Spotify Model
I have to admit, that until recently I had a pretty low opinion of the Spotify Model. This probably had a lot less to do with the Spotify Model, and more to do with the people who were telling me about the Spotify Model (SM). Mostly these were managers from large banks and insurance companies, who having seen a video or two, were about to make their whole organisation agile based on the SM. It was hard not to laugh.
However, having attended a course by Joakim Sundén “Agile at Scale, Inspired by Spotify”, I’ve changed my mind. Their journey is a lot more interesting than the buzzwords everyone already knows. Experimenting and improving is hardwired in the culture of Spotify and the path they have taken is neither as straightforward nor as linear as the model might have you believe. There was a lot of experimenting and tweaking to get to where they are now – which still isn’t the end of the road!
Re: the strip itself. This strip had a long gestation period – so much for my time-boxing 🙁 This has to do with my desire to actual draw something that stretches me – and the fact that my “jokes” are relatively weak. Many comic strips focus on the joke – and literally use cut and paste (I’m looking at you Don’t hit Save) or the same pictures every time to tell the joke – see Ryan North’s Dinosaur Comics. I am so impressed by people who can produce 2 or 3 strips a week – I just don’t have that many good ideas (or agile just isn’t that funny!). I’m really just an agile coach who happens to draw strips, rather than a real webcomic auteur. Still, I can live with that 😉