First pass at a couple of initial Agile Badge definitions

[Richard J Foster]

Greetings all,

Yes, I know I said my goal was to define the first three "Agile Skill"
badges by August 23rd, but as happens sometimes life got in the way! I
have finally updated the wiki with a suggestion for two possible
badges (the text also appears below). Is this the sort of thing people
are looking for?

On a related subject, if this does look like something the group wants
to pursue I would like to try and get the ball rolling on some sort of
web based application to manage the nomination and award process. It
would also act as a public location where potential collaborators
could review an individual's Agile skill-set. I'd really like to use
the development of that application as an opportunity to start work on
earning an Apprentice badge, and would also love to explore a
technology I haven't currently used. I was thinking of possibly using
the Lift framework, but I'm open to other suggestions. Anyone want to
earn their Mentor badge and help me out?

Regards,
Richard

--- Text from "Mentor" badge page ---

Mentor
To earn the Mentor badge, an individual must work with one or more
apprentices, helping them develop and improve their skills over a
period of time.

Building a medium or long term mentoring relationship (12 months or
longer) is strongly recommended, as is encouraging your apprentices to
mentor others.

Bronze
To earn a bronze Mentor badge you must:

* Work with the apprentice, an individual who is less skilled than
you in a particular subject area, to identify the gaps in their skills
and/or knowledge.
* In collaboration with the apprentice, develop a plan to transfer
the necessary information to them.
* Over a period of not less than 1 month, communicate with the
apprentice to help them build their skills. Such communication should
take place no less than once per week. Three or more times is
encouraged.
* In collaboration with the apprentice, create a summary of the
lessons learned by both Apprentice and Mentor and post it online for
review (for example in a blog post, or posted directly to the Agile
Developer Skills group).


Silver
To earn a silver Mentor badge you must:

* Have completed the Bronze badge requirements with at least 3
different apprentices.
* Provide documentation (in a similar manner to the summary
created as part of the Bronze badge) to demonstrate an ongoing
relationship with at least one Apprentice lasting three months or
longer.

Gold
To earn a gold Mentor badge you must:

* Have completed the equivalent of two Silver Mentor badge
requirements in no less than two different pillars.
* Provide documentation of mentoring relationships with no less
than five apprentices.
* Demonstrate that at least one former Apprentices has earned a
Mentor badge (or an upgrade in badge status) after working with you.

--- Text from "Apprentice" badge page ---
Apprentice
The Apprentice badge is intended to show that the badge holder has
demonstrated a willingness to improve their skills by working with one
(or more) more experienced mentors.
Bronze

To earn a bronze Apprentice badge you must:

* Identify a subject area you are interested in improving.
* Identify a person with skills in that area willing to mentor
you.
* Create an initial plan for what you wish to learn and post it
online for review (for example in a blog post, or posted directly to
the Agile Developer Skills group).

Silver
To earn a silver Apprentice badge you must:

* Over a period of no less than 3 months, create at least one
public update each month describing how the apprenticeship has
progressed and what you have learned so far.

Gold
To earn a gold Apprentice badge you must:

* Over a period of not less than 12 months, create regular public
updates showing how you are working with your mentor(s) to improve
your skill set.

[Ron Jeffries]

Hello, Richard. On Friday, October 22, 2010, at 1:44:30 PM, you
wrote:

> Yes, I know I said my goal was to define the first three "Agile Skill"
> badges by August 23rd, but as happens sometimes life got in the way! I
> have finally updated the wiki with a suggestion for two possible
> badges (the text also appears below). Is this the sort of thing people
> are looking for?

Wow. Seems this group has totally died. Not sure what to do about
that ...

Ron Jeffries
www.XProgramming.com
Make it real or else forget about it -- Carlos Santana

[Oleg]

On Nov 4, 1:56 am, Ron Jeffries <ronjeffr...@acm.org> wrote:
> Hello, Richard.  On Friday, October 22, 2010, at 1:44:30 PM, you
> wrote:
>
> > Yes, I know I said my goal was to define the first three "Agile Skill"
> > badges by August 23rd, but as happens sometimes life got in the way! I
> > have finally updated the wiki with a suggestion for two possible
> > badges (the text also appears below). Is this the sort of thing people
> > are looking for?
>
> Wow. Seems this group has totally died. Not sure what to do about
> that ...

Ron, me neither.
We may come up with a dozen of "because".
The only decisive thing is IMHO how this group is useful to its
participants. It obviously wasn't :-(

One parallel comes to my mind: I've just finished a basic coach
training. I'm pulling together a group of co-trainees, who are willing
to work together after the course, learn together etc. I do this,
because that's a very effective way to improve my coaching skills (and
I need to exercise with someone). For them it's the same motivation.
Together we motivate each other, bring greater dynamic.

What does this group have to offer to someone, who wants to learn?
Does it offer more, than XP/scrum yahoo groups do?

Oleg

[Ron Jeffries]

Hello, Oleg. On Sunday, November 14, 2010, at 6:24:38 PM, you
wrote:

> What does this group have to offer to someone, who wants to learn?
> Does it offer more, than XP/scrum yahoo groups do?

Not much, I guess. The original vision was to provide a map of
things to know, and learning resources to learn them. When the
energy of a few, notably Andre, faded, so did the group.

Natural selection in action, I guess.

Ron Jeffries
www.XProgramming.com
Sorry about your cow ... I didn't know she was sacred.

[Richard J Foster]

On Sunday, November 14, 2010 at 6:41 PM Ron wrote:

>Hello, Oleg. On Sunday, November 14, 2010, at 6:24:38 PM, you
>wrote:
>
>> What does this group have to offer to someone, who wants to learn?
>> Does it offer more, than XP/scrum yahoo groups do?
>
>Not much, I guess. The original vision was to provide a map of things to know, and learning resources
>to learn them. When the energy of a few, notably Andre, faded, so did the group.
>
>Natural selection in action, I guess.

Sadly, it does seem that way. :-( I had hoped to be able to contribute
significantly more in the way of time... but it hasn't worked out like
that. I'm also a little wary of making too many modifications to the
current site because despite my interest I can't claim to *practice*
Agile development. I want to, and I am doing *some* of the things that
processes like Scrum recommend, but current personal constraints mean
I am doing so in a bit of a vacuum. (In particular, nobody is looking
over my shoulder and going "Hey, you fool... don't do it that way,
*this* way is much faster/better/easier".) That was why I wanted to
make the Mentor / Apprentice badges the first ones on offer. It was my
hope that it would help stimulate the ADS group (and site) and help
match those willing to learn with those wanting to earn their first
significant Agile badge.

Que sera, sera.

Regards,
Richard

[CHM de Beer]

Ron / Oleg,

I have been following this group for a long time. It has served its
purpose and by design or by accident, it had enough reflection built
in, to spawn http://www.agileskillsproject.org which I now refer to
constantly and I encourage teams that I work with, to refer to it
frequently.

My suggestion would be let the group die a natural death, and focus
energy on http://www.agileskillsproject.org.

Regards,

Marius

[Oleg]

On Nov 15, 11:15 pm, CHM de Beer <chmdeb...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ron / Oleg,
>
> I have been following this group for a long time. It has served its
> purpose and by design or by accident, it had enough reflection built

> in, to spawnhttp://www.agileskillsproject.orgwhich I now refer to

> constantly and I encourage teams that I work with, to refer to it
> frequently.
>
> My suggestion would be let the group die a natural death, and focus
> energy onhttp://www.agileskillsproject.org.

Marius,

that's an interesting point. I've looked at the site and I was
impressed ("wow, that looks great!"). It actually resonates with
something I have been playing with in my mind:
Take, what we've created, and use it in some different way.

For me it would be: Do it in a personally rewarding way.

I'm thinking about this:
1. Personal benefit - I need some place to organize ideas, write down
things I've learned, so I can build my knowledge base. I could use
this site to record that stuff. (Well, I'm still reluctant, but I will
work on my reluctance).
2. Bring in some "social" thing
People are using blogs to present themselves, store some ideas, share
an opinion. Also people keep different lists on-line (like book
lists). How can we bring those together? Do some integration?
(technology last...)
Authors on InfoQ sometimes do that - they post links to different blog
items, which talk about the same idea and add narrative to those.
3. Use existing groups
Personally, I follow XP and Scrum yahoo groups. And I'm not able to
keep up. Sometimes there are great ideas there, lying around, often
forgotten after discussion is over.
Do you extract information from those in a systematic way? Just doing
that may bring new insights and knowledge.
Well, I don't do that, but I understand why (too much interesting
stuff, I should concentrate on things, that really relate to me, but I
don't - again, why?). Again, I've seen InfoQ articles based purely on
yahoo group posts - interesting.
How can we provoke people on those groups to do that themselves?

Oleg

Note to myself: if we want to keep a structure, there should be
structure promoting something (rules?). E.g. collective ownership
(structure promoting factor) vs. personal satisfaction (content
promoting factor).