this talk, ZXM CEO Matthew Hodgson, presents to the Global Scrum Gathering in Austin on patterns from Gottman and social psychology research to help
ZXM wins Corporate Excellence Award for Agile Training and Consultancy 2019
Zen Ex Machina is a leading Agile transformation company. Following our success in CV’s Corporate Excellence Awards, Zen Ex Machina was profiled and CV magazineÂ
Agile Leadership
What does it take to be an agile leader? 21st century leaders face a raft of challenges: technological change, disruptive forces in industry after industry, and global competition. What does leadership look like in a VUCA, highly disruptive world?
Demystifying Agile Estimation and Planning
Estimating in hours can be highly inaccurate. Estimating using relative wide band delphi like planning poker is key to understanding what you can do and when you can do it by as a team.
Agile Strategic Planning
Can you predict the future? Can it be planned in the 21st century?In the face of relentless technological change, disruptive forces in industry after industry,
Evidenced Based Management – Measuring value to enable improvement and Business Agility
Organisations invest in agile processes, tools, training, and coaching, but how much are they getting back? Has product delivery improved? How much happier are users and the
What does a Product Owner do and who should fulfil this role?
What does a Product Owner do? Is it a full time job? Are they the customer? Are they the business owner of the IT system? While it’s been nearly 20 years since the role of “Product Owner” emerged from Scrum few people still understand what a “Product Owner” is and does.
What makes a good coach?
Agile coaching is not for the faint hearted. Don’t get me wrong, it’s very rewarding, but sometimes it’s difficult when there is a lot of
Executive Agility
Many people are starting to recognise that agile has a lot to offer outside software development, but where do you start? Leadership support is critical
APAC CIO Outlook recognises ZXM as a Top 10 Agile Solution Provider 2018
ZXM was again recognised by APAC CIO Outlook as one of thw Top 10 Agile Solution Providers for the second year in a row. Revitalising
Strategic Planning in Agile
What does strategic planning in agile look like? Do we need to fully understand and agree on a strategy before we proceed to deliver new
ZXM named in Top 10 Innovative Agile Solution Providers 2018
Insights Success magazine recently release its Sept issue featuring the 10 Most innovative Agile Solution providers. Very excited that ZXM was named as one of
Isn't Agile really just a series of small experiments to build experience and learning
The State of Agile Report (Version One) consistently shows that the reason why most agile projects fail, is lack of experience. Knowledge will only get
Delivering Policy with Business Agility
How do you deliver a big policy outcome that normally takes 6 months when you only have weeks? Use Kanban WITH Scrum!
Accelerate Through Retrospectives
Teams were bored with their Retrospectives. I was bored. They were just doing mechanical Scrum. Retrospectives are such a powerful tool to drive continuous improvement, so here’s what we did to fix the problem.
Is a self-organising agile team a self-managing agile team?
The Agile Manifesto highlights that “the best architectures, requirements and designs emerge from self-organising teams”. Scrum also reinforces that the Development Team (the people developing
Estimating without a baseline
Agile Teams tend to use relative estimation rather than creating tasks, estimating hours, and then adding up all the hours. Adding up hours it fundamentally
Relative Estimating and Sizing Stories
How should we size Stories? Not by hours but through looking at new work relative to the size we gave to old work.
Getting Sizing Right with Cycle Time
Sizing in Story Points represents a significant shift from estimating in hours. Understanding cycle time is key to getting it right.
ZXM CIO recognised as one of the Most Influential Women in Scrum Coaching – Australia 2018
Recently CV Magazine profiled the creative coaching team before speaking to Mia Horrigan to find out more about the company and its extensive achievements after
Psychological Safety: Patterns from Child Psychology to Build Safety in Teams
In this presentation, ZXM’s Partner for Agile Enterprise Transformation, Matthew Hodgson, looks at psychological safety through the lens of a psychological, research-based approach to creating
APAC CIO Advisor names ZXM in Top 10 Agile Solution Companies 2017
ZXM was excited to be named in the top 10 for Agile Solution Companies 2017 by APAC CIO Outlook Magazine Executive Coaching for Business Agility
Two Teams but Oh so Different
What makes one team Scrumdiddlyumptious whilst another the Killjoys? At LAST Conference this week, I discussed a tale of two new agile teams within the
To spike or not to spike?
So, what actually is a Spike? Where does the term come from and should all agile teams use them?
Why Spotify’s agile patterns work and why you shouldn’t copy them
There is no Spotify agile model. But lots of people from Spotify keep talking about how their system of people and processes operates. It all
Becoming agile with Zen Ex Machina
Zen Ex Machina has been helping people and organisations to be agile. Digital transformation isn’t a one-size-fits-all. It requires an understanding of context, customers and
Zen Ex Machina recognised as one of the top 30 Innovative Companies to watch in 2017
Really excited that Insights Success named Zen Ex Machina as one of their top 30 innovative companies to watch in 2017. Zen Ex Machina: Simplifying
Backlog Refinement Patterns: Yin and Yang
What’s an easy way to run a Backlog Refinement session so that assumptions, risks, ideas and draft designs are identified? Yin and Yang is one of our favourite patterns.
Collaboration vs Cooperation
They sound similar, and are often conflated, but what are key differences and reasons why you might want to work collaboratively instead of just cooperatively?
What does a Product Owner do?
The Product Owner is a role in many Agile Frameworks. They are responsible for optimising the delivery of products and maximising the value of the work of the Team. But what does a Product Owner do?
What does a Scrum Master do?
The Scrum Master is a role in Scrum – an Agile Framework for optimising the delivering products. In most organisations, when someone is given responsibility
1st Conference 2017, Melbourne. Scrum: Declutter. Optimise. Deliver.
How do you unclutter the dogma surrounding Scrum’s 20 year history? Can you find its powerful Lean, user-centred powerhouse for collaborative improvement? Some people throw away
Stay up to date:
Copyright © Zen Ex Machina® and ™ (2020). All rights reserved. ABN 93 153 194 220