Episodios

  • From the Archives: Dave Snowden on Cynefin and Building Capability for Managing Complexity

    From the Archives: Dave Snowden on Cynefin and Building Capability for Managing Complexity
    Apr 17 2025
    Guest Bio: Dave Snowden divides his time between two roles: founder & Chief Scientific Officer of Cognitive Edge and the founder and Director of the Centre for Applied Complexity at the University of Wales. Known for creating the sense-making framework, Cynefin, Dave’s work is international in nature and covers government and industry looking at complex issues relating to strategy, organisational decision making and decision making. He has pioneered a science-based approach to organisations drawing on anthropology, neuroscience and complex adaptive systems theory. He is a popular and passionate keynote speaker on a range of subjects, and is well known for his pragmatic cynicism and iconoclastic style. He holds positions as extra-ordinary Professor at the Universities of Pretoria and Stellenbosch and visiting Professor at Bangor University in Wales respectively. He has held similar positions at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Canberra University, the University of Warwick and The University of Surrey. He held the position of senior fellow at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies at Nanyang University and the Civil Service College in Singapore during a sabbatical period in Nanyang. His paper with Boone on Leadership was the cover article for the Harvard Business Review in November 2007 and also won the Academy of Management aware for the best practitioner paper in the same year. He has previously won a special award from the Academy for originality in his work on knowledge management. He is a editorial board member of several academic and practitioner journals in the field of knowledge management and is an Editor in Chief of E:CO. In 2006 he was Director of the EPSRC (UK) research programme on emergence and in 2007 was appointed to an NSF (US) review panel on complexity science research. He previously worked for IBM where he was a Director of the Institution for Knowledge Management and founded the Cynefin Centre for Organisational Complexity; during that period he was selected by IBM as one of six on-demand thinkers for a world-wide advertising campaign. Prior to that he worked in a range of strategic and management roles in the service sector. His company Cognitive Edge exists to integrate academic thinking with practice in organisations throughout the world and operates on a network model working with Academics, Government, Commercial Organisations, NGOs and Independent Consultants. He is also the main designer of the SenseMaker® software suite, originally developed in the field of counter terrorism and now being actively deployed in both Government and Industry to handle issues of impact measurement, customer/employee insight, narrative based knowledge management, strategic foresight and risk management. The Centre for Applied Complexity was established to look at whole of citizen engagement in government and is running active programmes in Wales and elsewhere in areas such as social inclusion, self-organising communities and nudge economics together with a broad range of programmes in health. The Centre will establish Wales as a centre of excellence for the integration of academic and practitioner work in creating a science-based approach to understanding society. Social Media and Website LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/dave-snowden-2a93b Twitter: @snowded Website: Cognitive Edge https://www.cognitive-edge.com/ Books/ Resources: Book: Cynefin - Weaving Sense-Making into the Fabric of Our World by Dave Snowden and Friends https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cynefin-Weaving-Sense-Making-Fabric-World/dp/1735379905Book: Hope Without Optimism by Terry Eagleton https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hope-Without-Optimism-Terry-Eagleton/dp/0300248679/Book: Theology of Hope by Jurgen Moltmann https://www.amazon.co.uk/Theology-Hope-Classics-Jurgen-Moltmann/dp/0334028787Poem: ‘Mending Wall’ by Robert Frost https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44266/mending-wallVideo: Dave Snowden on ‘Rewilding Agile’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrgaPDqet4cArticle reference to ‘Rewilding Agile’ by Dave Snowden https://cynefin.io/index.php/User:SnowdedField Guide to Managing Complexity (and Chaos) In Times of Crisis https://cynefin.io/index.php/Field_guide_to_managing_complexity_(and_chaos)_in_times_of_crisisField Guide to Managing Complexity (and Chaos) In Times of Crisis (2) https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/managing-complexity-and-chaos-times-crisis-field-guide-decision-makers-inspired-cynefin-frameworkCynefin Wiki https://cynefin.io/wiki/Main_Page Interview Transcript Ula Ojiaku: Dave, thank you for making the time for this conversation. I read in your, your latest book - the book, Cynefin: Weaving Sense Making into the Fabric of Our World, which was released, I believe, in celebration of the twenty first year of the framework. And you mentioned that in your childhood, you had multidisciplinary upbringing which involved lots of reading. Could you tell us a ...
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    42 m
  • E048 Bala Madhusoodhanan on Critical Considerations for Leaders when Adopting AI Solutions

    E048 Bala Madhusoodhanan on Critical Considerations for Leaders when Adopting AI Solutions
    Feb 9 2025
    Bio Bala has rich experience in retail technology and process transformation. Most recently, he worked as a Principal Architect for Intelligent Automation, Innovation & Supply Chain in a global Fortune 100 retail corporation. Currently he works for a luxury brand as Principal Architect for Intelligent Automation providing technology advice for the responsible use of technology (Low Code, RPA, Chatbots, and AI). He is passionate about technology and spends his free time reading, writing technical blogs and co-chairing a special interest group with The OR Society. Interview Highlights 02:00 Mentors and peers 04:00 Community bus 07:10 Defining AI 08:20 Contextual awareness 11:45 GenAI 14:30 The human loop 17:30 Natural Language Processing 20:45 Sentiment analysis 24:00 Implementing AI solutions 26:30 Ethics and AI 27:30 Biased algorithms 32:00 EU AI Act 33:00 Responsible use of technology Connect Bala Madhusoodhanan on LinkedIn Books and references · https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-chatbots-emily-m-bender.html - NLP · https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/27/clearview_europe/ - Facial Technology Issue · https://www.designnews.com/electronics-test/apple-card-most-high-profile-case-ai-bias-yet - Apple Card story · https://www.ft.com/content/2d6fc319-2165-42fb-8de1-0edf1d765be3 - Data Centre growth · https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/02/06/1087793/what-babies-can-teach-ai/ · Independent Audit of AI Systems - · Home | The Alan Turing Institute · Competing in the Age of AI: Strategy and Leadership When Algorithms and Networks Run the World, Marco Iansiti & Karim R. Lakhani · AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World, Kai-Fu Lee · The Algorithmic Leader: How to Be Smart When Machines Are Smarter Than You, Mike Walsh · Human+Machine: Reimagining Work in the Age of AI, Paul R Daugherty, H. James Wilson · Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, Nick Bostrom · The Alignment Problem: How Can Artificial Intelligence Learn Human Values, Brian Christian · Ethical Machines: Your Concise Guide to Totally Unbiased, Transparent, and Respectful AI, Reid Blackman · Wanted: Human-AI Translators: Artificial Intelligence Demystified, Geertrui Mieke De Ketelaere · The Future of Humanity: Terraforming Mars, Interstellar Travel, Immortality, and Our Destiny Beyond, Michio Kaku, Feodor Chin et al Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku So I have with me here, Bala Madhusoodhanan, who is a principal architect with a global luxury brand, and he looks after their RPA and AI transformation. So it's a pleasure to have you on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast, Bala, thank you for making the time. Bala Madhusoodhanan It's a pleasure to have a conversation with the podcast and the podcast audience, Ula. I follow the podcast and there have been fantastic speakers in the past. So I feel privileged to join you on this conversation. Ula Ojiaku Well, the privilege is mine. So could you start off with telling us about yourself Bala, what have been the key points or the highlights of your life that have led to you being the Bala we know now? Bala Madhusoodhanan It's putting self into uncharted territory. So my background is mechanical engineering, and when I got the job, it was either you go into the mechanical engineering manufacturing side or the software side, which was slightly booming at that point of time, and obviously it was paying more then decided to take the software route, but eventually somewhere the path kind of overlapped. So from a mainframe background, started working on supply chain, and then came back to optimisation, tied back to manufacturing industry. Somewhere there is an overlap, but yeah, that was the first decision that probably got me here. The second decision was to work in a UK geography, rather than a US geography, which is again very strange in a lot of my peers. They generally go to Silicon Valley or East Coast, but I just took a choice to stay here for personal reasons. And then the third was like the mindset. I mean, I had over the last 15, 20 years, I had really good mentors, really good peers, so I always had their help to soundboard my crazy ideas, and I always try to keep a relationship ongoing. Ula Ojiaku What I'm hearing is, based on what you said, lots of relationships have been key to getting you to where you are today, both ...
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    38 m
  • E047 Brian McDonald on the Art & Craft of Storytelling (Part 2)

    E047 Brian McDonald on the Art & Craft of Storytelling (Part 2)
    Jan 5 2025
    Bio Brian McDonald, an award-winning author, filmmaker, graphic novelist, and podcaster, is a sought-after instructor and consultant. He has taught his story seminar and consulted for various companies, including Pixar, Microsoft, and Cirque du Soleil. Interview Highlights 01:30 The Story Spine 04:00 Proposal, argument, conclusion 07:40 Video games – noodles are not cake 11:30 Armature 16:25 Stories in speeches 21:25 Finding your armature 23:00 Tools and weapons go together 25:30 The first act 27:00 Angels 28:00 Brian’s memoir 28:45 Paying attention Connect · Brian McDonald (writeinvisibleink.com) · @BeeMacDee1950 on X · @beemacdee on Instagram · Brian McDonald on LinkedIn Books and references · Land of the Dead: Lessons from the Underworld on Storytelling and Living, Brian McDonald · Invisible Ink: Building Stories from the Inside Out, Brian McDonald · The Golden Theme: How to Make Your Writing Appeal to the Highest Common Denominator, Brian McDonald · Old Souls, Brian McDonald · Ink Spots: Collected Writings on Story Structure, Filmmaking and Craftmanship, Brian McDonald · Brian's podcast 'You are a Storyteller' Episode Transcript Ula Ojiaku Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Welcome back to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast, this is Part 2 of my conversation with Brian McDonald. In Part 1 we discussed defining a story, why we tell stories, among other things, and in this second part, Brian shares more of his insights around the storytelling formula, Brian’s upcoming memoir, and building a story’s armature. It’s been such an honour to speak with Brian and I hope you find Part 2 of our conversation as insightful as I have. Everyone is a storyteller, everyone has a story to tell, and we knowing how to structure it is key to making it impactful and helping people to get information that heals, that helps them survive, that helps them navigate the conflicts of this world. So, you, in your book, Invisible Ink, you gave us a storytelling formula, do you mind sharing that with us? Brian McDonald So the story spine are seven steps that you need to create a story. So they use it at Pixar, I've worked with them quite a bit so we speak similar language, but they use this too, and I think we basically learned it from the same source. So, they are once upon a time, and every day, until one day, and because of this, and because of this, until finally, and ever since that day. So they are once upon a time, and every day, until one day, and because of this, and because of this, until finally, and ever since that day. And you set up the status quo, this is what happened, this is who this person is, this is what they want, whatever it is, and then something changes. Now you're into the ‘until one day’, and the second act, now that would be the first act, the second act would be the body of the story. It's really what people say the story is about, so that's the longest part. That's why it's sort of split in two in a way because of this and because of this. There are some people who will add more because of this, but I don't, and some people don't like that I'm so rigid about it, but what I find is that the hardest thing I teach people is how to simplify. That's the hardest thing. So, adding more details is easy, simplifying is hard, right, and so that's why I stick with the seven and the because of this and because of this. And then, until finally, now you're into the third act, and ever since that day, because the third act is all about the conclusion or the resolution, but the conclusion, but the way I like to think about the three acts is this, and I had been thinking about it this way, and this is something that I don't know where Hitchcock got it, but Alfred Hitchcock talked about it, but I've never heard it anywhere else. So it's proposal, argument, conclusion. That's the way stories work, and those are the three acts. Proposal, argument, conclusion. Now, it's the way people talk. That's why it works. So the proposal is, let's say, I say Saturday I went to the best party I've ever been to in my life. That's my proposal. Everybody knows what comes next. My proof, this happened, that happened, this star was there, this blah blah blah, whatever it is, whatever my argument is, that this is the best party in the world, right? And then the conclusion, often stories are circular, so you'll come back around to the beginning again. So, that's the best party I've ever been to, then I talk about it, and then I say, oh, what a great party, oh, that was the best party I've ...
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    31 m
  • E046 Brian McDonald on the Art & Craft of Storytelling (Part 1)

    E046 Brian McDonald on the Art & Craft of Storytelling (Part 1)
    Dec 15 2024
    Bio Brian McDonald, an award-winning author, filmmaker, graphic novelist, and podcaster, is a sought-after instructor and consultant. He has taught his story seminar and consulted for various companies, including Pixar, Microsoft, and Cirque du Soleil. Interview Highlights 02:45 The gift of writing 04:00 Rejected by Disney 05:35 Defining a story 07:25 Conclusions 10:30 Why do we tell stories? 13:40 Survival stories 17:00 Finding the common thread 19:00 The Golden Theme 20:45 Neuroscience Connect Brian McDonald (writeinvisibleink.com) @BeeMacDee1950 on X @beemacdee on Instagram Brian McDonald on LinkedIn Books and references Land of the Dead: Lessons from the Underworld on Storytelling and Living, Brian McDonald Invisible Ink: Building Stories from the Inside Out, Brian McDonald The Golden Theme: How to Make Your Writing Appeal to the Highest Common Denominator, Brian McDonald Old Souls, Brian McDonald Ink Spots: Collected Writings on Story Structure, Filmmaking and Craftmanship, Brian McDonald Brian's podcast 'You are a Storyteller' Episode Transcript Ula Ojiaku Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Very honoured to introduce my guest for this episode, Brian McDonald,. He’s an award-winning author, filmmaker, graphic novelist and podcaster. Brian is a sought-after speaker, instructor and consultant who has taught his story seminar and consulted for companies like Pixar, Microsoft, and Cirque du Soleil. In this first part of our two-part episode, we discuss the gift of writing, his experience being rejected by Disney, his book Invisible Ink, that book is lifechanging. We also discuss defining a story, conclusions, and why we tell stories. Stay tuned for an insightful conversation! Brian, it's a pleasure to have you on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast and an honour. Thank you for making the time for this conversation. Brian McDonald Thank you. Thanks for having me. Ula Ojiaku Awesome. So could you tell us a bit about yourself? What are the things that have led you to being the Brian McDonald we know today? Brian McDonald How I got to be, I guess, a story expert or whatever it is I am, the memory I have is of being in kindergarten and seeing an animated film about King Midas, and I was obsessed with it. It was stop motion animation, so it was frightening, it scared me, but I couldn't stop thinking about it. So I got obsessed with stop motion animation and I got obsessed with the story of King Midas and I thought about stories a lot. We lived not very far away from a drive-in movie theatre, and so we would, as a family, watch movies from our porch, and I remember, because we couldn't hear them, I remember piecing together the stories that we couldn't hear, and I would tell my younger brother and my sister what I assumed was happening. So it was an early, early thing for me. I didn't know necessarily that I was studying it, I was just obsessed with it. What made it work and what made people laugh and what made them scared and what made them lean forward, that was fascinating to me, but I didn't know I had any particular gift for it, until I guess I was in the seventh or eighth grade when a friend of mine did a drawing and he said to me, Brian, come up with a story for this drawing because you're good at that. I didn't know I was good at it, right. It was so natural to me, and so I just pursued that path. I wanted to be a director. Before that, before the 70s, not every director was a writer, but in the 70s, it seemed like every director was a writer. So Francis Ford Coppola was a writer, Steven Spielberg was a writer, George Lucas was a writer. So I thought that's what you had to do. And I had dyslexia, so writing scared me, it was difficult for me, but wanting to tell stories overrode that, and I just thought that's what I had to do, so I just kept doing it and pretty soon, accidentally became an expert at it, where people would start asking me for advice and the people who started asking me for advice were higher and higher up the food chain. I remember I was on a plane next to some award winning writer and I happened to be sitting next to him and I was star struck that I got to sit next to him on this plane and we were talking and I thought we were just talking about story stuff and then he said, do you mind if I take notes? So I thought, okay, maybe I've got something, but I didn't think anything I was saying was worthy of taking notes, but he did. Yeah, and then I wrote the book for two reasons. I submitted a screenplay to Disney for their fellowship program, and it was rejected in the first round, and I didn't think that was right, and they also gave me a list of books I ...
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    28 m
  • (S4) E045 Kerrie Dorman on Entrepreneurship and Supporting Businesses through Mentoring

    (S4) E045 Kerrie Dorman on Entrepreneurship and Supporting Businesses through Mentoring
    Aug 11 2024
    Bio Kerrie, a serial entrepreneur, was introduced to mentoring after her last successful business sale. Realising she had no support or guidance in what she was doing, Kerrie founded the Association of Business Mentors in 2011 to provide mentoring skills and training for those seeking to mentor business owners professionally. Kerrie’s vision for the ABM was to provide reassurance to business owners that they are in the safe hands of a trusted and experienced ABM professional business mentor. Kerrie mentors businesses of all shapes and sizes. She also mentors within the workplace, working closely with HR departments to run mentoring programmes to support the growth and development of their employees. Interview Highlights 01:30 Give it a go or you’ll never know 03:30 Starting out in mentorship 06:30 The vision or the team? 10:30 Boundaries in business 12:30 The onion exercise 16:30 Mentoring v coaching 21:00 The mentoring door 22:00 Quietening the mind 23:30 Embedding an organisational mentoring culture Contact Information · ABM website (Association of Business Mentors) · Association of Business Mentors on LinkedIn · Kerrie Dorman on LinkedIn Books & Resources · The Mentoring Manual - Julie Starr · A Complete Guide to Effective Mentoring (The FT Guides), Dr. Ruth Gotian, Andy Lopata · Henley Business School webinars · Bounce: The Myth of Talent and the Power of Practice, Matthew Syed · The Choice: Embrace the Possible, Edith Eger Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku I am very honoured to have the Founder of the Association of Business Mentors, Kerrie Dorman, as our guest on the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. Kerrie, thank you so much for making the time for this conversation. I've been looking forward to it for ages. Kerrie Dorman You're very welcome. Thank you for having me. Ula Ojiaku My pleasure. So what's led you to the place where you are today and being the Kerrie Dorman that we've gotten to know and admire? Kerrie Dorman Okay, so actually part of my upbringing was being very much around entrepreneurship. My father was a key project manager on business ideas, primarily in Africa, and my stepfather also ran a very large family business. So I had business sort of around me from quite a young age, and I would talk to both my father and my stepfather about why things would happen and et cetera, et cetera. And so I became a serial entrepreneur from quite a young age. I think what gave me the impetus was the fact that I wasn't afraid to give something a go, and actually my motto now is give it a go or you'll never know, and if it works out, amazing, if not, then you learn and you move on. So my first business was in optics, because what I did do was get a profession behind me first, and that was a qualified dispensing optician. And so my first business was in recruitment for people within the optical industry, and I somehow managed to sell that by the skin of my teeth. And I just felt that it was incredibly satisfying, and a great sense of achievement to have been able to build something, even though it was very small, that was attractive to somebody else to want to pay for it. And so hence my entrepreneurialism streak started. So I started all sorts of businesses in all sorts of industries, I saw niches and just as I said, gave it a go. Some work just failed, and some I managed to sell, so I sort of came out vaguely on top at the end of it all, and then of course, there was the Association of Business Mentors, which is still going, and that came about because when I sold my last business, which was probably the most successful of them all, there was a new government funded mentorship program happening. It was an incubation centre, so there were young and bullish business owners wanting to be in this incubation centre to make sure that they had the best start, and so I was asked to come and share all my experiences, the successes, the failures, what I learnt, and I felt that I had a lot to share with these people, and that was my first stab at being a mentor. However, I didn't really know what I was doing, I'd never had my own mentor before, and I felt that I was getting quite frustrated with these young, inspiring people because they weren't running a business the way I had run a business. And I thought that that's what mentoring was about. There was no guidance on this scheme, and I just felt that it wasn't quite right in terms of what I was supposed to be doing. So I looked around for somewhere to hang my...
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    30 m
  • (S4) E044 Darren Wilmshurst on Solving Organisational Challenges and Demonstrating Value

    (S4) E044 Darren Wilmshurst on Solving Organisational Challenges and Demonstrating Value
    Jul 28 2024
    Bio Darren, as the European Managing Director of Cprime, spearheads transformation initiatives in EMEA, leveraging over two decades of experience in banking and IT leadership. As a SAFe Fellow and renowned author, he drives strategic growth by defining innovative go-to-market strategies and deepening client relationships. Darren is responsible for overseeing Cprime’s consultancy services, implementing complex programs, and negotiating multi-million pound contracts, positioning the company as a leader in organisational efficiency and performance optimisation. He co-authored the BCS Book “Agile Foundations – Principles Practices and Frameworks” and "SAFe Coaches Handbook". A contributor to the SAFe Reference Guide 4.5 and "The ART of avoiding a Train Wreck". Finally a reviewer of "Valuing Agile; the financial management of agile projects" and "Directing Agile Change” Interview Highlights 01:30 Pandemic impacts 04:00 Cprime 08:00 Wooing clients 09:15 Using the right language 11:00 Doing your research 12:30 Mistakes leaders make 15:30 Changing mindsets 16:00 Ingredients for change 17:30 Reading for knowledge 26:00 Three thirds 28:30 Disruption 31:30 SAFe Coaches Handbook 37:50 SAFe frameworks 40:20 Enterprise strategy Connecting LinkedIn: Darren Wilmshurst on LinkedIn Books & Resources - Strategic Leadership: How to Think and Plan Strategically and Provide Direction, John Adair - Tribal Unity Book, Em Campbell-Pretty, - Drive, Daniel H. Pink - SAFe® Coaches Handbook: Proven tips and techniques for launching and running SAFe® Teams, ARTs, and Portfolios in an Agile Enterprise, Darren Wilmshurst & Lindy Quick - Agile Foundations: Principles, practices and frameworks, Peter Measey - The ART of Avoiding a Train Wreck: Practical Tips and Tricks for Launching and Operating SAFe Agile Release Trains, Em Campbell-Pretty, Adrienne L. Wilson, Dean Leffingwell - Industrial Devops: Build Better Systems Faster Dr. Johnson, Robin Yeman, Mik Kersten, Dean Leffingwell - Radical Focus: Achieving Your Most Important Goals with Objectives and Key Results: Christina R Wodtke - Who Does What By How Much | Jeff Gothelf & Josh Seiden (okr-book.com) Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku It's a huge honour and privilege to have again with me as my guest on the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast none other than Darren Wilmshurst, Managing Director at Cprime. Darren is an SPCT and a SAFe fellow. So for some context to the audience, Daz was one of the very first people I interviewed for the Agile Innovation Leaders Podcast and this was about five years ago or so, and I actually wanted to have a way of speaking with Daz, and I didn't know how to, so I said, hey, can I interview you for a podcast? And long story short, I ended up heading on a plane to Oman, but that's a different story. So, Daz, what have you been up to since then? Because when we recorded the first one, you were not yet a SAFe fellow, it was afterwards that you became a SAFe fellow and lots of other things must have happened. Darren Wilmshurst Well then the pandemic started, and I think that that changed life for all of us, most of our consultancy work stopped because it was discretionary spend, people were in retreat in terms of trying to buckle down and understand, try and reduce costs as much as possible. I think the biggest impact was then training, because obviously we couldn't do training in person. We weren't allowed by the certificating bodies to train online, so they had to give us permission to do that, which they did, and then we had to think about, well, how are we going to do this online? You know, what conference facilities are we going to use? What collaborative tools are we going to use? And how do we deliver this experience to make it still interactive and engaging? So I think that was a major challenge for us as well, and if I'm honest, whilst we're still doing stuff online, we're starting to see some training, at least moving back in person, but my preference is still in person because it's a different experience. The theatrics in me, the smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd is still really important as well. So I think that's the first thing I think has changed is that we had that period where everything was remote, I think we're back into a world now where we're more hybrid, which I enjoy the in person stuff, but I think we’ll probably never go back to pre-pandemic where everything was in person, both ...
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    53 m
  • (S4) E043 Denise Tilles on the Three Pillars of Product Operations

    (S4) E043 Denise Tilles on the Three Pillars of Product Operations
    Jul 7 2024
    Bio Denise Tilles wrote the recently published book Product Operations. Co-authored with Escaping the Build Trap’s Melissa Perri, the book is the must-read guide technology leaders have been missing. With over a decade of product leadership experience, Denise supports companies like Bloomberg, Sam’s Club, and athenahealth by strengthening capabilities around: Product Operations, Product Strategy, and establishing a Product Operating Model. Interview Highlights 01:00 Background and beginnings 04:00 Product Operations: The book 06:30 Product Operations vs Product Management 07:30 The Three Pillars of Product Operations 08:30 Using Product Operations to Scale 10:20 Leading and Lagging Indicators 12:20 Product Operations in Startups 21:10 Generative AI Social Media · www.denisetilles.com · Denise Tilles on Twitter X · Denise Tilles on LinkedIn · Grocket Books & Resources · Product Operations: How successful companies build better products at scale: Melissa Perri, Denise Tilles · Escaping the Build Trap: How Effective Product Management Creates Real Value, Melissa Perri · MasterClass with Denise Tilles: Getting Started with Product Operations — Produx Labs · Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value, Terese Torres · Lenny’s podcast: Lenny's Podcast (lennyspodcast.com) · Lenny’s Newsletter: Lenny's Newsletter | Lenny Rachitsky | Substack (lennysnewsletter.com) · Pivot podcast: Vox Media: Podcast Network | Pivot · Melissa Perri’s podcast: Product Thinking — Produx Labs Episode Transcript Intro: Hello and welcome to the Agile Innovation Leaders podcast. I’m Ula Ojiaku. On this podcast I speak with world-class leaders and doers about themselves and a variety of topics spanning Agile, Lean Innovation, Business, Leadership and much more – with actionable takeaways for you the listener. Ula Ojiaku So I have with me here, Denise Tilles, who is the Founder and CPO of Product Consultancy Grocket. She is also a co-author of the book Product Operations, How Successful Companies Build Better Products at Scale. Thank you so much, Denise, for making the time for this conversation. I've been looking forward to this. Denise Tilles Thank you. Me too. Ula Ojiaku Awesome. So who is Denise, so can you tell us how you've evolved to the Denise we are seeing today? Denise Tilles Yeah. So, I have been in product management for probably 12 years now, both on the operating side, as an individual contributor, and then as a leader, working with companies like B2B SaaS companies, Cision, and a media company, Condé Nast. And then for the past two-ish years, I've been a product consultant and working with really great companies like Bloomberg and Sam's Club, Walmart, we're helping them with product maturity assessments, product operations in terms of like, does this make sense for a company? How do we stand it up? What is sort of day one look like, you know, day 366 and then so on, sort of building it to scale. And then also co-authoring this book with Melissa Perri, the Product Operations book, and as we talk about the book, folks, I think naturally might say, well, why you, why should you be writing about the book? I have experience with product operations before we really knew that's what it was called, and I mentioned this in the book that I was working at this B2B SaaS and I had just started and my manager, the SVP said, hey, maybe we should get some people to think about managing the data, maybe thinking about understanding what kinds of experiments we should be doing. I'm like, we can do that, well, wow, yes, that sounds amazing. And we were going to hire an individual contributor, we ended up hiring this amazing VP level person, and then she built a small team, and it really was a great compliment to the product, I had a product team of about 10 folks globally and really great compliment, because they understood the product, but they weren't so close to it that they were myopic in terms of seeing what the potential opportunities or challenges were with the data, so they became a great partner and sort of highlighting here's what we're looking at for the month, X shows us maybe there's a challenge with the funnel, maybe we could do some experiments, maybe tests, and anyway, they had uncovered a potential opportunity. It was this sort of add on product and we ended up making a million dollars the first year, it wasn't even sort of like an advertised product, it was kind of just back pocket offering for clients. So after that, I was like, wow, this is great, I love this, and didn't really know that was product operations. Fast forward a couple of years later, I...
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  • (S4) E042 Peter Newell & Dr Alison Hawks on Enabling Innovation and Agility in Defence

    (S4) E042 Peter Newell & Dr Alison Hawks on Enabling Innovation and Agility in Defence
    Jun 23 2024
    Bio: Pete Newell Pete Newell is a nationally recognized innovation expert whose work is transforming how the government and other large organizations compete and drive growth. He is the CEO of BMNT, an internationally recognized innovation consultancy and early-stage tech accelerator that helps solve some of the hardest real-world problems in national security, state and local governments, and beyond. Founded in Silicon Valley, BMNT has offices in Palo Alto, Washington DC, Austin, London, and Canberra. BMNT uses a framework, called H4X®, to drive innovation at speed. H4X® is an adaptation of the problem curation techniques honed on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan combined with the best practices employed by successful Silicon Valley startups. The result is a disciplined, evidence-based, data-driven process for connecting innovation activities into an accountable system that delivers solutions and overcome obstacles to innovation. Pete is a founder and co-author, with Lean Startup founder Steve Blank, of Hacking for Defense (H4D)®, an academic program taught at 47+ universities in the U.S., as well as universities in the UK and Australia. H4D® focuses on solving national security problems. It has in turned created a series of sister courses – Hacking for Diplomacy, Hacking for Oceans, Hacking for Sustainability, Hacking for Local and others – that use the H4X® framework to solve critical real-world problems while providing students with a platform to gain crucial problem-solving experience while performing a national service. Pete continues to advise and teach the original H4D® course at Stanford University with Steve Blank. In addition, Pete is Co-Founder and Board Director of The Common Mission Project, the 501c3 non-profit responsible for creating an international network of mission-driven entrepreneurs, including through programs like H4D®. Prior to joining BMNT, Pete served as the Director of the US Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF). Reporting directly to the senior leadership of the Army, he was charged with rapidly finding, integrating, and employing solutions to emerging problems faced by Soldiers on the battlefield. From 2010 to 2013 Pete led the REF in the investment of over $1.4B in efforts designed to counter the effects of improvised explosive devices, reduce small units exposure to suicide bombers and rocket attacks and to reduce their reliance on long resupply chains. He was responsible for the Army’s first deployment of mobile manufacturing labs as well as the use of smart phones merged with tactical radio networks. Pete retired from the US Army as a Colonel in 2013. During his 32 years in uniform he served as both an enlisted national guardsman and as an active duty officer. He commanded Infantry units at the platoon through brigade level, while performing special operations, combat, and peace support operations in Panama, Kosovo, Egypt, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan. He is an Army Ranger who has received numerous awards to include the Silver Star and Presidential Unit Citation. Pete holds a BS from Kansas State University, an MS from the US Army Command & General Staff College, an MS from the National Defense University and advanced certificates from the MIT Sloan School and the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Bio: Dr Alison Hawks Dr. Alison Hawks is one of the leading experts advancing public sector innovation. A researcher and academic-turned-entrepreneur, she is the co-founder and CEO of BMNT, Ltd., the innovation company that is changing how public sector innovation happens; and Chair of the Common Mission Project UK, BMNT’s charitable partner that guides mission-driven entrepreneurial education in the UK. Dr. Hawks co-founded BMNT Ltd with (Ret) Col Pete Newell, the CEO of BMNT, Inc., in 2019 to bring BMNT’s proven innovation approach to the UK market. Under her leadership BMNT has become a trusted innovation partner across all single Services of Defence, the Cabinet Office, and the national security community. She has also helped change how real-world government challenges are addressed in the UK, launching the “Hacking for” academic programmes created in the U.S. These courses that teach university students how to use modern entrepreneurial tools and techniques to solve problems alongside government at startup speed. As a result of her efforts, 14 UK universities are offering Hacking for the Ministry of Defence, Hacking for Sustainability and Hacking for Police. More than 480 students have taken these courses, addressing 103 real-world challenges. Dr. Hawks teaches mission-driven entrepreneurship at King’s College London, Department of War Studies and at Imperial College London’s Institute of Security Science and Technology. She was named the Woman of the Year for Innovation and Creativity at the Women in Defence Awards in 2022. She serves on the Board of Directors of BMNT, leading development of BMNT’s innovation ...
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    1 h y 5 m
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