Meeting with Agile software pioneer Alistair Cockburn

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Comment by Hans-Peter Korn on January 7, 2010 at 17:52

This meeting was a starting point for this "emerging piece of work":
"Solutions Focus aka Delta Method"
http://alistair.cockburn.us/Solutions+Focus+aka+Delta+Method

Alistair created this page & discussion on his website based on comments from Mark, me and some others.

Comment by Klaus Schenck on January 7, 2010 at 13:21

Agile & SF - a lovely "narration with the neighbors", indeed! Only with some delay, and thanks to Hans-Peter's posting on the "old" SOL-listserv did I become aware of this emergent conversation, and I'm especially struck by three aspects: 1. the opening-up to neighboring fields in the first place, 2. the explicit link to "metaphor", and 3. the special metaphor of a "gradient". Let me try and briefly explain:
1. Opening-up to neighboring disciplines and areas of interest / thought always seems like a welcome sign of maturity in any "school of thought". In the earlier days of SOLworld (as I perceived them ...) trying to investigate SF's relations to, for example, "systemic" traditions seemed not well received. Maybe SF then was still too much busy with defining its own identity, its own "center of gravity", with "settling in", to be ready and self-secure enough to "look around". The "Karlstad-Group" was the first major sign of increasing openness. Last year's conference theme "Connections" was another one. I'll be curious to see what will happen re further opening at this year's conference in Bucharest - the desire has been inspired already! ...
2. "Metaphor", as a special aspect of art- and helpful usage of language has become an intense focus of my own curiosity. It was much to my surprise to find how much has been written about the topic, from Aristotle's days to "clean language", and I was glad to see Judy Reese make connections between the worlds "Metaphors in Mind" (a booktitle on clean language) and SF. Another "narration among neighbors" ...
3. As part of Kirsten's and Ingrid's one-day congress on SF in Munich, Germany, last November I offered a workshop on the use of metaphor in SF consulting. We used SF's "scaling" as a starting point. Taken literally, the word might be derived from the latin "scala": a traditional means to help you move "up", with a stepsize that can be handled (or "foot-led"? ...;-). (By the way, it is a well described "conceptual metaphor" that in everyday perception "better" correlates with "up" in a spatial understanding - as in Mark's and Jenny's sketches of the "Albert Model" ...)
If the "distance" between say "3" and "4" on the ladder is too big for a client's confidence in the next step, you can put the "rungs of the ladder" closer together. Then the step is only from "3" to "3.1".
The stepsize can be narrowed down further. What you get with a series of infintesimally small "steps" is - a gradient! Just like in Alistair's poem (linked to above), many "littles" result in: a lot. But a lot with a direction within, a gradient, a kind of a lot - of progress.
Strange enough, back in the eighties I did my diploma work (in developmental neurobiology) on: gradients! The "morphogenesis", the emergence of defined shape from quite homogenous beginnings during the development of any organism then was explained by various gradients of shape-ing substances, like hormones or neurotransmitters. And it was surprising to see with how few such "morhogen gradients" how many different shapes could be generated.
Simple beginnings, iterative interaction, emergent variety ... - a biological metaphor for SF, isn't it?

Thanks again for the food for thought!

Klaus

Comment by John Nicol on November 24, 2009 at 5:14

Thanks for posting Mark. Interesting read. Been (loosely) applying the 4 Agile manifesto bullets above in a recent telecoms operations project in North America. By helping focus the team efforts on getting software working and then sharing the 'step by step' results widely, we have generated a lot of excitement and fresh thinking.. We called the project NEON - i.e. all about shining lights into the gaps and dark corners. Being able to show 'what is working' in a software-centric workplace releases a lot of energy. Soon enough solutions emerge.

Thinking about the gap you mention above. In the latest project, I experienced a sort of 'stop - start' gap. Like a traffic light phase. Could the gap be the time it takes for an individual or team to realise that it is better to stop doing what doesn't work and begin to focus on what they are already doing and what works.. just thinking out loud here..

Aren't the most compelling metaphors the ones that work? :-)
e.g. in the USA, automobile/truck metaphors worked well. Our project made use of 'Getting the logs of the truck' = stop doing things we do not need to, 'test driving' the software and 'top coating' i.e. final coat of paint = finalise the software interface according to user needs

Comment by Hans-Peter Korn on November 23, 2009 at 15:03

Hi Mark, interesting thoughts, indeed!

Concerning the "gradient" (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradient):
To see the step-by-step-improvement towards the "solution" as a path following a gradient (and - ideally - the gradient with the greatest value, that is the path where the most important changes are happening) indeed is a useful picture. And I would introduce an additional idea: In SF and in "agile development" as well the "goal" or "solution" is not clear enough in the beginning - it becomes more and more clear during "going step by step" following the gradient. That means, based on this illustration: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gradient2.svg (LEFT pucture): The "solution" is the black area (the gradients are the blue arrows) - BUT at the beginning the location of this "black area" is not clear... there is , maybe, no clear "black spot" but somewhere a "grey shade" covering a greater area ... and so, there are only small gradients ... pointing to different directions within maybe about 60 degrees .... And, going ahead step by step following some of this gradients, the position and the "blackness" of the goal becomes more and more clear ... and the clear direction and magnitude of the gradients increases.

Concerning the "more powerful language" to deal with the "empty space between the next small steps and the better future":
Well, in Project Management this "magic word" is "Agility" and - even much more "empowering" - the word "Scrum", see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrum_%28development%29 and http://www.scrum.org/storage/Scrum%20Guide.pdf#view=fit
And, interesting, both words don't stay for some intermediate places within this "empty space" or for the "better future" but they stay for a specific kind of ACTIVITY how to deal with this "empty space".
"Agility" means, to act in this empty space in a way which is in contrast to the "traditional" management approaches based on "very broad and deep analyses of requirements" / "working out a detailed plan how to fulfil the requirements" / "delegating and controlling the tasks based on this plan". And "Scrum" means, to act in this"empty space" by making use of the power of self organizing teams.
What we, in SF, maybe can learn from this is IMHO: Instead of "Solution" (which is a word standing for a "stable" and "finite" situation) we should think about a word standing for those specific kinds of activities how we work within this "empty space" between "now" and "the better future".
Some words pop up in my mind:
>> simple
>> brief
>> successful
>> positive
Maybe not the best words describing how we ACT .... more suggestions are welcome!

Cheers
Hans-Peter

Comment by Mark McKergow on November 23, 2009 at 13:19

You can see a photo of our meeting at http://www.solworld.org/photo/mark-mckergow-and-alistair?context=user