AgileLeave a comment

On Agile mindset

iulianalexandrustoica

We hear more and more often about the individual terms Agile and mindset but also about the concept which results by combining them. But what is an Agile mindset? In my opinion, an Agile mindset is based on the following pillars: The ability to have a clear vision about own work and teamwork, from small topics to larger topics like product vision The ability to understand what inspect and adapt really means – inspecting the results at the end of each period of work (sprint) and adapt activities planned for future periods of work (sprints) The ability to understand change … Continue reading On Agile mindset

Product managementLeave a comment

On problem space

iulianalexandrustoica

In product management, problem space and solution space represent two very important concepts. The first one comprises all the customer needs which will be addressed by a new feature or product. The second one is represented by the product being developed to address the customer needs, or can be even a partial representation of it like wireframes, prototypes. We see daily products failing although the solution seems to address existing customer needs. So, why does this happen? In a large percentage of situations, it is because the product teams spent insufficient time in the problem space and the majority of … Continue reading On problem space

LearningLeave a comment

On learning

iulianalexandrustoica

3 new paperback entries for my library: The Lean Product Playbook by Dan Olsen Inspired by Marty Cagan Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time by Jeff Sutherland Although I don’t have as much time as I want for it, I like to read, as learning is the most powerful source of inspiration and knowledge. While I do have many books in electronic format, I enjoy more the feeling of reading and learning from the paperback ones. Electronic books sometimes just feel like navigating and scanning through the content. If product management or Scrum topics … Continue reading On learning

EntrepreneurshipLeave a comment

10000

iulianalexandrustoica

Or the power of social media This is the number of views for my content in January this year, on one social media platform (LinkedIn). If I add the views from Facebook or the website the number is way higher. Is 10000 a number to talk about? For me it is, as in the entire last year I had less views. So what changed? I looked for advice, from people with far more experience in earning their paycheck from social media, and started to adopt their suggestions on how to generate more view, likes, shares, comments and in the end … Continue reading 10000

EntrepreneurshipLeave a comment

2019 Plans and challenges

iulianalexandrustoica

2019 is the year in which I plan to invest more time and budget in developing my own brand. For doing this I have a vision, strategy and, of course, a roadmap. The top 5 items on my roadmap are: Branding: activities are in progress, the visual identity creation of my brand is shaping up. Social Media presence: LinkedIn: improved the look and feel of my page, added new posts so that the number of followers increases and I extend the reach of my target audience. Facebook: created and customized my FB page (consistent look and feel with my LinkedIn), … Continue reading 2019 Plans and challenges

Business analysis, ServicesLeave a comment

Business analysis courses

iulianalexandrustoica

Are you looking to make a change in your career to a business analyst role and you don’t know where to start from or if you have the proper skills? Luckily for you, business analysis courses are part of my services catalogue @Iulian Stoica Product Management & Scrum. Start your business analyst career NOW. #mentoring #teaching #learningcommunities Continue reading Business analysis courses

DesignLeave a comment

On simplification

iulianalexandrustoica

As a business analyst, one of my main responsibilities is to help organisations to #streamline processes and to simplify workflows. Naturally, this “gift” is working also outside office hours. For example, when I pay online my utility bills on the utility provider website. It’s all nice and easy until you find some options which are there to make your life easier but actually they don’t. So I have the option to add my credit card details in my account, with the purpose of not typing them for each payment. Brilliant. What happens after I add one card and proceed to … Continue reading On simplification

Product managementLeave a comment

On cost of delay

iulianalexandrustoica

In each company, there is a rush in having innovative ideas brought up and implemented. When it comes to implementing those ideas there are huge delays in the time to market and for this reason, rival companies already release similar products or features. As a consequence, a lot of great ideas are wasted and the enthusiasm to innovate and improve is heavily diminished. But how are companies making sure that the valuable ideas are implemented quickly and their capacity to innovate is not wasted? The answer to this question is using proper prioritization techniques. There are a couple of techniques … Continue reading On cost of delay

AgileLeave a comment

On improvement kata

iulianalexandrustoica

In martial arts, a kata is “a routine you practice deliberately, so its pattern becomes a habit.” Kata it’s a way of transferring skills and developing the mindset, helping in the translation of concepts into practical reality.         For sure kata sounds familiar for martial arts enthusiasts but what is Improvement Kata? The Improvement Kata, as explained by Mike Rother, is a general-purpose framework and a set of practice routines for reaching goals where the path to the goal is uncertain. It requires us to proceed by iterative, incremental steps, using very rapid cycles of experimentation. This model is described in … Continue reading On improvement kata

Scrum2 Comments

On practicing Scrum

iulianalexandrustoica

In our corporate life, we are Scrum practitioners every day. But are we Scrum practitioners outside the office and outside the working hours? I say we are. Let’s the consider the vacation (as a product) a very good candidate for practising Scrum outside the office. What we need to implement this product? The following might just be enough: Vacation team Scrum team -> Discuss who is part of the team and who owns each role Vacation vision product vision -> Decide what we want to do in the vacation: go to a sea destination, admire landscapes, go hiking, visit museums, … Continue reading On practicing Scrum

Business modelLeave a comment

On trust

iulianalexandrustoica

An IT services organisation usually provides IT services for product organisations. This mainly happens when own teams don’t have enough capacity for executing the activities/tasks required for matching the business goals and ambitions. For the IT services organisation, this is a good opportunity which can lead to an even better opportunity with the proper environment. While only executing tasks gets the paycheck at the end of the month, the real challenge in the collaboration is made when the IT services organisation becomes a business and technology partner (adviser) for the product organisation. There a few things to consider for this … Continue reading On trust

Change managementLeave a comment

On change

iulianalexandrustoica

A wise man once said that change is in the centre of the universe. As a Business Analyst and Scrum Master change is part of my daily activities and on a larger scale change is a constant part of our lives. But what is change exactly? According to dictionary.com change is: to make the form, nature, content, future course, etc., of (something) different from what it is or from what it would be if left alone to transform or convert to become different Sounds simple, isn’t it? Yet the reality proves to be different. It is in our human nature not to like change … Continue reading On change

OrganisationsLeave a comment

On failure

iulianalexandrustoica

Every day we see statistics about failures, affecting either new companies others or companies with an important background in software development large companies or start-ups, impacting either top edge mobile applications or state of the art web applications. Since software development methodologies and frameworks are there for quite some years now and technology improvements are being delivered as we speak we could consider that there is already a proper setup for having successful products and/or teams. Yet the reality proves to be different.  So why do our products and/or teams fail?  There are a lot of reasons out there and … Continue reading On failure

Business analysisLeave a comment

On systems thinking

iulianalexandrustoica

Systems thinking has its foundation in the field of system dynamics, founded in 1956 by MIT professor Jay Forrester. Professor Forrester recognized the need for a better way of testing new ideas about social systems, in the same way, we can test ideas in engineering. Systems thinking allows people to make their understanding of social systems explicit and improve them in the same way that people can use engineering principles to make explicit and improve their understanding of mechanical systems. We can extend the initial use of systems thinking from social systems and apply it to IT systems. The Systems … Continue reading On systems thinking

Personal developmentLeave a comment

On success

iulianalexandrustoica

There are thousands of books, articles, blog posts about success. Some of them are inspired from the own experience of the author, while others are theoretical „recipes” for being successful. A wise man said the following about success: „Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value”. I prefer to define success by having great results, as individual or as part of a team. Along the years I identified a set of elements which compose my own recipe for reaching great results. These elements helped me along the years so they might help you too. My recipe is made … Continue reading On success

EntrepreneurshipLeave a comment

2018 retrospective

iulianalexandrustoica

As the new year started it is time for the 2018 #retrospective. In January last year, I set for myself an ambitious goal, meaning to write an article each month on business analysis, product management, Agile, or Scrum topics. The goal was to share the practices I found useful along the way so that other professionals can apply the same or to inspire others with a different perspective on the above topics. So, how was this experience for me? – I published 10 articles, missing 2 articles from my goal set – Topics which are trendy will get a higher … Continue reading 2018 retrospective