Timing:1 Hour

Overview:

Most of us find ourselves multitasking at some point and are possibly even proud of our multitasking skills. Here is one game that was created by Alan Cyment and introduced to me by Gerry Kirk and Yves Hanoulle at SDEC11 that allows you to simulate the actual costs of task switching. The game involves pairing up to perform three different simple but coordinated tasks and comparing your times and experiences after using both multitasking and single tasking processes. It generates a lot of laughs and a lot of excellent discussion.

Learning Points:

Exposing the myths of multitasking and demonstrating the costs of task switching. Tips and links for avoiding multitasking.

When your team is ready for it, this is a great game for starting the discussion on multitasking (personal and project) and how to change.

Link to Game: http://winnipegagilist.blogspot.com/2012/01/multitasking-game-handsnumberssong.html

Timing: 30 minutes – 1 hour including prep and reflection.

Materials: One game of Battleships

People: 2 Teams, or 1 vs 1

Overview:

This is a game I use to introduce people to iterative development. The aim is to help the players to understand that upfront large plans are pointless the minute they are created. Helmuth (quoted above), for me, was one of the first proponents of an iterative approach. He didn’t necessarily create grand plans, conversely he didn’t disregard planning altogether, but he was smart enough to plan just enough and adjust his plan to meet the changing reality. Often my experience of working on projects with large up front plans, the opposite is true and the owner of that plan tries to adjust the reality to fit the plan.

So how do you play it?

Simple, one player (Player A) is given 40 pegs and told to place their ships and all their planned attacks up front. The second player (Player B) simultaneously places their ships. Once that has been done, the first player reads out the 40 pre-planned attacks and is given the hits and misses. Player B then get to play each attack (up to 40) separately, getting feedback on hits & misses for each.

It’s pretty obvious what will happen, most of the time Player B’s turn (iterative) based play will allow him to adjust and change his plans as he scores hits. Player A (large plan) will score hits, but is far less likely to sink all the opponents ships. So player B being limited to 40 moves also may sink the whole fleet or not, typically though that player will score more hits than the other.

What does this tell us?

Predictive planning is unreliable and is akin to reading crystal balls, reading tea leaves or any other clairvoyant technique you care to mention. Ultimately you’re predicting the future based on an infinite number of possible outcomes, effects and variables. The iterative approach is empirical, each time Player B hits his opponents ships, he can instantly change plans and target nearby locations to sink it.

Occasionally Player A wins, this is a bit like the fortune teller coincidentally getting something right, it’s often more luck than judgement.

Learning Points:

Iterative development allows you greater flexibility to the changing world, environments and needs of the business.

Often the player with the large upfront plan will score hits but not sink the ships, this could be a metaphor for a testing phase of a traditional waterfall project not being completed before time or money runs out.

Link to Game:

You Sunk My Methodology

A physical-participation disentanglement puzzle that helps a group learn how to work together (self-organize) and can be used to illustrate the difference between self-organization and command-control management or simply as a get-to-know-you icebreaker. Standing in a circle, group members reach across to connect hands with different people. The group then tries to unravel the “human knot” by unthreading their bodies without letting go of each other people’s hands.

Why you’d use it:

As a management-awareness game to illustrate required change in behavior and leadership on a management level (e.g., illustrate the change from ‘task-oriented’ management towards ‘goal/value-oriented’ management).

Timing: 15-30 minutes

Materials and environment: space (indoor or outdoor) big enough for a groups of 7-16 people (can scale for up to 200 people)

Instructions (from Holden Leadership Center):

1. If necessary split the entire group into smaller groups of 7 to 16 people (too many people in a human knot becomes extremely difficult). Groups of 10-12 are ideal.
2. Arrange group members in a circle, standing shoulder to shoulder.
3. Tell everyone to put his or her right hand up in the air and then grab the hand of someone across the circle.
4. Everyone then puts his or her left hand up in the air and grabs the hand of a different person.
5. Check to make sure that everyone is holding the hands of two different people and that not holding hands with someone directly next to him or her.
6. Tell group members to untangle themselves to make a circle without breaking the chain of hands.
7. If group members break the chain they need to start over.

Notes: 

• To illustrate the concept of centralized, top-down decision-making vs. self-organizing, run the activity twice: The first time, have a “manager” tell the participants how to solve the knot (they must obey); the second time, remove the manager (or let the manager observe and answer questions for the team) and let the participants solve for themselves.
• You can give teams a time limit on this activity to make it more challenging.
• You can also mute/ blindfold participants throughout the activity.
• Instead of making groups start over when the chain is broken you can create penalties like blinding or muting a group member.

Debrief/ discussion questions:

1. How did it feel to be successful/ unsuccessful?
2. How did it feel to be mute? Blind?
3. What strategy did your team end up using to complete the task?
4. Who were the leaders in this activity?
5. Did the team reach consensus on a plan of action? What process did the team go through to reach consensus?
6. How do you feel your team communicated during this activity?

Links:

• http://leadership.uoregon.edu/resources/exercises_tips/team_builders/human_knot
• http://wilderdom.com/games/descriptions/HumanKnot.html

• 1 hour

Players (5..8 recommended):

• Project manager or facilitator
• Internal team, partners, or customers

Ingredients:

• internet access
• a to-do list

Directions:
The goal of this activity — based on A. Roger Merrill, Rebecca R. Merrill, and Steven Covey’s description in their book First Things First — is to prioritize your to-do list in a way that helps you plan ahead and work efficiently.

Clicking on the image to the right will start an “instant play” game at innovationgames.com. Here, this 2×2 matrix will be used as the “game board,” and will help you organize the urgency and importance of your tasks. Each cell has a different significance:

• Cell 1: Urgent, important – these tasks should be at the top of your to-do list
• Cell 2: Not urgent, important – these items are likely to be neglected, but are necessary for long-term success. Set aside time each week to focus on these in order to be more productive. This cell is highlighted to remind you of its significance.
• Cell 3: Urgent, not important – these tasks suck your time and are often the result of poor-planning. They should be minimized or eliminated.
• Cell 4: Not urgent, not important – these items are trivial time-wasters that should be eliminated

There will be two different icons that players can drag onto the chart and describe to represent the tasks:

• Green squares – priority tasks that require attention
• Red square – tasks to minimize/eliminate

All moves can be seen in real time by each participant, so everyone can edit the positions and descriptions of the icons. Also, the integrated chat facility allows you and your players to collaborate to form the most efficient to-do list.

Key Points:
When it comes to our to-do lists, we tend to focus on urgent items while disregarding the importance of planning for tasks that are necessary to reach our overall goal. This negligence leads to even more stress in the long run, as everything will eventually become urgent if not prepared for. Play Merrill Covey Matrix to identify the purpose and value of your tasks and to minimize or eliminate time-wasters. Plan ahead to avoid busy work and to accomplish your goal in a productive manner.

• 1 hour

Players (5..8 recommended)

• Project team (manager, director, developers, designers, programmers, etc.)
• Neutral facilitator recommended

Ingredients

• Internet access
• A past project to reflect on

Directions
The goal of this game, introduced by Diana Larsen, is to efficiently form high-quality plans through retrospective analysis by recognizing factors that are within the team’s control. Before identifying what you want to improve, you must first be clear on the dimensions you can regulate and what you need to adapt to. Clicking on the link to the right will take you to an “instant play” game at innovationgames.com. Here, the image will be used as the “game board,” which consists of three concentric circles. Each circle represents a different element of your project:

• Inner circle: “Team Controls” – what your team can directly manage
• Middle circle: “Team Influences” –persuasive actions that your team can take to move ahead
• Outer circle: “The Soup” – elements that cannot be changed. This term — explained further by James Shore – refers to the environments we work in and have adapted to. Ideas from the other 2 circles can identify ways to respond to the barriers floating in our “soup.”

You will find an icon of blue squares at the upper left corner of the board. Each square symbolizes an idea, which players describe and drag onto the respective circle.

All edits of square placements and descriptions made by the players can be seen in real time. Communicate throughout the game using the integrated chat facility to get a better understanding of each move.

Key Points
Negative self-evaluating activities often end up emotional and unproductive. Take advantage of this game’s visual organization and extensive collaboration to avoid the blame and hopelessness that cover up ideas for future improvement. By identifying factors your team can control, influence, or cannot change, you can collectively discover how to respond to and overcome various situations. Play Circles and Soup to recognize what you can do to avoid barriers and gain insight on what actions will most effectively enhance your project.

Materials: None – just your hands.

Instructions

Four person team, around a table in a bar. One member chooses to use Zhong Zhi to surface an issue about poor performance.

Everyone takes their hands off the table. On the count of three, everyone is to put their right hand down on the table with between one and four fingers extended. The team wins if there’s one person with one finger extended, one person with two, one with three, one with four. Ready, steady, play.

It is unlikely this will happen by chance (less than one chance in ten). Repeat until either (a) it does happen by chance, or (b, preferably) someone notices that there’s nothing in the rules about not talking to one another before putting the hands down.

Variations

For the problem of over committal : same game except that the number of fingers put down should be 3, 4, 5 and 6. Either (a) someone says lets use both hands [increase team size] or (b, preferably) the team refuses to play until the goal is achievable.

For teams who want to investigate the sense of winners and losers, or of creative solutions within fixed constraints. The team divides into pairs, preferably facing across the table like a foursome playing bridge. When the hands appear, a pair wins if they have the same number of fingers while other pairs do not. Non-verbal communication is allowed. Once a team has won using a form of communication, that form may not be used again.

Learning Points

“So, we don’t talk to each other unless someone makes us”

“We accepted the crazy target, why didn’t we just say no?”

Background

The first suggestion for a name, Middle Finger, was considered offensive. Zhong Zhi (get a Mandarin Chinese speaker to help you with pronunciation) means middle finger, and we hope is less offensive and cooler.

Written up by Jonathan Clarke with credit to my friends at Agile 2011, in the Agile Game Incubator session run by Michael McCullough and Don McGreal.

Ingredients:
• Internet access

Players (5..8 recommended):
• Business Manager / Business Owner
• Employees / Team members

Directions:
While creative ideas often form during the brainstorming process of a project, originality can be lost as time goes on. Complicated plans, difficult decisions, and limited resources often force you to resort to used, familiar ideas. To surpass the stagnant stream of stale strategies, you must think outside of the box to generate new, feasible ideas. Ironically, with Gamestorming’s productive game, you will think inside of a box to do so. Use the visual organization in How-Now-Wow Matrix to create original ideas that can be implemented efficiently.

Clicking on the image to the right will take you to an “instant play” game at innovationgames.com. Here, there will be a 2×2 matrix with “originality” on the x-axis and “feasibility” on the y-axis.

• How (yellow) – original, difficult to implement
  - This represents ideas that are innovative, but not feasible. This area is good for setting future goals.

• Now (blue) – unoriginal, easy to implement
  - This is for used ideas that are familiar and known to work well

• Wow (green) – original, easy to implement
  - This category is for creative ideas that can be executed. Aim to form as many ideas in this category as you can.

There will be a light bulb icon at the upper left corner of the chart, which symbolizes ideas that your players come up with. Participants drag light bulbs to different areas of the chart corresponding to the originality and feasibility of their ideas, and describe what each one represents.

All moves can be seen in real time by each participant, so everyone can collaborate to edit the descriptions and positions of the ideas. Communicate using the integrated chat facility to work together and form original ideas.

Key Points:
By collaborating and graphically arranging ideas, participants can expand their boundaries to let their innovative thoughts flow. Also, the extensive input from the players provides multiple perspectives to alter ideas and to ensure the feasibility of the suggestions. Resist the temptation to resort to overused ideas; play How-Now-Wow Matrix to identify what you can do to make your project a success.

Ingredients:
• Internet access
• A goal

Players (5..8 recommended):
• Business Manager / Business Owner
• Employees / Team members

Directions:
This version of the famous impact-effort technique has been popularized by XPLANE. Aiming to find the most efficient strategy to reach your goal, Impact & Effort Matrix maps possible actions against two factors: the potential impact and the effort required to implement. By organizing your ideas, you can see which ones will lead to the greatest payoffs and lowest costs before you get stuck on a twisted road of wasted time.

Clicking on this image will bring you to an “instant game” at innovationgames.com, where you can play Impact & Effort Matrix online. The same image will be used as the matrix, which has a different impact-effort combination in each quadrant.

• High Impact, Low Effort: The best ideas go here!
• High Impact, High Effort: Further study is likely required.
• Low Impact, High Effort: Probably best to avoid these.
• Low Impact, Low Effort: Further study is likely required.

The light bulbs you will see at the upper left corner of the chart represent ideas. Simply add an idea to the chart by dragging a light bulb to its corresponding quadrant and describing what it is.

All moves can be seen in real time by each participant, so everyone can collaborate to edit the descriptions and positions of the strategies. Communicate using the integrated chat facility to work together and form useful ideas.

Key Points:
This technique is a necessary first step in reaching your goal; while it is great to know where you are going, it is also critical to understand how to get there. The spatial organization and group collaboration involved in the game helps identify how to optimize the benefits and minimize the costs of reaching your goal. Play Impact & Effort Matrix to map the most effective way to arrive at your objective.

The game is designed to give people a taste of what it is like to manage a portfolio in an agile organisation. The learning objectives are:

1) Show how much better Agile projects are for portfolio management
2) Show the advantage of planning with stable teams

Please note that this is a fairly complicated game and that it needs a bunch of iterations to properly tweak it. At the end of the post is a list of things we still think need some improving. Please help us improve by sharing your experiences with the game.

Time:

* Explain: 10m
* Play: 45-60m
* Debrief: 10m

Ingredients

* Big piece of paper (like flipover, ideally with grid)
* Bunch of paper (2 different colors)
* Pen
* Sissor

We need 1 board with materials for every 3-5 participants.

Preparations

On the big paper make a big table with horizontally 4 teams and verticially 12 quarters. Make sure the cells are big enough, about 5x5cm
This is going to be the planning board. Now we need to make some projects. We do this by making strips of paper. The length of the paper is the length of the project and on it we put a number. The number represents the value of the project when it is completed.
The ratio that we will be using during this game is value/quarter. So pick an average value/quarter and create a bunch of projects with value above and below that average. Use one color for agile projects and another for waterfall projects.
Be sure to include some very juicy waterfall projects with a high value/quarter, we are going to mess with them later
Make an overview of the projects and their value/quarter.

Next are some constraints. Dependencies between projects, projects that need to be finished before a certain time or can’t be started before a certain quarter. Or can only be done by a certain team.
The whole point is to give them a big puzzle where they have to optimize the projects to score as many points as possible in the next 3 years.
Next up are the event cards. Of course nothing is going to go according to plan. So be creative and make up some events. High value projects with very tight deadlines, halving the value of big waterfall projects, CEO pet projects with no or little value that have to be completed, projects taking longer etc etc.

Directions

Explaining the game

When explaining the game do not tell participants about the events. Keep those events to yourself. Just present the board, the projects and the constraints. In fact, do not even tell them about Agile and waterfall projects. Or about value/quarter.
Explain that, except for constraints, all projects can be done by all teams.

Playing the game

Leave the players with the puzzle. It will usually take them about 20-25 minutes to figure out the best configuration. During this someone will have figured out value/quarter. Once they do give them the value/quarter sheet. That is going to save them quite some time.

Once they are happy with the configuration and look at you to tally the results walk to a board, write down Q1, and write down their total for Q1, which is most likely 0. Then grab the event cards and pick one.
Give them a couple of minutes to change the plan with this new information and then tell them the difference between agile and waterfall projects. Agile projects can be divided for the value/quarter rounded down. So an 18 value Agile project taking 4 quarters can be divided into 4/9/13/18 points. This is to represent that they are delivering value throughout.

Keep going for 4-8 quarters or until time runs out, but leave about 10 minutes for the de-briefing.

Learning points

Debriefing

Go over the game and see what people have learned. People will most likely have realized the risk of waterfall projects, how easy it is to be able to cut up Agile projects and realize partial business value. Explain that the game is a bit oversimplefied (all teams can do all projects for example), but this can work without much alteration in real life.
And that there’s a lot more ‘shit’ happening in RL than the game.

Things to tweak

As mentioned before this game is still in a beta phase. There are quite a few variables that still need tweaking. This is a list of stuff that doesn’t quite work as we want it to. If you have any suggestions to improve these or other areas, please drop us a line or comment below.

• Work out the projects/constraints/events to optimize the chances for difficult decisions
• People are confused about the 2 colors projects
• I am going to try names of animals next, with fishes for waterfall projects and cats for agile projects
• How to get people emotionally involved/attached to the current plan.
• It is now too easy to completely change a project that has not started yet.
• Fixed events vs random ones
• Fixed events make it possible to prepare carefully prepared traps.
• Random events make it clear for the players that unpredictable ‘shit happens’
• Figure out what to do with projects that go over the 12th quarter