What is it? A visible location in a room or virtual whiteboard that looks to capture any type of topic that is not important to discuss at the time, but deemed worthy to discuss later by the group gathered. Is a means to capture the thought and intention so that it is heard and understood, and then placed somewhere so that it is not forgotten and followed up on at a later time.

What is it? The Non-Functional Requirements Map is a tool to capture and articulate the non-functional requirements of a solution that a team is striving to deliver. It aims to elaborate non-functional areas that are unlikely to be captured using practices primarily focused on functional aspects of a solution. Non-functional requirements are broken down into areas represented by each segment on the canvas which are examined and populated in turn as a group.

What is it? This practice consists of a meditation of 10 minutes based, on the Metta Bhavana Buddhist practice, that can help to develop an empathetic mindset towards team members, calm thoughts, stimulate positive emotions, reduce the level of stress, and relieve anxiety. The most common form of the practice is in five stages, each of which should last about 2 minutes for a beginner. Why use it? We value individuals and interactions over processes and tools, so we provide tools for team members to improve their interactions.

What is it? Lean inception is the effective combination of Design Thinking and Lean StartUp to decide the Minimum Viable Product (MVP). It is a collaborative workshop that will help a group of people — typically an agile team, a squad, or a product team — understand, align and plan the building of the lean product. The construction of a successful product starts with a Lean Inception. Why use it? Because, in the end, you’ll know what is the best way to validate the product to be developed, as such the hypothesis to be tested and goals to be reached.

What is it? The Business Priorities Exercise is a collaborative approach to getting stakeholders to agree on what the top priorities are for whatever they are trying to achieve. Start by asking the group to pick 3-4 top business priorities that they want to achieve from the project in question Run through each of the priorities with the team and provide example (note: don’t lead the witness!) Using Dot Marking, ask them to vote for the top 3 then workup a mind map for them identifying what they actually mean Once the team have settled on their top 3, take each priority in turn and have a more detailed discussion about it.

What is it? It is a practice that helps you to understand more about your customer, mapping stakeholders and agreeing ways of communicating with different teams/people. The target outcome is to have a stakeholder map and a communication plan. When to use it? It can be useful when you start engaging with a new customer, while you are in a presales phase or before starting the delivery of a project.