Design up front is back!

I gave a fifteen minute talk about using design methods to boost software product development at Tampere Goes Agile 2013. This is probably the best talk I have ever given, I really like the fifteen-minute format. Here are the slides. The core message of the talk is:

Working software is an expensive way of getting user feedback when compared with role-play or design prototypes.

 

Design up front is back! from Ari Tanninen

Everything is interconnected

Everything in life is interconnected. People are connected via social networks, family ties, organizations, and their employers. The economy is a global net that reverbrates with the slightest of changes. We are connected to the same economy as consumers and through corporations as employees. We share the same ecology, and keep using and re-using the same ingredients through the carbon and nitrogen cycles. And after all, we are all star stuff.

But most importantly, everything effects everything sooner or later, and for every action there is a consequence. Kall it karma, or TANSTAAFL, or cause and effect. Regardless, this forms an interesting basis for morality. As human beings everything we do has consequences and we should keep those in mind. Because sooner or later there will be payback for all of our actions to either ourselves, or to someone else. And since everything is interconnected, the consequences of our actions impacting ourselves is just a matter of time. It is easy to miss this though, since feedback loops can be long.

The missing link between business need and software development: product design

I gave a talk about improving IT systems with participatory and user-centered design at the Wildcard 2013 conference in Latvia the other day. Here are the slides and video.

What's in a value?

I've been meaning to write this blog post for a long while now. I don't really know why, but it's about a realization of some importance to me. And by value I don't mean the usual "our company's values are openness, honesty and integrity" bollocks. You know, the part of the holy mission-vision-strategy-values quad that companies use as repairkit when they have lost one or - more often - all of the four.

So what is a value, for a person? Here is my definition:

A value is something a person values in her or his head that cannot, and should not, be justified or rationalized.

Now what?

For all intents and purposes I've abandoned my blog years ago. I've been thinking about starting to write again, but in the past three years my interests and aspirations have changed dramatically.

Things that have changed:

• I finally understand my values and the kind of work I want to do
• I finally understand why I've been miserable as software engineer
• I've decided to change careers, I don't want to write software anymore
• This Agile and Lean thing I had going on? Forget it. Not going to save the world.
• What will? Human creativity, leadership, and the bloody Deming Transformation. And as long as we're operating in a capitalistic context the primary tool for change must be business.
• I am almost finished with my MBA
• Current interests: user-centered methods, philosophy, coaching, business & organizations, zen

Should I delete this blog and start a new one, or change this blog's direction, I wonder? Once again, I am thinking too much and doing too little.

So I decided to write this post and just get on with it.

Have to do something about this ancient butt-ugly layout for sure.