This afternoon we welcome 14 new divers and one sundeck diver to the vessel. They would come here from all over the world to see what Palau has to offer. After getting settled in the rooms and assembling the gear, we would give them a short briefing about the boat and safety. Then they would have their first dinner from Chef Christian.
After a good night’s sleep, the divers would all wake up eager to get in the water. First dive would be Sandy Paradise, a slopping coral garden that finishes off in a long sandy run to the deep. Here we would get to see the leaf scorpion fish, and mantis shrimp. Over the sand they would see schools of jacks, barracuda, and a few sharks as well. Next we would head to the amazing Siaes tunnel. A long and deep tunnel that holds the rare Helfrichs dart fish. They usually live much deeper but here in the tunnel they think they are deeper. Then the divers would travel along the wall seeing turtles Spanish mackerel, and lots of reef fish in large schools swimming above eels and nudibranchs. The next dive Siaes Corner is the first hookin dive of the week. We would swim along the wall to a point where the sharks and large schools of fish hag out. After hooking in we would fly there for a while and watch the action. The last dive of the day would be to Ulong channel. The premier dive site of this area. A beautiful hard coral wall leading up to a hookin with sharks and turtles. Then we Swim and slowly drift to the end seeing A huge lettuce coral wall, then a couple more sharks patrolling the site. Then finish off the dive with 2 100 plus year old giant clams.
This morning and every morning Chef Christian would serve us the best omelets, eggs, French toast sausage and bacon and waffles. After being filled up for breakfast we would head off to blue corner, one of the top 5 dive sites in the world. Here the divers would be treated to a fantastic wall dive leading up to the corner, after hooking in we would be treated to a friendly and curious napoleon wrasse, lots of sharks parading up and down the wall, a giant school of jacks, and red toothed trigger fish by the thousands (literally). Next after a little relaxation would be blue holes a site right down from the corner that has 4 large holes in the top of the reef leading to a big cavernous room with disco clams,, nudibranchs, and sea fans, then down the wall towards the corner where they would see lots of sharks more schools of travally and barracuda. After that would be a lunch buffet consisting of a large salad, a choice of meats, today it would be Mexican tacos day. A couple sides and some fruit. Nobody looses weight on these trips. Off to new drop off and another hook in dive where the guests would be treated to turtles, sharks and one baby eagle ray that fly’s effortlessly in front of them. For the final day dive we would take them to German channel, here the manta rays would put on a 50 minute display during feeding, swimming close, doing flips, and large angled turns back. This was a couple of the guest’s first sitting of a manta. The first night dive would be to turtle cove where the guests would slowly drift along the wall seeing huge groupers, lobsters, tons of shrimps, and beautiful yellow cup coral everywhere, a great end to the day,
Early in the morning we head down to Peleliu, a beautiful island in southern Palau, also the site of a deadly world war two battle. Some of the guests would go on a land tour during the second dive. There they would see tanks, planes, Japanese caves, a museum and the Japanese headquarters. But for the first dive we would go to Peleliu corner. A fast drift and the most advanced dive we have due to a strong current, but that current brings a lot of fun, and some of the larger sharks sometimes. Here we would see a few big reef sharks, eels, and schools of jacks. Next during the tour the remaining guests would go to west wall. A sheer wall that has barracuda and lets of small crabs, nudes, and scorpion fish. There would also be quite a few turtles checking out what the divers were doing. After lunch we would head out for a quick skiff ride to Orange beach. Here the guests would get to see a small landing vessel from the war, bottles, bullets and shells leftover. After that we would go to Barracks point. Here we would be accompanied by lots of turtles, sharks and travally. Then that night for the night dive we would see Ngedebus coral garden. A sloping garden that has lots of small shrimp, patrolling sharks, sleeping turtles. A perfect end to a great day.
Back to blue corner we head. Awe can never do a week without a second visit to this site. Again we would be treated to a show of sharks, barracuda and 1000’s of other schooling fish. Plus of course the friendly napoleon wrasse. Next we take the divers to see turtle cove during the day. First they would get to go through a small tunnel onto the wall. A cool way to start. Then travel along the wall seeing sharks big schools of fish, turtles, eels, and disco clams just to name a few. Then after a big lunch and a long nap we would head out to canyons, the divers would get to see one of the largest crocodile fish ever. A cool find. After that we head off back to German channel, this time we would see mantas many times during the dive, sometimes getting so close even the responsible people found it hard not to touch them. But nobody did and the mantas were spectacular. That night the divers would chicken out and choose a nice glass of wine and a cut-throat came of Uno, instead of the night dive.
For the last full day we would spend some time on walls. The first one would be Dexter’s wall where the guests would be treated to lots of turtles, and a gorgeous wall. After that we would take the divers to Ferns wall a site that would give us a sighting of a scorpion fish, turtles, sharks, and a beautiful sheer wall with the sunbeams shining through. After lunch we head off to Barnums Wall, where we would see a larger scorpion fish, nudibranchs, and some more turtles. This week has been packed full of turtles. The last dive of the day would be to Big Drop Off, a site where we would see a large ball and chain left over from the German occupation, just beyond that would be a nook in the wall with a couple snoozing white tip sharks. This sheer wall is full of life both on the wall and off of it. You never know where to look. That night Ernan would show his video of the week to the divers delight.
On the final morning we would go to the IRO Maru first thing. A 500 ft wreck with large guns, a cuttlefish, and on the kingposts we would see a couple small giant clams, and a plethora of anemones with some feisty tomato anemone fish. For the last dive of the week we head over to Chandelier Cave. Here we would hop from air filled cave to air filled cave seeing the stalactites. On the way out the divers turn the lights off to use the ambient light to make their way out. Once outside they would spend the rest of the dive looking for and at the elusive Mandarin fish. A beautiful multicolored fish that hides in the coral. After we get back the guests all clean up their gear with our help and then enjoy the afternoon. Some go into town or to the drop off bar to have a drink and some internet. The rest relax on the boat until the cocktail party that evening. After that they all go off the boat to enjoy their final meal on land.
It’s been a great week of diving stories and sightings. The guests were a pleasure and the weather wonderful. At 8am Sunday morning we hate to send them off. Bon Voyage and we hope to see them all again.
Chris Matts is one of the most inventive, creative and illustrative guys I have the pleasure to know. We collaborated on a few half-fun, half-serious projects, only one of which made it to being published—LeanProcrastionation. Chris and Olav Maassen contributed important ideas regarding the identification of the Last Responsible Moment, which lead to a game being created that’s going to be played at the Agile2011 in Salt Lake City tomorrow… Unfortunately, without me.
I only once met Chris in person so far, on my first night in Trondheim where we attended the XP2010 conference. We had much fun (as you can see in the picture) and I’ve learned a lot about and from his work since then…
Your next chance to meet Chris might be the ALE2011 unconference in Berlin (Sept 7-9), where he’ll give a talk about Feature Injection! Register here, there are still free places. Back to Chris' work:
I’m surprised how many people I meet who have not heard of this concept, as “Real Options is the underlying principle of agile.” (quoted from the linked article by Chris and Olav)
One of the principles of the Lean Software approach is “deferring decisions to the last responsible moment”. Why? Because we want to spend our time building the right system, and we only find out what the right system is while we build it. As long as we learn, we have options, and we need to make those options explicit so that we can evaluate when to decide. The model itself is surprisingly simple, yet very powerful:
To explain all of this is beyond the scope of this post, but Chris and Olav have published a wealth of useful information about this on their blog. I suggest to start reading here. Or, if you prefer it in comic format, enjoy Chris’ drawing skills here.
With Feature Injection, Chris gave us an analysis process based on Real Options and a learning cycle. It explains why Examples are of such great importance in BDD. The whole story is, again, presented in the form of a comic, which makes it fun to read! He starts with
Information Arrival, as available information is key to assess your options. The important difference to classical analytical processes is that with Feature Injection information is pulled rather than pushed, leading to a continuous information flow.
As we pull value from a system, we inject features. We recognise that the value of any IT system lies in its outputs.
Identify the minimum set of features to deliver that value, by asking what is needed in the system to produce the expected output.
We try to repeatedly break the Model in the last instalment, thereby completing it. Chris shows how to establish an Experiential Learning Cycle: Example-Reflect-Test-Model-… which leads to the creation of a distributed cognition system. Amazing.
In the Afterlude, Chris connects back to Real Options. He explains the important difference between things we know we don’t know (we know the questions, but don’t have the answers yet), and things we don’t know we don’t know (unknown unknowns, aka Black Swans, the things we do not even have the questions for). By leading us to asking the right question, Feature Injection helps us to create boundaries around the unknown. This boundary we can manage, thereby reducing risk.
“First Chris Matts started to go to conferences. Later, he sent his friends to conferences, so that they could share their learnings with him. In the meantime, these friends send their friends to conferences, too, so that…
He uses the same approach for books. When he saw he couldn’t read all the books he wanted to himself, he started to let his peers read and share…” (quoted from my memory)
This is why we think Chris Matts is an Awesome Coach. If you can add an awesome experience with Chris, please do so in the comments. We honour one Coach a week. Suggestions welcome!
I recently returned from a magical family holiday to Florida. My wife and I decided it was the perfect time for our two young children (now aged seven and five) to experience the delights that Disneyworld has to offer. For those who haven’t been, I can thoroughly recommend it. As a self-confessed “big kid”, there was as much fun to be had for me as they was for my children.
Part of the fun for me was becoming immersed into the world of Pixar. I saw a lot of Pixar characters, and rode a lot of Pixar-themed rides at the parks, but I was intrigued to know more about “how” they work as a company.
“The art challenges the technology, and the technology inspires the art.” – John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer of PIXAR
Pixar Animation Studios (to give them their full name) is a computer animation film studio that is a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company. As such, Disneyworld has devoted considerable parts of their parks to character and rides associated with Pixar productions. Pixar’s growth and innovative approach has always intrigued me, and I believe there is an inherently “agile” culture at the soul of the company. Here is what I found during my trip…any beyond!!! (See what I did there?!?)
Firstly, Pixar believe that we are all potential storytellers. Yes, they do hire “story artists” to help craft new exciting worlds and characters for us to enjoy, but deep down, they fundamentally believe that we have one simple thing in common – being human.
Good stories come from humans. They come from our own experiences. They come from our own emotions. One of the documentaries I watched featured the story artist behind “Monsters Inc.”. He started with a drab story about a monster that scares kids for a living – a story that didn’t really ‘hook’ the audience. Only when that story artist had his first child, did the same idea evolve into a story about a Monster learning to become a father – and hence becoming one of Pixar’s major productions.
Similarly, the stories we use in agile or scrum projects should be personal too. They should hold emotional connection firstly for the story writer, and then for the story implementers. I often remark that in a Scrum team, the Product Owner is the chief storyteller. They should be able to convey a personal connection to the story behind the requirements – even if the Product Owner themselves are not the leading character.
“A hallmark of a healthy creative culture is that its people feel free to share ideas, opinions, and criticisms.” — Ed Catmull, President of PIXAR
Pixar are constantly looking to break the boundaries of computer animation. In Monsters Inc. the breakthrough came by animating hair and fur. In Cars, it was reproducing “shiny” metal objects. In Inside Out, the challenge was creating characters made from light particles. These challenges can take up to a whole year to master, and the only way they achieved that was by iterating through trial and error. Characters like Sully from Monsters Inc, went through over 30 iterations and reproductions to get his fur looking “good enough”.
Pixar also still encourage the production of “short films” – some of which have been nominated and even won Academy Awards. Despite the bulk of there revenue coming from blockbuster feature length movies, they still encourage their directors to create short films – to experiment with new technologies and techniques.
So despite many Pixar projects running much longer than more common software-themed scrum projects, Pixar still take and iterative approach to their developments. And stories and characters are reimagined several times before they hit our screens. An iterative approach supports creativity and imagination within teams and organisations – and coupled with an ambition to experiment and surpass what seems impossible at the outset is what makes Pixar such a fascinating company to learn from.
“Mistakes aren’t a necessary evil. They aren’t evil at all. They are an inevitable consequence of doing something new.” — Ed Catmull, President of PIXAR
The story artists at Pixar ask themselves a simple question to help create more engaging storylines. Simply asking “What if?” removes logic and sparks their imagination. Here are some examples that you might recognise:
This is a great way to start thinking about product creation. I would encourage a product owner in a Scrum team to use “What if?” to help create product backlog items. When you haven’t got time to write a long-winded user story or just need some inspiration – give “What if?” a try.
Pixar’s approach to storytelling is now open to anyone. They have shared their process and wisdom in an online training package – primarily aimed at school children – to encourage us to believe in telling our own stories, and even start to think about how they could be animated.
I have started this training myself – and it’s really very good. I would recommend it to anyone interested in how storytelling can be useful to agile teams.
Maybe Pixar are hoping the next generation of storytellers is already out there – and these videos are an invitation to anyone of us to join in with the fun.
If you are interested in the Pixar in a Box, you can sign up at https://www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/pixar