Mike Bowler

Helping organizations improve how they deliver value for over 25 years.

Mike primarily works on corporate engagements that block months at a time, although he does make time slots available for individuals who need quicker assistance (see the 55 minute coaching call below).

If you heard Mike speak recently and are looking for more information on that topic, you’re probably looking for this follow-up page.


Overview

Mike is an experienced coach and trainer who helps teams, and their management, improve the way they deliver value. What makes Mike’s approach different is in the range of skills that he brings to your organization:

  • Human behaviour, psychology, and applied neuroscience, to improve how people work, both individually and in groups. This includes a focus on growing psychological safety.
  • Workflow design and implementation, to improve how the work flows through the system and how value is created. A focus on metrics, more data-informed decision making, and probabilistic forecasting to more accurately answer the question “when will we be done?”
  • Technical skills to improve how the value is actually implemented and maintained. Development, architecture, DevOps.
  • 25 years of experience with Agile methods to put it all together. Kanban, Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP)

Mike is based in Canada and has traveled around the world, provide training classes, coaching and facilitation services to his clients. Today, preference is being given to coaching that can be done remotely and he works in your timezone, wherever you are located.

Credentials

Where else does Mike post content?

Recent articles by Mike

Date Title Location
2024-11-27 Mob mentality podcast Unconscious Agile
2024-11-25 Ensemble work feels slower, but that’s deceptive Agile Technical Excellence
2024-11-22 Only one ticket per work item Improving Flow
2024-11-21 Basic Flow Metrics Improving Flow
2024-11-19 Survivor Bias Unconscious Agile
2024-11-10 Cognitive Bias Unconscious Agile
2024-11-02 Continuous improvement Improving Flow
2024-10-07 Focus on Value Improving Flow
2024-10-05 Visualizing Flow Efficiency Improving Flow
2024-09-28 Looking for improvement Improving Flow
2024-09-25 High WIP invalidates prioritization Improving Flow
2024-09-18 YAGNI (You Aren’t Going to Need It) Agile Technical Excellence
2024-09-08 Hot-fixes Agile Technical Excellence
2024-09-05 Perceptual positions & Halloween Unconscious Agile
2024-09-04 Hybrid teams Improving Flow
2024-09-02 Mocking frameworks Agile Technical Excellence
2024-09-01 Audit Improving Flow
2024-08-29 Fractional people Improving Flow
2024-08-26 “Everything that’s old is new again” Agile Technical Excellence
2024-08-24 Should remote workers have cameras on? Unconscious Agile

Books

Mike was a contributor to the following books.

  • “Test-Driven Development: A Practical Guide” Author: Dave Astels, Published: 2003
  • “Mob Programming” Authors: Woody Zuill & Kevin Meadows, Published: 2016

Interviews with Mike

Date Podcast Topic
Nov 2024 Mob Mentality Podcast We talk about how I facilitate ensemble (mobbing) sessions and then dig into some neuroscience to explain some of the benefits of working this way.
Nov 2024 Scrum Master Toolbox Episode 1: We discuss the notion of “there is no failure, only feedback” and also about coaching management to ensure teams thrive
Nov 2024 Scrum Master Toolbox Episode 2: Trust and collaboration
Nov 2024 Scrum Master Toolbox Episode 3: Leading through curiosity and trust
Nov 2024 Scrum Master Toolbox Episode 4: Using Six Thinking Hats as a retrospective format
Nov 2024 Scrum Master Toolbox Episode 5: The pitfalls of combining the PO with other roles
Jul 2024 The Agile Within Neuroscience Strategies for Leading Teams
Aug 2019 Legacy Code Rocks Unconscious Behaviour in Coding
Feb 2017 Agile Games Using LEGO to teach technical topics
May 2016 InfoQ Using LEGO to teach technical topics
Jan 2015 Agile Coffee Using LEGO to teach technical topics