Month: February 2022

February 23, 2022

Greg Thomas

Determining Sprint Capacity

As easy as it would be, Sprint Capacity isn’t all about numbers.  The numbers are the foundation to build a capacity but they aren’t the entire story.  If you’re being asked to determine your team’s capacity, there are a number of factors you should be considering. Some factors I consider when looking at how I want to manage a sprint and what I think of when determining the capacity of the team; How many stories are allocated to each developer to each sprint and what are they in particular? I.e., a developer could have 3 – 4 user stories a sprint,

February 22, 2022

Greg Thomas

Leading the Army of One

Whenever I’m stuck on a piece of code I can’t get past or take a look at that one user story no one wants to work on or look at the daunting amount of email I have in my inbox I always ask myself that same question… Can you Lead the Army of One? This question takes on greater meaning when working with new developers that want to take on leadership roles (whether with people, projects, or code) and I always start off with this – Can you lead yourself? The knee-jerk reaction always is – “Well I got here

February 21, 2022

Greg Thomas

The Job you Don’t Know Exists… Yet!

You might be applying for a Junior, Intermediate, Senior Developer job, or maybe a Tech Lead – who knows – but in the back of my head, I’m evaluating you for a job that doesn’t exist yet. When you’re hiring someone you’re presumably doing it because your team is growing. Maybe your role has expanded, your project is growing, your product is doing well in the field, whatever the reason, there is an element of growth behind it – you need more awesome people to meet that growth. As someone close to the problems, you are probably thinking further out

February 20, 2022

Greg Thomas

What Makes a Great Team Lead

Hats off to everyone out there is a Team Lead right now, it’s not an easy gig, there are lots of moving parts and it can be a challenge with your peers. One of my most memorable times as a Team Lead was when I asked someone to do so task and they responded back with – “are you telling me to do it or are you asking me to do it?” – in my head, we needed the task done, I had been asked my manager to get the team to do it, so I knew what I was

February 19, 2022

Greg Thomas

What We Don’t Know

This is the best way to start a meeting where no one knows what is happening or what the problem is. It sets the tone and gets people into the right mindset. It’s not about justifying your position. Assigning blame. Or analyzing what did or did not go wrong. It’s about getting everyone on the same page before deciding to move forward.

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