The various AI vendors want us to trust their autonomous agents. I have several problems I would love to use AI to solve. (Including updating all the tags on this site!) However, I cannot trust the agents yet. Even when I use interactive prompting, I'm not happy with the results. Those results can change (non-deterministic […] The post A Management Minute: Who Deserves Your Trust: AI Agent, Your Team, or Your Network appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
This week, my podcast is the opening of a short story, a portal fantasy. Enjoy! The Podcast: The Transcript: This is 60 Seconds of Writing in Public with Johanna Rothman for October 10, 2025, where I read an excerpt of just a minute of some writing in progress. This is the opening of a (hopefully) […] The post 2025.36 Portal Fantasy Short Story Opening appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
In Project Charter Part 2: Clarify the Project Driver, Boundaries, and Constraints for This Project, I explained how project risks can affect the team's approach to the work. But project risks are not the same as product risks. Product risks are about the need for product innovation. The more innovation this product needs, the more […] The post Project Charter Part 3: How Product Risks Can Support or Change Your Feedback Loop Choices appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
Let me set the context for this post about the project charter: By now, the team knows what it has to accomplish because they have a product vision. The next question is: How will the team manage their risks to achieve those outcomes? That's where I recommend a team define its project driver, up to […] The post Project Charter Part 2: Clarify the Project Driver, Boundaries, and Constraints for This Project appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
My podcast this week is from a fiction story. After I wrote this part, I realized I started in the wrong place. So you get the benefit of reading something I will definitely change later today. Yes, I write fiction exactly the same way I write nonfiction. I start where I think the piece starts. […] The post 2025.35 Solarpunk Short Story Opening appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
This is Johanna Rothman's September 2025 Pragmatic Manager newsletter. The Unsubscribe link is at the bottom of this email. Humans excel at seeing problem signals—the signs that we have a problem. However, we often have blind spots about the root causes of those problems. Our beliefs and/or insufficient or irrelevant data reinforce those blind spots. […] The post How to See the Blind Spots That Maintain the Current System, Useful or Useless appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
Does your team have an overarching goal for its work—a product vision? Too many teams do not. The whole point of a project is to deliver a useful product that satisfies its customers. I like to think about projects as a container of some product value. That means that a given release does not need […] The post Project Charter Part 1: Write (And Test) a Product Vision for This Project appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
This week's podcast is from the Effective Public Speaking book. The cover people are working on a back cover, which means I'm close, close, close to the end of the publication work. Yay! The Podcast: The Transcript: This is 60 Seconds of Writing in Public with Johanna Rothman for September 19, 2025, where I read […] The post 2025.34 Black Boxes on a Virtual Presentation appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
Does your team have a project charter so they know what to do for this project? I see too many teams try to start work without one. That leads to feature factories, apparently random work that does not add value, or worse, a product that's partly done in too many areas. Teams start without project […] The post How to Create a Useful Project Charter in Less Time Than You Think: Overview appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
Are you trying to change people's minds? Data can help. But data is not enough. We all need stories to make that human connection. That's the point of the podcast I recorded with Sam Taggart: Storytelling is Problem Solving. (That's the link to the podcast for audio listening.) That page also has a link to […] The post Storytelling is Problem Solving on the LabView Experiment Podcast appeared first on Johanna Rothman.| Johanna Rothman
This week's podcast is from the Effective Public Speaking book. A funny thing happened on the way to the podcast. I've been heads-down, proofing and finishing the book. I plan to start the index today. That's all finishing the book. I hate this part, but if I don't do it, I can't publish the book. […]| Johanna Rothman
I've heard that the AA/PMI wants to create a manifesto for enterprise agility. I'm not sure we need a manifesto, but that's fine. Here are the necessary conditions for enterprise agility: A culture of flow efficiency thinking. That means everyone collaborates across the organization to optimize up for one overarching goal. Limited planning horizons, with […]| Johanna Rothman
This is the August 2024 Pragmatic Manager Newsletter, from Johanna Rothman. The Unsubscribe link is at the bottom of this email. Problems. They're always there, just waiting to pop up and say, “Surprise! Gotcha!” I don't mind new problems, but the sneaky problems, the ones that reappear after I thought I fixed them? I really […]| Johanna Rothman
I offer these kinds of workshops: Public cohorts where I do not customize the content. If you want to bring these workshops inside your organization and customize them, we can chat. Private cohort, customizable workshops for inside an organization. Self-study workshops. Pre-recorded, no interaction. If you want coaching after these workshops, let’s chat. Public Cohort […]| Johanna Rothman
Assessments, Workshops and Training, Coaching, Speaking, Facilitation, Project Jump Start, Books and More| Johanna Rothman
Do you have more projects than time? Have you seen these problems in your organization: You or your staff are having trouble with multitasking You have many emergency projects It's difficult for people to agree on goals or priorities or make strategic decisions You'd like to make decisions, but somehow, as a group, you don't […]| Johanna Rothman
Does your agile project feel like a death march, with immovable deadlines, long backlogs, and no time to do the work right? If so, you're not alone. Fake agility has your project by the throat and won't let go. You don't have to work like this. Instead, you can design your approach to manage the […]| Johanna Rothman
Several of my clients want to plan the product roadmap and then “work to the plan.” They think the roadmap is the long-term goal. But roadmaps aren't goals. Instead, they are tactics for achieving a long-term goal. That means we need long-term goals based on both the corporate strategy and each product's strategy. Those are two […]| Johanna Rothman
Many of my consulting and job-searching colleagues feel stuck in finding clients or jobs. Social media used to work, but it doesn't anymore. But people actually have more options for discoverability (aka marketing) than ever before. That's writing, speaking, and connecting people who might not know about each other. The more we write, speak, and […]| Johanna Rothman
I continue to work with people who have trouble with their agile approach. They tell me their relative estimation isn't working for them. They continue to roll over items, from sprint to sprint. They've rolled over some items for six months or longer. The people feel demoralized. And the Scrum Masters or agile project managers […]| Johanna Rothman
You’ve tried to use an off-the-shelf approach to agile techniques, and it’s not working. Instead of a standard method or framework, work from agile and lean principles to design your own agile approach in a way that works for you. Build collaborative, cross-functional teams. See how small batch sizes and frequent delivery create an environment […]| Johanna Rothman
I write nonfiction about all aspects of managing product development. I've recently branched out into fiction. Since I like to read most of the genres, I write across genres. Nonfiction Books I write about management, product development, and personal development. Click on the link next to each cover to see the details for that book. Management […]| Johanna Rothman
When Mark, my husband, and I moved into this house a decade ago, we faced the problem many other people face: what to keep and what to toss (or recycle, etc.). Mark had a particularly difficult time with the kitchen drawer that held all the old baby dishes and utensils. I wanted to toss everything […]| Johanna Rothman
Are you trying to use story points for estimation? If so, you might have encountered these problems: Story points reflect the ideal thinking of the team, not the actual experience of the team. Your managers don't want story points—they want durations and dates. In the absence of sufficient information, everyone makes up fiction (human stories) […]| Johanna Rothman
