Stories/Change To Cycle Plan Mid-Cycle

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Change to Cycle Plan Mid-Cycle
Some of you have been following the goings on of the team I'm on in regards to switching to a system of allowing extra work (or changing it) during a cycle.

Well, this week the team I'm on had it's first big trial of this and I'm glad to say, it worked out very well.

The team was directed by the owner of the company to take themselves out of the team to work on a separate project for 20% of the cycle.

This was actually built into our Cycle Plan.

We had a major surprise change to a requirement mid-cycle. It meant the entire cycle would be blown.

The team decided to accept the changes knowing they would need to lose some other work. I have been encouraging them to think as business people and consider other factors such as customer retention (churn), overall value, current backlog list, .. basically you know... ROI type thinking... This I find, helps them understand why these changes happen.

Then came the big decision... WHAT to remove ?.. I made it very clear to the team that I had a very specific opinion but did not want to influence them in any way. I wanted them to have the opportunity to do what they felt was in the best interest of the company and the team. I would support whatever they wanted and stand behind them. However, THEY needed to make the decision.

It was interesting for me to see as they were actually very nervous about it. They had not been given such responsibility before. They have been deciding on how to do things, what order, volunteering for work... all the standard stuff.. but never something so "Product Owner" ish.

We had talked about the fact this day would come ,learned about it, but they had not had the opportunity to actually experience a real-life situation.

I put them at ease by saying "NO MATTER WHAT THE DECISION, I WILL SUPPORT YOU. We have 30 minutes.. please just start talking it out....Just let me know what you've decided and why.   I am part of the team but this one I don't want to try and influence.".

After about 20 minutes, the team had actually decided to not do the "special project" for the owner of the company. Our next cycle ends on the upcoming Wednesday. They felt that it could wait 4 days (the special project will end up being about a 5 month project to completion)., and the special emergency requirements that changed the cycle had more IMMEDIATE and effective impact. Also, the team was already working on the code where the emergency change was required.

The owner came back on Friday and the "Process Facilitator for the day" let the owner know about their decision. After discussing it logically and with a commitment from the whole team, it just made business sense to allow the right thing to get done.

I believe the owner for the first time saw that the team is making logical decisions as a group for the benefit of his company.

The team agreed with him to put 25% towards his project next cycle to make up the difference.

I call that Win-Win.

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