--- title: "5 Whys: There are no experts. There is only us." url: "https://www.5whys.com/index.md" canonical: "https://www.5whys.com/" tags: [] author: "Roy Osherove" description: "Roy Osherove on software team leadership: growing self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode, and the Elastic Leadership model. Articles, interviews and videos." usage: "Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page)." license: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" --- # 5 Whys > 5 Whys is Roy Osherove's blog about leading software teams: the Elastic Leadership model (survival, learning and self-organizing modes), growing people, and team-leader anti-patterns. HTML: https://www.5whys.com/ · Guide for AI systems: [llms.txt](https://www.5whys.com/llms.txt) · Full text: [llms-full.txt](https://www.5whys.com/llms-full.txt) ## On the home page ### [There are no experts. There is only us.](https://www.5whys.com/noexperts) 5 Whys is a blog about technical leadership in the software world. [![Cover of Elastic Leadership by Roy Osherove](https://www.5whys.com/img/cover-400.jpg) Based on the book “Elastic Leadership” by Roy Osherove (a.k.a “Notes to a Software Team Leader”)](https://www.elasticleadership.com/) #### Start here - [First Steps During Chaos](https://www.5whys.com/articles/category/First+Steps+during+chaos) Your team is in survival mode. What to do first. - [Utilizing Learning Mode](https://www.5whys.com/articles/category/Learning+Phase) Your team has some slack. How to grow people with it. - [Team Leader Manifesto](https://www.5whys.com/articles/team-leader-manifesto-take-4.html) Great teams are grown, not hired. #### Featured [All 166 articles →](https://www.5whys.com/articles) June 15, 2020 ##### [Possible Anti Pattern: A Remote Team Member is Never Ever Visible in Video Chat (Zoom, Teams)](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2020/6/15/possible-anti-pattern-a-remote-team-member-is-never-ever-visible-in-video-chat-zoom-teams) Team members that don’t show their face ever, or 99% of the time when video chatting with the team used to be OK, before COVID. But in the age of COVID this shouldn’t be the new normal. Team facilitation and communication with people’s… May 30, 2019 ##### [InfoQ Book Q&A on Elastic Leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/5/30/infoq-book-qampa-on-elastic-leadership) I had the privilege of being interviewed by Ben Linders over at InfoQ regarding my book on Elastic Leadership. You can read the article over here. Some of the main takeaways from it: A team can be either in survival mode, learning mode, or… March 22, 2019 ##### [The Elastic Leadership Model in a picture](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/3/22/the-elastic-leadership-model-in-a-picture) I realized that there isn’t one picture that shows the entire elastic leadership model with the right amount of details out there. So I made one. Would love any feedback in the comments! - [Johanna Rothman Interview - Agile, a Decade Later](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/2/16/johanna-rothman-interview-agile-a-decade-later)February 16, 2019 - [A Critical Chain of Bus Factors](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-critical-chain-of-bus-factors.html)February 22, 2017 - [Elastic Leadership Book Published](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-book-published.html)February 22, 2017 The newest article is from June 15, 2020. #### Archived Interviews [All audio interviews →](https://www.5whys.com/archived-interviews) - [**Kent Beck: an agile conversation**](https://www.5whys.com/archived-interviews#kent-beck)Audio · February 2006 - [**James Bach: the role of the tester**](https://www.5whys.com/articles/interview-james-bach-the-role-of-the-tester.html)Audio · April 2010 - [**Johanna Rothman: agile, a decade later**](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/2/16/johanna-rothman-interview-agile-a-decade-later)Audio · February 2019 #### More ##### Elastic Leadership Videos [Watch the videos](https://www.5whys.com/videos) ##### Recommended books [See the reading list](https://www.5whys.com/recommended-books) ## Pages - [There are no experts](https://www.5whys.com/noexperts.md): Roy Osherove on why there are no experts in software teams, only us, and what a team leader should do about it. - [There is only us](https://www.5whys.com/thereisonlyus.md): Roy Osherove on why there are no experts in software teams, only us. - [Archived interviews](https://www.5whys.com/archived-interviews.md): Audio interviews by Roy Osherove with Johanna Rothman, Kent Beck, Juval Lowy, David Platt, Charlie Poole and others on management and agile development, 2005 to 2006. - [Elastic Leadership videos](https://www.5whys.com/videos.md): Talks and videos by Roy Osherove about Elastic Leadership and software team leadership. - [Recommended books](https://www.5whys.com/recommended-books.md): Roy Osherove's reading list for software team leaders: Peopleware, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Behind Closed Doors and more. - [Courses](https://www.5whys.com/courses.md): Leadership and engineering courses by Roy Osherove. - [Contact](https://www.5whys.com/contact.md): Send Roy Osherove a message about team leadership, talks or workshops. ## Posts (166) ### First Steps during chaos - [Team Bus Factors: How to Reduce Them and How to Prevent Them](https://www.5whys.com/articles/team-bus-factors-how-to-reduce-them-and-how-to-prevent-them.md) (2015-10-16): There was a discussion on HN asking about good tips for team leaders. So I thought I'd chime in a bit more deeply. The following is a new chapter from the upcoming second edition of my book for software team leaders… - [A Value System for Code Reviews, and How to Scale Them for a Large Project](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-value-system-for-code-reviews-and-how-to-scale-them-for-a.md) (2014-09-18): One of my customers wanted my help is increasing their code quality. When I spoke with the developers the following conversation happened several times: Me: "Wow, this code... how many lines long is this method?" Dev… - [Signs you might be in survival mode](https://www.5whys.com/articles/signs-you-might-be-in-survival-mode.md) (2014-03-27): We had an interesting discussion in class on how one can detect you might be in survival mode. Here are some possible early warning signs: There is a perception or feeling of continuous urgency There is lack of context… - [Definition: Survival Mode](https://www.5whys.com/articles/definition-survival-mode.md) (2013-10-20): A team is in "Survival" mode if they do not have time to learn and slowly practice new skills. Such a team is usually over committed and is too busy chasing fires instead of having enough time to hone and practice the… - [Elastic Leadership in Devops Survival Mode](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-in-devops-survival-mode.md) (2013-02-24): This blog post from the devops guys , shows that the idea of “survival mode ” or chaos can exist in many different places. and a command and control leadership can help buy valuable time that you can then use for… - [Team Leader Manifesto - Take #4](https://www.5whys.com/articles/team-leader-manifesto-take-4.md) (2012-06-06): Here's what I have, before speaking at NDC next morning: - [Team Leader Manifesto - Take #3](https://www.5whys.com/articles/team-leader-manifesto-take-3.md) (2012-06-06): As team leaders our goal, and the way we measure our work, is the overall growth in skills of self organization and self maintenance of each person of our team, and the team as a whole. To that end: We accept that the… - [On time, with quality - why is this mostly failing?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/on-time-with-quality-why-is-this-mostly-failing.md) (2012-05-06): Everyone in the software industry seems to be talking about the quality mantra lately. Agile, XP and kanban brought this issue to full front, but I see many team leads failing with the quality part. Many of us keep… - [Middle Management or puppet management?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/middle-management-or-puppet-management.md) (2012-05-06): Most team leaders I've seen in lead roles usually feel quite helpless. Someone put them in their position, and no one taught them how to do their jobs. So they are mostly developers who are just trying to keep the… - [What should a good code review look and feel like?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/what-should-a-good-code-review-look-and-feel-like.md) (2012-05-02): The way I see code reviews, is that they are a great cover for learning, mentoring _and_ finding interesting quality issues in your code. If our main goal as leaders is to grow our teams, then code reviews are a great… - [Do new startup leaders need to grow their teams?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/do-new-startup-leaders-need-to-grow-their-teams.md) (2012-05-01): I've been involved with several small startups. My feeling is that in the first few weeks or months of a startup's life, your main goal is to make sure you're running in the right direction. You're about to release… - [The Chaos Addiction](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-chaos-addiction.md) (2011-08-07): I'm convinced more than ever these days, that being in chaos is a self perpetuating state of being, unless drastic measures are taken. It is a pattern of addiction , in that it reinforces the bad habits that lead to… - [Video: How to manage a person who is always late to a standup meeting](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-how-to-manage-a-person-who-is-always-late-to-a-standup.md) (2011-07-30): I came across this common question on LinkedIn: How do you manage a person who is always late to a standup meeting? My thoughts on it are below, and the answer of course, depends on the three stages of software team… - [Video: Mistake #1 - Not Understanding Team Maturity](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-mistake-1-not-understanding-team-maturity.md) (2011-07-28): I recently posted my slides about ten mistakes team leaders make. I thought I'd take some time for each mistake and do a short video on it. Here's the first one: Watch on YouTube Team Leader Mistakes #1 - Not… - [Video: Ten Mistakes Software Team Leaders Make](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-ten-mistakes-software-team-leaders-make.md) (2011-07-20): I've just finished a two day Elastic Leadership course - Essential Skills for software team leaders, in London. I'll be doing another one in November. During that time, I've also spoken at an "in the brain" session at… - [The Fear Of Failure And What To Do About It](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-fear-of-failure-and-what-to-do-about-it.md) (2011-06-30): I'm embedding this very inspiring video of Milton Glaser talking about The Fear Of Failure, because it has so much to do with your own personal development as a leader in your organization. Most team leaders are really… - [What to do if some people in the team just don't want to take a task?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/what-to-do-if-some-people-in-the-team-just-dont-want-to-take.md) (2011-06-06): Recently I found this question on LinkedIn: We just started using Scrum in our organization and today is the last day of our first sprint. In the beginning, after the second part of the sprint planning the tasks were… - [Video: Elastic Leadership in software - InfoQ interview](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-elastic-leadership-in-software-infoq-interview.md) (2011-04-15): during the recent QCON London 2011 Conference, Michael Hunger of Infoq interviewed me about what I later started describing as “ Elastic Leadership ” – The team leader changes her leadership style (dictator all the way… - [12 Behavior Anti Patterns You Will Face As a Software Team Leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/12-behavior-anti-patterns-you-will-face-as-a-software-team-l.md) (2011-04-11): Most of these, we covered today on the 1st day of my Lead Better course that is taking place in Oslo , with live simulations. The purpose was to see how a team lead deals with these anti patterns when going through team… - [Slides: Team Leadership In the Age of Agile](https://www.5whys.com/articles/slides-team-leadership-in-the-age-of-agile.md) (2011-03-19): Here are the slides I've used during my latest talk at QCON london 2011 : In this talk I explore the three maturity stages of a software team, and how a team leader can adjust their leadership type based on the current… - [Video – Code Leaders and Beautiful Teams](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-ndash-code-leaders-and-beautiful-teams.md) (2010-05-24): Here’s the video of a talk about team leadership and beautiful teams I gave at QCON London this year. You can download the slides for this presentation here. This talk is mainly about the first stage (out of the three… - [The 3 maturity stages of a software team and how scrum fails to identify them](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-3-maturity-stages-of-a-software-team-and-how-scrum-fails.md) (2010-05-17): Many so called ‘Agile’ teams fail so miserably to deliver for the simple fact that the teams simply are not mature enough to be part of an agile process that requires self managing teams. I’ve learned to recognize three… - [Do Not Fear Confrontation](https://www.5whys.com/articles/do-not-fear-confrontation.md) (2009-10-24): hope the sound wasn't too weak... Watch on YouTube Team Leads: Do Not Fear Confrontation - [A simple way to know you're missing some leadership skills](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-simple-way-to-know-youre-missing-some-leadership-skills.md) (2009-10-15): how often does this happen to you as a team lead: You believe in some great practices that the team needs to follow, but you can't convince or get the team to follow them - even the simplest ones. If that happens to you… - [Spend at least 50% of your time with your team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/spend-at-least-50-of-your-time-with-your-team.md) (2009-09-10): To be an effective team lead, you need to actually spend time with your team. Otherwise, you won't be able to do daily stand-ups , do code reviews , or sit down and pair with a team member every once in a while. And no… - [Step #4 - Start doing code reviews – Seriously](https://www.5whys.com/articles/step-4-start-doing-code-reviews-seriously.md) (2009-09-08): 2009, Sep 9 As one team lead to another, as someone who has actually done this with a real team, I can tell you that this is one of the few effective techniques to maintain a high quality bar in your code base, and to… - [Daily Standup Meetings - Introduction and 5 useful tips](https://www.5whys.com/articles/daily-standup-meetings-introduction-and-5-useful-tips.md) (2009-09-06): A daily standup meeting is one of the easiest practices you can implement with your team. It only takes 10-15 minutes at the beginning of each day, and it increases the amount of communication and synchronization in the… - [If you don’t own your team, Someone else will](https://www.5whys.com/articles/if-you-dont-own-your-team-someone-else-will.md) (2009-09-06): One of the first steps I suggest new team leads do is to take ownership of their team and territory . There were a couple of comments, both on the blog and on twitter that questioned whether this was the right thing to… - [Step #2 – Use a big visible board with post it notes](https://www.5whys.com/articles/step-2-use-a-big-visible-board-with-post-it-notes.md) (2009-09-05): Most team leads really have no idea how many things their developers are doing at the same time. There is a very simple tools that you can use starting today . Take a white board and place it in an area where your whole… - [Step #1 – Claim Your Territory, Own your team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/step-1-claim-your-territory-own-your-team.md) (2009-09-05): Many dev leads don’t seem to easily see that their territory is constantly compromised by people from the outside. Compromising territory can be in many simple forms, but they all hurt the leadership and ownership… ### Learning Phase - [Two Techniques to Avoid the Bus Factor In your Teams: Push and Pull](https://www.5whys.com/articles/two-techniques-to-avoid-the-bus-factor-in-your-teams-push-an.md) (2013-09-06): I spoke before on this blog about BUS FACTORS and how to get rid of them . A bus factor is calculated the the amount of people on your team or project who need to get hit by a bus before the project comes to a halt… - [Should you grow even a short-term consultant in your team?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/should-you-grow-even-a-short-term-consultant-in-your-team.md) (2012-05-06): What if you have a short-term consultant on your team? What if you're the team lead for just this project, and there will be a new team lead in the next project? Should you work on growing people even in those… - [If you're looking for a QA to automate your tests, you've started to fail](https://www.5whys.com/articles/if-youre-looking-for-a-qa-to-automate-your-tests-youve-start.md) (2012-05-06): If you are looking for someone to join the QA team to automate tests, the failure is in the way the system is built. Your *developers* should be proficient (or start learning how to) in automating the tests, creating… - [Chapter four - commitment language - is online](https://www.5whys.com/articles/chapter-four-commitment-language-is-online.md) (2012-05-02): I've just released a new chapter to my team leader book. Chapter 4 is about commitment language, as the first step as part of the learning stage. It's about bringing your team closer into Integrity thinking, and an… - [Grow your "feature teams" into just "teams"](https://www.5whys.com/articles/grow-your-feature-teams-into-just-teams.md) (2012-05-01): A feature team, as I see it, is a team consisting of all the people needed to accomplish a released specific feature. So on such a team you might have an architect, a DBA, a coder, a UI guy, a frontend guy etc.. In that… - [You're not self organizing if you have a go-to architect](https://www.5whys.com/articles/youre-not-self-organizing-if-you-have-a-go-to-architect.md) (2012-05-01): I realized that while I was writing the previous post , I came up with another simple way to tell if your team is self organizing or not, In my courses , people always ask me, how to tell if I'm in chaos, learning or… - [The architect as a leader, and other specialists](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-architect-as-a-leader-and-other-specialists.md) (2012-05-01): To me, if you have an architect on your team, their role should be To act as an unofficial leader in the team that mentors and teaches people on the team about architecture To make themselves unneeded - that their… - [How to be an effective code coach](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-be-an-effective-code-coach.md) (2011-12-12): As a technical team leader, you might expect others to become better coders. You can also be a coach for them by pairing with each person for a few hours each week. Being an effective code coach means that you pair with… - [Video: The Mistake at the heart of Agile - Michael Feathers, NDC 2011](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-the-mistake-at-the-heart-of-agile-michael-feathers-ndc.md) (2011-06-17): A video was embedded here. Its host (Viddler) has shut down, so it is no longer available. I think this video, recorded at NDC 2011 , goes well with this post I just finished writing , actually, about bursting your… - [Burst your team's bubble - stop protecting them from the surrounding organization](https://www.5whys.com/articles/burst-your-teams-bubble-stop-protecting-them-from-the-surrou.md) (2011-06-17): During the learning phase of your team , one of the nicest things you can do for your team members, is to stop protecting them from the surrounding organization. It was a great thing to do during the chaos phase, when… - [What are you going to do about it?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/what-are-you-going-to-do-about-it.md) (2011-02-03): A couple of Days ago I finished the first “Lead Better” course for software team leaders in Oslo. It was the first time I had done this course out of Israel. It was a great feeling to get the following email today from… - [Exclude a team member – and you’re an idiot](https://www.5whys.com/articles/exclude-a-team-member-and-youre-an-idiot.md) (2010-05-25): Don’t exclude people in your team. It’s important that all people in your team are treated as equals and with respect. It may feel like a “duh” moment, but people get offended, deeply if they are left out of the loop… - [The Bus Factor - Why your ‘best’ developer is your biggest problem](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-bus-factor-why-your-best-developer-is-your-biggest-probl.md) (2010-05-17): From wikipedia , a “Bus Factor” is: an irreverent measurement of concentration of information in a single person, or very few people. The bus factor is the total number of key developers who would need to be… - [My team keeps breaking their promises. What can I do?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/my-team-keeps-breaking-their-promises-what-can-i-do.md) (2010-05-09): Execution – actually having the team get things done– requires people to : Say what they will do Mean it (be committed) Do it Everyone likes to do #1. Only some do #2. Great teams also do #3. This post is about #2… - [Move-Around kata for team leaders](https://www.5whys.com/articles/move-around-kata-for-team-leaders.md) (2010-02-14): Here’s an experiment for software team leaders: a set of katas (things you repeat exactly the same way many times). Let’s try to do the following kata once a day: Move-Around Get out of your chair and lock your computer… - [Creating Team Trust](https://www.5whys.com/articles/creating-team-trust.md) (2009-12-13): Editor’s note: The following post was written by Johanna Rothman . Johanna helps managers and leaders solve problems and seize opportunities. She consults, speaks, and writes on managing high-technology product… - [The Five Dysfunctions of a Team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-five-dysfunctions-of-a-team.md) (2009-12-08): As part of my reading, one book i came across was The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable it’s a great book and i recommend that every team leader, at any level, read this. it connects very well to many… - [How to influence others](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-influence-others.md) (2009-11-30): Two books I’ve been occupied with recently deal directly with a very problematic topic for most team leaders world wide – how do you influence people in your team and your organization to either change or help you… - [Dev Anti Pattern: Unworkable Machine](https://www.5whys.com/articles/dev-anti-pattern-unworkable-machine.md) (2009-10-24): Summary: A developer in your team always has problems with their machine, to the point where they are less productive, and always trying to fix something before they can get things done. Usually this gets noticed during… - [4 ways to discover a stuck team member, and what you can do about it](https://www.5whys.com/articles/4-ways-to-discover-a-stuck-team-member-and-what-you-can-do-a.md) (2009-09-06): More than five years ago I wrote on my .NET blog a little sad story about how I got fired from my job as a developer. You can read the full story here . Here is my summary in the context of five or so years ago: “As… ### Anti Patterns - [A Realistic HackerRank Developer Interview Question List](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-realistic-hackerrank-developer-interview-question-list.md) (2015-07-09): When I was looking for a new job it always puzzled me that companies looking for senior developers, team leaders, architects and Dev managers were asking me to fill out silly hackerrank style questions such as : * How… - [Assume you are wrong](https://www.5whys.com/articles/assume-you-are-wrong.md) (2012-06-21): Here's a chat conversation that actually happened. See if you can find all the places where each person is telling themselves a story about the other person, and then assuming its true, and notice how volatile the… - [You Can't Fire Everyone](https://www.5whys.com/articles/you-cant-fire-everyone.md) (2011-12-09): If you go through your leadership career wondering "if only I'd been stuck with a better team of developers - we'd do much better" - you're doing it wrong. Management - done right, is a tough job. That's why you get… - [Don't be afraid to become management](https://www.5whys.com/articles/dont-be-afraid-to-become-management.md) (2011-12-08): If you do it right, your fears can mostly be wrong. If you do it wrong - your fears will mostly be right. So I just made this late night video to talk about that: Watch on YouTube Don't be afraid to become management - [Three reasons not to have your own private office](https://www.5whys.com/articles/three-reasons-not-to-have-your-own-private-office.md) (2011-10-02): When I was just starting out as a team lead, I remember bemoaning to myself how I wasn't being 'appreciated' enough to have my own office. For geeks like it is can often feel like a status symbol. But the more time goes… - [Technical Anti Patterns Arising from Social Inadequacy](https://www.5whys.com/articles/technical-anti-patterns-arising-from-social-inadequacy.md) (2011-09-19): The book Roundtable on Technical Leadership (SHAPE Forum Dialogues) by Jerry Weinberg is a treasure trove of interesting things that give words to feelings I've had during my work as a team leader and with other team… - [Distributed Team Evasion Tactic - Away or Offline](https://www.5whys.com/articles/distributed-team-evasion-tactic-away-or-offline.md) (2011-08-30): Evasion tactics make sure you as a manager don't have to confront employees, or even engage with them. Engaging with your team is part of your job as a manager. It's *supposed* to be difficult. That's why you get paid… - [Spread your workload](https://www.5whys.com/articles/spread-your-workload.md) (2011-08-27): The following is a guest post by John Hill . You can submit your own guest posts here. John is a .NET Team Leader / Senior Developer for a small Australian CMS software development company. During my many years of… - [Video: Team Leadership in the Age of Agile](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-team-leadership-in-the-age-of-agile.md) (2011-07-08): during QCon 2011 in London, I gave a talk about the new qualities that team leaders need to make agile succeed. It's a very small fraction of what I cover and coach during my upcoming course. See the full video here… - [Yelling at team members](https://www.5whys.com/articles/yelling-at-team-members.md) (2011-06-17): This is perhaps one of the worst things a team leader could ever do with a team. Multiply that by 10 if that yelling is done in public. It does not matter *how much* frustration you feel. It does not matter *how* much… - [A good leader won't need to ask](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-good-leader-wont-need-to-ask.md) (2011-06-06): A good team leader would not need to ask you about the good things you've done in the past year. They should be attentive enough to your personal progress, and helping you shape your learning, that they might actually… - [How to annoy your customer with usability problems](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-annoy-your-customer-with-usability-problems.md) (2010-07-03): You can’t download the software. you have to buy it and ship it on a CD set. You HAVE to buy it with headphones, and you HAVE to pay extra taxes for the shipping. During the installation process, multiple DOS windows… - [my worst team leaders](https://www.5whys.com/articles/my-worst-team-leaders.md) (2010-02-14): my worst team leaders Didn’t bother to check or see if I was stuck on something Didn’t coach me or teach me to be a better developer or team mate Didn’t earn my trust in their technical skills Didn’t have a problem with… - [How to deal with bad decisions made by the team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-deal-with-bad-decisions-made-by-the-team.md) (2009-11-16): I’ve been going through the book “ Succeeding with Agile ” by Mike Cohn. I like what I see so far because it talks about the various failures that happen to us all when we try to implement change in our companies and… ### Meta - [Developing Critical Team Thinking](https://www.5whys.com/articles/developing-critical-team-thinking.md) (2013-02-25): Borrowing a few terms from critical thinking, this is another map, or model, of how I feel I need to guide my teams. When do I feel like I have successful gotten my team where they could have been all along? Here is a… - [Things to consider when building a new team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/things-to-consider-when-building-a-new-team.md) (2012-12-26): Look for inherent knowledge creating experts(leaders) A potential leader is someone who is a bottleneck. an expert. They can become a leader by coaching and sharing on that knowledge. Architects are a good example. If… - [Elastic Leadership Team Survival Vs. Team Chaos Vs. Cynefin](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-team-survival-vs-team-chaos-vs-cynefin.md) (2012-07-30): I've decided that the word ' chaos ' isn't a good match to describe the phase where a team has no time to learn. Instead, the word 'survival' is going to be used from now on. There are several reasons for this: 1) The… - [Different ways to view organizational change](https://www.5whys.com/articles/different-ways-to-view-organizational-change.md) (2012-05-04): I've written about how to change your organization in a couple of places, but I also highly suggest you read this very interesting blog post referencing different models, some of which I've only had a glipse at uptil… - [Software Team Leader Manifesto - Take #2](https://www.5whys.com/articles/software-team-leader-manifesto-take-2.md) (2012-02-23): after the first one, here's what I have so far. Your comments are appreciated. We believe the role of a team leader is to also grow the people in their team, and themselves, and that this will create the most value for… - [A Manifesto For Software Team Leaders - Take 1](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-manifesto-for-software-team-leaders-take-1.md) (2011-12-08): It occurs to me that a manifesto for a software team leader is not a bad idea. And, I intentionally not want it to be an "Agile" related manifesto, but more of a management/people/leadership manifesto that applies to… - [Five Questions to ask yourself when getting advice about team leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/five-questions-to-ask-yourself-when-getting-advice-about-tea.md) (2011-09-13): Go through each guest post in in this blog , and ask yourself the following questions about it: In what maturity stage does this suggestion make sense? What would happen if I exercise this suggestion during each of the… - [Elastic Leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership.md) (2011-04-04): Elastic leadership is about team context . It is about understanding that you need to lead the team differently, based on which phase you discover the team is in . The phases can change from day to day or week to week… - [3 Quotes about Leadership we should listen to](https://www.5whys.com/articles/3-quotes-about-leadership-we-should-listen-to.md) (2010-07-18): Some inspiring words from twitterverse today: @WilnaMurphy: You can never cross the ocean unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore. - Christopher Columbus. @leadershipcoach: "If I had asked people what… - [Scrum vs. Kanban attitudes](https://www.5whys.com/articles/scrum-vs-kanban-attitudes.md) (2010-06-13): If you’re wondering about choosing Kanban or Scrum for your team or organization, I’ve found this post to be very enlightening on the differences in attitude and change provocation between the two. I’ve also found that… - [Interview: Patrick Kua : Agile Coach](https://www.5whys.com/articles/interview-patrick-kua-agile-coach.md) (2010-04-21): This time, I talk with Patrick Kua , an Agile Coach living in the UK, about various subjects. Among them – the various types of tests, what is “Done”?, The difference between Team Leader and Team Manager and more… - [The three stages of learning team leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-three-stages-of-learning-team-leadership.md) (2009-09-10): or anything else, for that matter: Shu-Ha-Ri : Practices Principles Values *see related to this: Source: ShuHaRi and competence Cockburn on ShuHaRi This blog is right now at the "Practices" stage: Lots of "Do this" and… ### Growing People - [Feeling Stupid is Highly Recommended](https://www.5whys.com/articles/feeling-stupid-is-highly-recommended.md) (2013-02-10): So, to show you that the whole idea of taking risks and feeling stupid or frustrated is actually a good thing, because it's the only way to really learn a new skill, here are videos from my second day ever doing any… - [Video: Lejla Giske on Listening Modes and Techniques](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-lejla-giske-on-listening-modes-and-techniques.md) (2012-09-14): while at bouvet here in Norway, I'm getting to meet lots of interesting new people. It's a shame for those conversations to go to waste, so if they are interesting, I record what they have to say (not my job… - [Video: The Team Leader Manifesto, Growing Effective Teams](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-the-team-leader-manifesto-growing-effective-teams.md) (2012-06-15): Here is my talk from NDCOslo 2012 , two weeks ago. It details my current view and thoughts about the role of the team leader, and the manifesto is a good way to capture that. A video was embedded here. It is no longer… - [Check-in: sharing emotions in an effective way](https://www.5whys.com/articles/check-in-sharing-emotions-in-an-effective-way.md) (2009-10-23): In this blogpost I will cover “The Check-In Protocol” portion of The Core Protocols which are available for download at http://alturl.com/b9fn One of the most effective and, consequently, one of the most controversial… - [The hidden leadership lessons we can learn from music conductors](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-hidden-leadership-lessons-we-can-learn-from-music-conduc.md) (2009-10-21): This very inspiring video raises many questions and analogies to our technical world of leadership: Watch the talk on TED.com (Itay Talgam: Lead like the great conductors) I'd sure love to sit with Itay (the presenter)… - [The Core Protocols Introduction](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-core-protocols-introduction.md) (2009-10-16): Roy has asked me if I wanted to write a few guest posts on the 5 Why’s about The Core Protocols. I will start by explaining where these rules came from. This story starts in 1995. Jim McCarthy wrote Dynamics of Software… - [How to measure programmer productivity using TDD Katas](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-measure-programmer-productivity-using-tdd-katas.md) (2009-09-30): A TDD Kata is an exercise in writing code, test first, which one repeats once or more a day. Here's an example of one . I make students that take my TDD course do this kata each morning, in the space of 30 minutes. Near… - [Leading Through Learning: The Responsibilities of a Team Leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/leading-through-learning-the-responsibilities-of-a-team-lead.md) (2009-09-30): Editor's note: The following is a guest post from Cory Foy . Cory Foy is an agile coach and developer living in Bayonet Point, FL. He is currently helping product teams become much more lean in their approaches to… - [Be Productive and Go Mouseless](https://www.5whys.com/articles/be-productive-and-go-mouseless.md) (2009-09-25): Watch on YouTube Go Mouseless - [Growing developers: Ask for solutions instead of giving them](https://www.5whys.com/articles/growing-developers-ask-for-solutions-instead-of-giving-them.md) (2009-09-18): This post is part of the " Growing Developers " guidance. One of the best things you can do for the developers on your team is to stop giving them the solutions to problems they are facing, and instead ask them to find… - [5 ways to grow great developers instead of desperately looking for them](https://www.5whys.com/articles/5-ways-to-grow-great-developers-instead-of-desperately-looki.md) (2009-09-16): One of the most common phrases you hear from managers about lack of agile adoption in their team is We don't have that kind of 'super' developer here. We just have ordinary day folks - they can't handle it. And We can't… ### Video - [Ask Royo #1 - Team Leadership and Influence Edition](https://www.5whys.com/articles/ask-royo-1-team-leadership-and-influence-edition.md) (2014-11-03): A new experiment I'm making. Twieet me questions about anything relating to leadership or software dev, and I'll try to answer as best I can if I have any knowledge in the area. In this episode I answer the following… - [Video: The Coaching Architect](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-the-coaching-architect.md) (2013-02-01): A few days ago I gave a talk at the Architect Meetup here in Oslo. It was about the role of the architect, and how to become a coaching architect. I hope you enjoy this video. Watch on YouTube The Coaching Leader &… - [Video (Hebrew): On Time, With Quality? Yeah Right.](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-hebrew-on-time-with-quality-yeah-right.md) (2012-09-18): A few months ago I gave a talk at at secret military base in Israel. It was for some of the future tech leaders growing in the womb of Israel's technical military units. It talks about leadership, and how to make it… - [Leadership and management talk videos from NDC Oslo](https://www.5whys.com/articles/leadership-and-management-talk-videos-from-ndc-oslo.md) (2012-06-15): There weren't many of those, but here are some talks from NDC Oslo 2012 that you might find interesting: The Software Team Leader Manifesto (me) Panel - The State of Agile and the road ahead What does Self-Organizing… - [Choice](https://www.5whys.com/articles/choice.md) (2010-06-23): Maybe all Microsoft developers need to watch this http://66.29.219.11/conery_ndc_talk.mp4 - [Video - Pair Programming with a Guitar](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-pair-programming-with-a-guitar.md) (2009-10-27): Sure, Pair programming sounds a bit weird at first, but just show this video to those who aren't yet inspired to do it. via Naresh , living proof that pair programming can work beautifully in many areas :) A video was… - [Video: Influence Strategies](https://www.5whys.com/articles/video-influence-strategies.md) (2009-10-16): Richard banks posted what seems to be an interesting video about "Influence Strategies", based in Linda Rising 's work. I'd also recommend taking a look at his "Management" tag on his blog for some interesting gems… - [Be Productive and Stop Using XML](https://www.5whys.com/articles/be-productive-and-stop-using-xml.md) (2009-09-25): Watch on YouTube Stop using XML - [IDCC talk: Beautiful teams and code leaders is online](https://www.5whys.com/articles/idcc-talk-beautiful-teams-and-code-leaders-is-online.md) (2009-09-15): yesterday the first IDCC conference took place - it is a grass roots community driven conference and it was great! My talk on beautiful teams and code leaders is online here (in Hebrew). The list of questions every team… ### Courses - [Two Day Leadership Workshop–London April 11-12](https://www.5whys.com/articles/two-day-leadership-workshopndashlondon-april-11-12.md) (2013-02-03): I would love to see you at my upcoming two day workshop in London . Place is limited to 20 participants. The workshop is for architects, team leaders, and managers of software people. The point? Learn how to make the… - [Elastic, Agile, Adaptive Leadership Workshop, January 31 2013, Oslo](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-agile-adaptive-leadership-workshop-january-31-2013-o.md) (2013-01-16): This January, the 31st, I will be giving a two day Workshop for team leaders, architects, and scrum masters, titled Elastic, Agile, Adaptive Leadership. If you’re interested in joining, please contact me directly (or… - [Upcoming leadership 1 day courses in sweden](https://www.5whys.com/articles/upcoming-leadership-1-day-courses-in-sweden.md) (2012-06-20): I will be joining foo-cafe in sweden to do some one-day courses with them. If all goes well, this will be a continuous schedule every month : Stockholm, November 2. 2012 - Essential Skills and elastic leadership for… - [Elastic Leadership course in Amsterdam - July](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-course-in-amsterdam-july.md) (2012-05-06): Join me this July for two days of elastic team leadership workshop. Learn new skills, get out of your comfort zone, and learn to lead better. We can tackle all the hard questions together. I'm also looking for a venue… - [Lead Better Bucharest Edition - This Month](https://www.5whys.com/articles/lead-better-bucharest-edition-this-month.md) (2012-03-03): I'm happy to say that I'll be visiting Bucharest on the 22-23 of this month. This is the first time ever I'm visiting there and I'm bringing my new course - Lead Better (which is based on this blog, and and the new book… - [Stavanger Norway Elastic Leadership Course](https://www.5whys.com/articles/stavanger-norway-elastic-leadership-course.md) (2011-11-29): This is very short notice, (which is why there is a surprise) - but During December 15-16, I'll be doing my Elastic Leadership Course "Lead Better" in Stavanger, Norway. It is based on my experiences blogged here at… - [Oslo Lead Better Workshop - August 8-9 2011](https://www.5whys.com/articles/oslo-lead-better-workshop-august-8-9-2011.md) (2011-07-24): This August, I will be running my two day workshop in Oslo , for new and experienced team leaders about elastic leadership of software teams - called "Lead Better". You can register here. Feel free to contact me… - [London Team Leader Course this July](https://www.5whys.com/articles/london-team-leader-course-this-july.md) (2011-06-17): I'll be in London next month, teaching my new two day "Lead Better" course - essential skills for team leaders. I hope you'll join me! Why should you care about this course? Have you ever come across these situations?… ### Guest Post - [12 Lessons Learned for a New Team Lead](https://www.5whys.com/articles/12-lessons-learned-for-a-new-team-lead.md) (2013-02-02): This guest post is by Oren Ellenbogen . I’ve personally known Oren for a few years, and he is one of those people that you just know you will be seeing on the cover of some tech newspaper sometime in a a few years. Oren… - [Go see, ask why, show respect](https://www.5whys.com/articles/go-see-ask-why-show-respect.md) (2011-09-13): The following is guest post by Horia Sluşanschi . Contribute your own here. About Horia: Horia is a passionate Agile Coach, serving as the leader of the HP Agile Mentoring Office, and the HP Software Engineering… - [Appraisals and Agile Don't Play Nicely](https://www.5whys.com/articles/appraisals-and-agile-dont-play-nicely.md) (2011-09-05): The following is a guest post by Gary Reynolds . Contribute your own here. Gary is a Development Manager for a global software company, with particular expertise in transitioning teams from 'traditional' software… - [Making your team manage their own work](https://www.5whys.com/articles/making-your-team-manage-their-own-work.md) (2011-09-02): The following is a guest post by Lior Friedman . Contribute your own here. About Lior: I’m an Agile coach and Software Craftsman with more than fifteen years of experience. In recent years I consult and train teams… - [Change your mind: your product is your team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/change-your-mind-your-product-is-your-team.md) (2011-08-13): The following is a guest post by Jose Ramón Díaz , Agile coach at Biko. About Jose: My experience has always been in software development in the Java world. I am currently in charge of a development team in Biko2. I am… - [Leadership and the mature team](https://www.5whys.com/articles/leadership-and-the-mature-team.md) (2010-05-18): The following is a guest post by Mike Burrows . Until last year a developer, project leader and development manager in investment banking, Mike is now an IT Director in the energy risk management industry, still leading… ### people patterns - [How to plan and influence change at your company](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-plan-and-influence-change-at-your-company.md) (2009-12-10): In the book “Influencer” , the authors describe six forces that work together to influence any particular human behavior that we might want to change. The forces that influence behavior are: Personal Motivation : Why… - [Be more approachable in five minutes](https://www.5whys.com/articles/be-more-approachable-in-five-minutes.md) (2009-10-28): I found this blog post interesting because it starts out with a simple premise: you are not as "approachable" as you think. It also introduces the concept of " Daily Five Minutes ". That article is pretty long, but this… - [A Possible Job Description: Team Leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-possible-job-description-team-leader.md) (2009-10-16): Editor's Note: This is a guest post by Kevin Stevens. Kevin Stevens is a Senior Software Engineer at Ecology & Environment in Buffalo, NY. He claims to be the only person who has a B.A. in acting, a B.S. in Computer… - [How to squeeze a decision out of a sleepy meeting](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-squeeze-a-decision-out-of-a-sleepy-meeting.md) (2009-10-15): Yves has a short and to the point post - There's a simple protocol you can try for that. - [Why managing a software team can be more effective than "regular" management](https://www.5whys.com/articles/why-managing-a-software-team-can-be-more-effective-than-regu.md) (2009-09-24): Over on the team leadership mailing list , Yves claimed: "Is leading a software team different then leading another team? No it's not. Can it help to know about writing software? yes if you can also let go of control… - [Immediate and delayed satisfaction in software development](https://www.5whys.com/articles/immediate-and-delayed-satisfaction-in-software-development.md) (2009-09-10): All our lives we're told a mantra that keeps repeating itself. We hear it as children when we want an ice cream, and we hear it as adults when we want that brand new car, or that holiday vacation: Have some patience But… ### Audio - [Audio Book - Notes to a Software Team Leader, Now Available](https://www.5whys.com/articles/audio-book-notes-to-a-software-team-leader-now-available.md) (2013-08-15): Good news everyone ! After more than a year in the making, the text version of my book for team leaders is in final production stages, and the audio version is now already available. You can purchase the audio book in… - [Kevlin Henney – 3 things every programmer should know](https://www.5whys.com/articles/kevlin-henney-ndash-3-things-every-programmer-should-know.md) (2010-05-08): During the ACCU 2010 conference in London, I got to get on audio, several of the interesting people who attended and spoke at the conference. One of them was Kevlin Henney . I first got to see him speaking during NDC… - [Interview: James Bach – The role of the tester](https://www.5whys.com/articles/interview-james-bach-the-role-of-the-tester.md) (2010-04-19): During the ACCU 2010 conference in London (at which I am still stuck due to the ash cloud while writing this), I got to speak with many interesting people, and even recorded some of those conversations. One of the talks… - [A bunch of (old) audio interviews on management and agile methodologies](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-bunch-of-old-audio-interviews-on-management-and-agile-meth.md) (2009-09-29): Here are a bunch of audio interviews I did a loong while ago, but I feel that at least some of them still hold true today. Johanna Rothman - Secrets of great management (01/12/05) Johanna Rothman keeps coming back to… ### Link Love - [The Clean Coder](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-clean-coder.md) (2011-06-17): Robert Martin (uncle bob to many), released a new book - The Clean Coder : I had the honor of contributing a section to the book, called "A language of commitment", and it's based, in many ways, about this blog post… - [Confessions of a First Time Manager](https://www.5whys.com/articles/confessions-of-a-first-time-manager.md) (2009-12-14): Tim Barcz just became a manager of a large group of people. And he’s got some advice for you ! - [Other blogs on management and leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/other-blogs-on-management-and-leadership.md) (2009-12-01): Rands in Repose Noop Pawerl Brodzinski Scott Berkun Software by Rob podcast by David Meister Podcast: Manager tools got more? - [9 Articles from Joel On software for Tech Leads](https://www.5whys.com/articles/9-articles-from-joel-on-software-for-tech-leads.md) (2009-09-15): JoelOnSoftware has a bunch of links under the heading of "Tech Lead". I've read some of them, but for future reference I'll post them here as well: Two Stories Human Task Switches Considered Harmful Lord Palmerston on… ### Shu - [How to say NO by saying YES](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-say-no-by-saying-yes-1.md) (2009-09-14): Johanna Rothman, a dear friend and one of the most excellent management consultants I've seen, has a post about managers who won't take no for an answer . Read it, it's interesting! But I'd like to approach the same… - [Document Your Air, Food, and Water](https://www.5whys.com/articles/document-your-air-food-and-water.md) (2009-09-14): Editor's note: The following is a guest post by Travis Illig . Travis Illig is a .NET developer who enjoys the art of solving problems with technology. He is currently a Senior Software Developer with Fiserv, working on… - [How to find hidden problems in your project before it’s too late](https://www.5whys.com/articles/how-to-find-hidden-problems-in-your-project-before-its-too-l.md) (2009-09-08): A team lead I met a couple of years ago told me of a very effective technique he used in new projects and teams where he didn’t yet know what’s really going on, the team members, or all of the things that needed to be… - [Making Impossible Decisions Without Panicking](https://www.5whys.com/articles/making-impossible-decisions-without-panicking.md) (2009-09-07): Sometimes you're faced with a question that only has bad answers. A while ago one of my friends was faced with exactly one of those: It turns out that the technology the team chose to use on the project was not scalable… ### More posts from 2015–2020 - [Possible Anti Pattern: A Remote Team Member is Never Ever Visible in Video Chat (Zoom, Teams)](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2020/6/15/possible-anti-pattern-a-remote-team-member-is-never-ever-visible-in-video-chat-zoom-teams.md) (2020-06-15): Team members that don’t show their face ever, or 99% of the time when video chatting with the team used to be OK, before COVID. But in the age of COVID this shouldn’t be the new normal. Team facilitation and… - [InfoQ Book Q&A on Elastic Leadership](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/5/30/infoq-book-qampa-on-elastic-leadership.md) (2019-05-30): I had the privilege of being interviewed by Ben Linders over at InfoQ regarding my book on Elastic Leadership. You can read the article over here. Some of the main takeaways from it: A team can be either in survival… - [The Elastic Leadership Model in a picture](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/3/22/the-elastic-leadership-model-in-a-picture.md) (2019-03-22): I realized that there isn’t one picture that shows the entire elastic leadership model with the right amount of details out there. So I made one. Would love any feedback in the comments! - [Johanna Rothman Interview - Agile, a Decade Later](https://www.5whys.com/articles/2019/2/16/johanna-rothman-interview-agile-a-decade-later.md) (2019-02-16): 12 years ago I interviewed Johanna Rothman About Agile development and her then new book “Behind closed doors: secrets of great management”. A few weeks ago we ran again into each other on twitter and decided to see… - [A Critical Chain of Bus Factors](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-critical-chain-of-bus-factors.md) (2017-02-21): I've spoken before about the meaning of a bus factor . It's basically the idea that if there is only one person in your team that can do a critical part of the work, and that person gets hit by a bus, the team stops… - [Elastic Leadership Book Published](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-book-published.md) (2017-02-21): I'm happy (if a little late) to annoucne that "Elastic Leadership" has now been officially published by Manning. You can grab the book here - [Elastic Leadership Book: The re-publishing of "Notes to a Software Team Leader"](https://www.5whys.com/articles/elastic-leadership-book-the-re-publishing-of-notes-to-a-soft.md) (2015-10-21): I'm happy to announce that I am re-publishing the "Notes to a Software Team Leader" as a new book under Manning publishing, re-titled "Elastic Leadership". The new book will contain a couple of new chapters, regrouping… - [When I Want to Give Up](https://www.5whys.com/articles/when-i-want-to-give-up.md) (2015-06-11): When I'm at work and I suddenly feel like everything sucks and the world can just burn as far as I'm concerned, I take a look at this picture I found on the web a while ago, printed it and mounted it on my door: It… ### More posts from 2012–2014 - [Dangers of Survival Mode](https://www.5whys.com/articles/dangers-of-survival-mode.md) (2014-11-03): I have just finished teaching a two day elastic leadership class in Denmark. One of the exercises I ask leaders to do is to try and finish a time based LEGO building exercises while the world if crumbling around them… - [Scrum Master 2.0: A Scrum Master is Not](https://www.5whys.com/articles/scrum-master-20-a-scrum-master-is-not.md) (2014-07-21): I'm a big fan of the idea that you should grow your team to be self organizing . I also used to hold the idea e that a Scrum master is just another word for "team coach", that should grow their team. I felt that people… - [3 Reasons to stop solving other people's problems for them](https://www.5whys.com/articles/3-reasons-to-stop-solving-other-peoples-problems-for-them.md) (2014-05-23): If you re an expert in some field in your team (the DB guy, the UI gal, the search Guru.. you know), it also means you're a bottleneck, and people have to constantly wait for you to make decisions on important things… - [Technical Disobedience](https://www.5whys.com/articles/technical-disobedience.md) (2013-11-03): Rachel's Suffering In one of my first jobs as a programmer I joined a team working on a governmental project. The team was sitting at the code shop, not at the governmental place. The coding shop I was working for as a… - [What's your Position, Velocity, and Acceleration? by Neal Tibrewala](https://www.5whys.com/articles/whats-your-position-velocity-and-acceleration-by-neal-tibrew.md) (2013-09-05): About Neal: Neal Tibrewala is the head of software development at L5 Software Group in Austin, TX As a software consultant for 25 years, the thing that I've found the most useful is measuring to figure out where you are… - [Be a Book Reviewer for 'Notes to a Software Team Leader'](https://www.5whys.com/articles/be-a-book-reviewer-for-notes-to-a-software-team-leader.md) (2013-06-20): Want a free book ? Willing to review it on Amazon when it is published? Willing to give me valuable feedback? Fill out this form. Open the form (Google Forms) - [Audio: Preface–Notes to a Software Team Leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/audio-prefacenotes-to-a-software-team-leader.md) (2013-06-18): Here is a little experiment. Below is the audio version of the Preface of my upcoming book “ Notes to a Software Team Leader ”. Listen on SoundCloud I am thinking of turning this into a saleable audio book. How much… - [Consulting and Leadership Courses in Scandinavia](https://www.5whys.com/articles/consulting-and-leadership-courses-in-scandinavia.md) (2012-09-05): My move to Norway is now almost complete (should be getting my id number mid September.) Bærum Kummune, I am in you. Yeah. And I have the Norwegian keyboard to prøve it. Now that I’m here I plan to do a lot more in… - [Submit your story about a team leader you had - good or bad](https://www.5whys.com/articles/submit-your-story-about-a-team-leader-you-had-good-or-bad.md) (2012-06-19): Have something really important to say to software team leaders out there? Why not publish it in my upcmoing book? It could be anything, as long as there is a PERSONAL story in it. Outline why you liked/disliked that… - [New chapter: "Learning" in the book "From chaos to self organization"](https://www.5whys.com/articles/new-chapter-learning-in-the-book-from-chaos-to-self-organiza.md) (2012-06-19): I just added a new chapter to "From Chaos to Self Organization " . You don't know that book? You would have known it by it's previous name "Elastic Leadership" , and before that it was part of " Notes to a software team… - [Free for Elastic Leadership Training in June/July](https://www.5whys.com/articles/free-for-elastic-leadership-training-in-junejuly.md) (2012-06-12): With all the work going on with our move to norway this august, I managed to not book anything for end of june, and all through july. If anyone wants me to come over and bring some TDD sense , or leadership techniques… - [Joining Forces with other leaders to make change happen](https://www.5whys.com/articles/joining-forces-with-other-leaders-to-make-change-happen.md) (2012-03-30): Let's say you're trying to make some real change happen. Maybe you've just finished doing a course on unit testing, and your development department devs are all excited about making this a reality. But some devs are… - [Contribute a note to my upcoming book - Notes to a software team leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/contribute-a-note-to-my-upcoming-book-notes-to-a-software-te.md) (2012-03-04): Yesterday I published the first two chapters of my incrementally publishing book " Notes to a software team leader ". You can be part of it. I want you to. The first part of the book will contain concepts from this blog… - [New Book: Notes to a software team leader](https://www.5whys.com/articles/new-book-notes-to-a-software-team-leader.md) (2012-02-28): I've started to write my upcoming book titled " Notes to a software team leader " (hat tip to Kevlin Henney for the name idea). The book will combine many of the subjects this blog addresses, plus notes collected from… - [Stoos Gathering - Initial Thoughts](https://www.5whys.com/articles/stoos-gathering-initial-thoughts.md) (2012-01-08): This past weekend I was honored to be part of what I hope will be the beginning of a transformation in management culture. The start of a tipping point. It was the Stoos Gathering . that site contains a statement that… ### More posts from 2009–2011 - [Ten Things Distributed Team Leaders Should Do](https://www.5whys.com/articles/ten-things-distributed-team-leaders-should-do.md) (2011-10-03): This turned up in one of the LinkedIn groups I'm part of - what practices should you have as a team lead in a distributed team (assuming people work from home, for example)? Have a shared skype chat for the whole team… - [One Day Software Team Leader Skills Class - Lund, Sweden](https://www.5whys.com/articles/one-day-software-team-leader-skills-class-lund-sweden.md) (2011-09-02): FYI - This course has been canceled. I will be doing a one day class for new and experienced software team leaders about important skills you need to "make" it as a team leader. In the class you will learn how to… - [A week in Stockholm - Open for consulting or training](https://www.5whys.com/articles/a-week-in-stockholm-open-for-consulting-or-training.md) (2011-09-01): I'll be spending the week of September 12-16 in Stockholm, Sweden. While i'm there I will be doing consulting gigs and possibly training. If you're interested in me coming to your company for a day or two and teach Test… - [Lead Better - Skills for software team leads, Course next week in Oslo](https://www.5whys.com/articles/lead-better-skills-for-software-team-leads-course-next-week-1.md) (2011-04-07): I'll be doing my " Lead Better " course in Oslo next week . There are 3 places left if you want to join us. If you've ever tried to convince your team to do unit testing or TDD, but failed miserably at getting them to… - [Why XP’s influence is more effective than Scrum](https://www.5whys.com/articles/why-xps-influence-is-more-effective-than-scrum.md) (2009-12-09): in a previous post i explained what are the six forces that influence behavior. based on this, we can now begin to understand why some development methodologies are more effective when applying them at an organization… - [Leadership Conference coming up](https://www.5whys.com/articles/leadership-conference-coming-up.md) (2009-10-16): I'm in the stages of planning a team leadership conference. Chances are it will be held in the UK, week of January 25th (don't hold me to that yet!) I'm still looking for a good name for it. and I bet you can help… - [Manifesto for Continuous Improvement](https://www.5whys.com/articles/manifesto-for-continuous-improvement.md) (2009-09-24): thanks for the picture, Andrew . the difference between the picture above and continuous improvement? The answer to "Are you Happy" is always "No". - [Announcing the Team Leadership Google Group](https://www.5whys.com/articles/announcing-the-team-leadership-google-group.md) (2009-09-16): I believe the next wave of issues that we will need to start solving is that of software leadership. We may all believe in the stuff that agile, tdd and the like bring to the company, but we often have problems… - [Poll: Would you join a team leadership forum on this site?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/poll-would-you-join-a-team-leadership-forum-on-this-site.md) (2009-09-15): Please answer this quick poll, so I can decide if I should spend time on creating a forum for team leadership on this site. A forum will only work if there is a critical mass of people watching it, and I want to make… - [One-Liners a new team lead should and shouldn't read](https://www.5whys.com/articles/one-liners-a-new-team-lead-should-and-shouldnt-read.md) (2009-09-10): Alistair's blog\wiki has a set of specific one liners from programmers - to newly minted team leads. The whole list is here. My 3 favorites were: Whatever their job is, help them be better at it. You are now a junior… - [Generating Internal vs. commercial value](https://www.5whys.com/articles/generating-internal-vs-commercial-value.md) (2009-09-10): Alistair writes about something which I've only thought about in small glimpses, moving on to my daily business: One of the basic ideas behind lean development is that you narrow the amount of process that is done at… - [Is face to face pairing better?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/is-face-to-face-pairing-better.md) (2009-09-09): Two people working on the same machine at the same time? crazy! only, not really. But i'll touch on why pair programming works so great in a different post. This post is about showing a wholly different style of pairing… - [Call for content – what do new team leads need to know on the first day?](https://www.5whys.com/articles/call-for-content-ndash-what-do-new-team-leads-to-know-on-the.md) (2009-09-05): About 5 minutes after I posted about eh existence of this blog on twitter, I’ve gotten lots of great feedback (and various little nitpickings) about the content, what I shoudl talk about and things that I might cover… - [Don’t despair in the face of nitpickers](https://www.5whys.com/articles/donrsquot-despair-in-the-face-of-nitpickers.md) (2009-09-05): as you start up your quest to get better, you’ll find lots of gentle souls who want to help you on your journey to become better. They wil try to help you by trying to point out all the places where you haven’t been… - [The first five Whys](https://www.5whys.com/articles/the-first-five-whys.md) (2009-09-05): You might also like to: Read about the three team phases your team might be in. Read posts on the chaos phase , the learning phase , or the self-leading phase . 1) Why create this blog in the first place? Because I… --- ## About the author **Roy Osherove**: Senior Solutions Architect at AWS working on AI for production and AI-driven development; author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership, with about 20 years of consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery. ### Sites - [RobotPaper](https://robotpaper.ai/): This blog: AI patterns and anti-patterns, AI and coding agents, and engineering leadership. - [osherove.com](https://osherove.com): Roy's personal site. Author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership; consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery, plus about 20 years of blog posts. - [The Art of Unit Testing](https://www.artofunittesting.com): The Art of Unit Testing, 3rd Edition (Manning): readable, maintainable, trustworthy unit tests, plus TDD workshops in C#, JavaScript, Java and Kotlin. - [5whys.com](https://www.5whys.com): Roy's writing on software team leadership: self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode and the Elastic Leadership model. - [Pipeline Driven](https://pipelinedriven.org): Continuous delivery and DevOps practices: build patterns, pipeline-friendly testing, DevOps metrics and enterprise DevOps. - [Elastic Leadership](https://www.elasticleadership.com): Elastic Leadership, Roy's framework for software team leaders (survival, learning and self-organizing modes). ### Social - X: https://x.com/royosherove - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/osherove/ ### Contact - Contact form: https://forms.gle/jQSx5KoXvrVA1JCK7 ### License Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page). License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/