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Two weeks, four webinars, dozens of hours of preparation, planning and retrospective,
Forty improvements and again. Big losses.

Retro turning and Agile Training Certification

So on April 28th, the Slurm Evening School started. Together with our students, we’re creating a feedback course on Agile and Agile principles. In two weeks they worked technical issues, introduced more than 40 improvements, continued to fill the utility bank, received constant feedback from students. We were getting better, we were happy with ourselves and the product.

The Retro, after four webinars, invited a student to tell the public how cool we are. The feedback was unexpected, like cold water in the face. And a lot of confusing terms, English words in the speakers' speeches. And it is not possible to get into the personal office, and in the chat in Telegram did not get. And the themes of the webinars are «smeared», it is not clear for which target audience.

1. This week’s main feature: 

You can’t develop a strong product if you don’t know anything about the consumer. Stop talking about the product and start thinking about the users. First, get to know them, find out what the spheres are, what they care about, how much pain they’re in.

2. Another feature: 

You need to speak to users in a language that they understand. Yes, in Ajail, as in any narrow realm, your language and terminology. It is not necessary to search every time for Russian analogues of words such as «feedback» or «backclog». Although for the newbies who first took a dip in Ajail, we did a dictionary of terms last week. Reference to the dictionary.

"This is exactly the kind of feedback that students complain that they often don’t understand the speakers' terminology."

But it turns out the problem is buried much deeper. At the very beginning, in the course development process, we made a strategic mistake: we did not study our target audience. This is almost the main marketing task when creating a new project. No product (or service) is created for itself. It’s made for consumers! And who are they, our consumers, we haven’t figured it out. Representatives of the IT sphere? Business? Freelance loners? Agile teams? People from educational or government structures?

Writing user stories for system requirements

The fact that conversion falls from a webinar to a webinar is a signal, a siren for the organizers! We realized that the product that we were creating had no value as originally planned. Perhaps the participants, having experienced «difficulties of translation» at the first session, felt discomfort, boredom, they became uninterested - and they fell off.

1. Maybe on the May holidays, people relax, eat kebabs, drink wine, they don’t care about Ajail.

1. And maybe Russian business doesn’t need flexible management methods right now.

So, obviously, all of this is a hypothesis that we’re going to test on the next sprint. But it’s important that we understand what we’re doing wrong. Why these numbers? The first thing we did, «went into the fields» and asked the people.

It is invaluable for me to observe the live example of the development of your team and product. It is possible to tell a thousand times about adjail, or it is possible to show all its magic once in live)

Value should not be sought in what you want to give, but in what will give a valuable product to us.

Bad funnel

The analysis has begun. The deep insite has changed our consciousness. Up to four webinars, down to four!! - we’ve just learned we’re losing people. We forgot the numbers, we looked at them, but we didn’t see them. You judge them:

This is an unhappy vortex, with full confidence that our course is of great value. For the past two weeks, we’ve been giving people hundreds of benefits, telling them how not to drown in a crisis, seeing new horizons, capturing opportunities, storing effective Agile tools.
But the people are leaving me

WTF?!!! What is it?!

The thing is, every one of our Retrospectives came down to one thought: what a great product we’re doing, what we’re all here for free, to help managers, business owners, scrubs during the coronation period. Yeah, after every webinar, we get feedback.

Based on feedback, we were upgraded, polished, perfected. We were focused on the product, leaving out the end users.

2000 - those who came to "smell", 160 - those who liked + in this figure do not count those who look in the records, probably.
The "holidays" effect could still work here? Someone could have gone out into the wilderness, away from the viruses ) after the holidays to watch more, kmk.

I might say stupid, but we didn’t pay you any money, and that’s why people relaxed a little bit. So I’m going to compare it to paid tuition or the same training in the gymnasium, where people are doing everything they can to say to themselves, "I paid the price".

There is a sense of urgency in the webinars. Often voiced timing and abrupt transitions from topic to topic create anxiety, a sense of burning deadline. But it’s understandable that it’s all out of a desire for more material.

Worth 10 out of 10, eyes on fire, and hands do, a great value, especially watching the team work on the air. Anyway, course of fire, I’m very grateful to you all.

Different types of user stories in Agile

I came in on a pro bono course just in anticipation that the free one is likely to be basic and I can understand something. And I think it’s just a bombshell that you’re trying to put in an hour, from there, and a tempo, and twice a week. A month and a half, where both the case and the extra material and the living examples. I think it’s a fairy tale, not a free course)

I never give you 10 points, 8 points, if you’re all happy with them, and you’ve got to apologize, it’s a habit. Although the energy is probably 20.

And I’m not afraid to bet 10 out of 10:) For me, the more content, the more awesome. Yeah, with homework, there’s a margin of inertia. But they’re still in the process. Plants are good to water, but not to pull by the ears: the ears will be torn off, and the growth will not be faster. Grow at their own pace:)

Why do you need 10/10? I never put 10. Just because things aren’t new to me. And you can never, in every activity 100% of the time, be of use to everyone.

Gentlemen of the organizers, please, listen, but don’t buy into the IT-world toxics. They know everything and everything. You’re doing a great job, you’re doing a great job!

Ajail is about reaction speed

We are now actively studying the User Path Map (the Customer Journey Map tool) to understand why of the 2,000 registrants, the 4 webinars reached 140, that is 7%. We’ll describe our steps in detail. On a personal example, we will show how to work with end-users and, with a valuable product and constant feedback, to bring back customers without spending money on marketing.

By studying the feedback, we realized that our end users want an example of a real Agile case, not an overseas case, but one of their own, home Russian. Ajail is a quick reaction to change. We changed our product on the fly and invited the general manager of the hotel «Porto Mare» to the studio, where for 8 months Agile-transformation of the entire hotel has been taking place, so that he can tell honestly how everything is happening and what difficulties he has encountered. We expect you on Tuesday, 12 May, at 20:00 M. You will have an opportunity to ask questions to General Manager of the Park-Hotel «Porto Mare» Mikhail Bychenkov. Reference to registration.

P. S. Returning to the topic of hypotheses, share in the comments of your: why out of 2,000 registered on online-webinars there are 140.