When, like the children’s book character Alexander, you’re having a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day at work, how do you turn things around? In this episode, Peter shares four strategies he used to do just that on what started out as a really tough trail run, strategies that are just as powerful at work. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/four-trail-strategies-to-transform-a-bad-day-at-work/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

How we manage our work has to fit the nature of the work. And, too often, it doesn’t, which leads to waste and frustration. In this episode, Richard and Peter walk through 3 styles of process that go with 4 different kinds of work. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/make-your-process-fit-your-work/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

A great vision statement can create alignment, increase engagement, and improve business outcomes. But too many vision statements are corporate-speak buzzword bingo. And those can be worse than no vision statement at all. In this episode, Peter and Richard explain what makes a vision statement worth writing and share a quick, collaborative process to create one for your product, team, or organization. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/craft-a-vision-statement-not-corporate-speak/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

In this episode, David J Bland, author of “Testing Business Ideas” joins Peter and Richard to talk about how to use Lean Startup-style experiments in any kind of business. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/tackle-risk-with-david-bland/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

One of the trickiest problems leaders face is getting org structure right. This is even harder in Agile orgs because there are strong opinions out there about the perfect team structure that often don’t apply easily in real orgs. In this episode, Peter and Richard share 6 principles you can use to reason about the right team structure for your context. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/get-agile-org-structure-right/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

We all know early feedback on work can be useful, but it’s hard to do. We want to show people things when they’re all polished and when we feel proud of the product. Not to mention, most people don’t know how to give feedback well. In this episode, Richard and Peter introduce an approach to getting feedback that solves these problems and makes early feedback low-risk, productive, and encouraging. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/getting-feedback-on-wip/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Why is change so hard? Why do we say we want to make changes but then, so often, fail to actually make the change stick? In this episode, Richard and Peter dive into psychologists Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey’s work on immunity to change and how to overcome it. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/immunity-to-change/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Typical status reports start out green, go yellow if issues pop up, and only turn red if things get really, really bad. In this episode, Peter and Richard explain why status reports should have to “earn green” and how you can use this mindset to find good places to start on any initiative (even if you’re not actually creating status reports). Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/incremental-small-slice-approach-gives-real-progress/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Conflict is a natural result of trying to get things done with other people–we have different perspectives and want different things. It’s easy for that to turn into a battle of egos, but it doesn't have to. You can move through conflict gracefully, coming out of it with better outcomes, both in terms of the decision and the relationship. In this episode, Peter and Richard share the 3 tools they find most useful for resolving conflict and producing great outcomes. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/3-tools-to-resolve-conflict/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Leaders have a huge impact on whether Agile teams in their organization are going to be successful or not. In this episode, Peter and Richard share the most important things leaders need to know if they want to help their Agile teams get the best results. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/leading-agile-teams/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

There are times when it doesn’t feel possible to break or renegotiate a commitment, but you also can’t see how to deliver on it. You feel stuck. So what do you do then? Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/overcommitted-and-feeling-stuck/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

People spend a ton of time in meetings these days, and too many meetings are just a waste of time. In this episode, Peter and Richard talk through how to determine which meetings are worth having and which can go asynchronous, and they introduce the DAVID approach to ensuring the meeting you do have are worth the time. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/fix-your-meetings-with-david/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Richard and Peter get paid to teach leaders and coaches how to coach more effectively—and it works. So, what happens when Peter spends 20 minutes trying to teach ChatGPT how to coach? Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/train-chatgpt-ai-to-coach/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Are use cases an essential partner to user stories for Agile teams? Agile Manifesto co-author Alistair Cockburn thinks so. In this episode, Richard and Peter discuss use cases and user stories with Alistair, including some practical steps to get started with lightweight use cases as a complementary tool for your Agile product development. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/alistair-cockburn-on-use-cases-user-stories Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

In this episode, Richard and Peter explore what cross-functional teams are, why they're crucial to Agile methods like Scrum, and how to navigate some common challenges in creating and maintaining these teams. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/cross-functional-teams-real-world-challenges/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Have you or your team ever felt like prioritizing your work is like a hostage negotiation with your stakeholders…and you don’t have the leverage to get a good outcome? In this episode, Richard chats with Dean Peters about what he calls “feature hostage negotiation.” They dig into where it comes from, what problems it causes, and how to respond if you’re a product manager in that situation. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/feature-hostage-negotiation/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

It’s January, and people are setting goals and New Year’s resolutions. But how do you pick the right ones? It can be overwhelming, and you can end up picking no goal at all or just picking ones that are easy to define. In this episode, Richard and Peter share a simple process using the Theory of Constraints to find just the right personal and work goals for 2024. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/set-the-right-goals/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

In this episode, Richard and Peter give actionable advice for how to get unstuck when your team’s retrospectives produce lots of good ideas for change but never seem to lead to actual changes getting implemented. They share an agenda for a special retrospective you can do to address that exact challenge. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/inspecting-without-adapting/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Richard and Peter introduced the concept of culture signals in episode 71. But because of the examples in that episode, many people got the misconception that culture signals were only for CEOs. Not at all! In this episode they share 7 inspirational examples of mid-level managers, team leads, and individual contributors creating effective culture signals, and they review how you can do the same in your environment. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/culture-signals-for-everyone/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/

Most leadership teams adopt their style by accident and end up with wasteful meetings and unnecessarily noise and conflict. In this episode, Peter and Richard share an approach for figuring out the right kind of leadership team style for you based on your context. They describe the tools that fit each style and when your team might shift from one to another, drawing lessons from great music groups and sports teams. Episode page: https://www.humanizingwork.com/finding-the-right-style-for-your-leadership-team/ Share a challenge or episode idea: mailbag@humanizingwork.com Connect with Humanizing Work: https://www.linkedin.com/company/humanizingwork https://www.facebook.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/HumanizingWork https://twitter.com/rslawrence/ https://twitter.com/tptman/