This podcast is part a published article on The Digital Project Manager. You can read the entire article here.
Audio Transcription:
Ben Aston:
You can always do Agile better, no matter if you’re an ‘agilista,’ a staunch Scrum fan, or a more tentative ‘agiler,’ You can make your meetings and ceremonies more effective by planning better. Today we’ll talk about sprint planning, daily standup Sprint reviews, and sprint retrospectives. This will give you the inside track on how to do them better and improve your Agile approach.
Thank you for tuning in. This is The Digital Project Manager Podcast. I’m Ben Aston. Clarizen, a leader in enterprise portfolio and project management software, brought this podcast to you. Clarizen.com is a great place to start learning more. Alexa, our resident DPM expert at The Digital Project Manager, is joining me today.
Alexa is amazing. You can find her at our DPM school, which we are currently running. We also have another DPM school course that we will be launching in September. If you haven’t signed up yet, go check it out. Alexa works at Crema Kansas City. Alexa, thank you for being on the show again.
Alexa Huston
Thank you for having us back.
Ben Aston:
Good stuff. Alexa, you’re a former manager of projects. Tell us about your work.
Alexa Huston
Yeah. I hope that I’m not too controversial as the transition from digital project manager into business development was quite organic. I work for an agency that creates custom web apps and mobile applications. I did a lot of account growth through inside sales for the clients I was working with.
So, as I was reflecting on 2017 and thinking about the future, I was unsure. I had a conversation to the Biz Dev guy I worked with and he suggested that I join him on the sales team. It’s a pleasure and keeps me sharp to be part of the DPM community.
Ben Aston:
Alexa, you’re always welcome. But I’m still interested so pretend that you are the CEO of the company. This is a great question, regardless of whether you’re a PM, or a new bizperson. But, what keeps you awake at night? What is your outlook on the future of your company? What are the most important things you should be concerned about?
Alexa Huston
The personal company for which I work?
Ben Aston:
Yeah. Yeah. Think of it as the future of digital and where it’s going.
Alexa Huston
Yeah. Yeah. That’s interesting. We are growing rapidly. I say “we” because it is my part, but now I say “me” because it is my role as the CEO. We hire very carefully, and what would keep us up at night is ensuring that the people we have to hire are still in line with our culture.
And can provide the necessary skills, but also the right team dynamics, and sort of, collaboration style that allows us to be ourselves. This would keep me awake at night, as there are so many talented people out there. But a culture is crucial to the success of a company. Crema is very proud of that culture. This would be a concern to me.
Ben Aston:
Yeah. Yeah. It’s tricky, isn’t it? It’s not easy to hire good people.
Alexa Huston
Right. As you mentioned, technology, particularly …,, changes so quickly. This hypothetical keeps me awake at night because I have to balance experimentation and practicality. We are a very experimental team, but we don’t want to be the first on a client project. How do we reward?