General | Peter Alkema

FNB CodeFest: Highlights from the coolest IT sprint in the FirstRand Group – Part 2

Leave a Comment / Codefest, General, IT / By Peter Alkema

Three more ingredients for the secret sauce of a “mind blowing” event; team coaching through the night, exec sponsorship (and exec dragons) and world class tech support. Last week the second FNB Codefest saw 250 developers converge for a multi-day sprint to work on over 40 business sponsored ideas of which the winner was a kids …

FNB CodeFest: Highlights from the coolest IT sprint in the FirstRand Group – Part 2 Read More »

Spinning our way to IT health

Leave a Comment / General, IT, Personal mastery / By Peter Alkema

Our IT department recently took a spinning class at work; it boosted our heart rates and illustrated a powerful concept of teams. The link between exercise and knowledge work is well established; stay healthy and your productivity should be higher. The general sense of wellbeing that accompanies regular exercise has also been shown to improve results. …

Spinning our way to IT health Read More »

Do techpreneurs need an ecosystem that supports innovation?

2 Comments / Codefest, General, IT, Leadership / By Peter Alkema

It’s the difference between thriving and surviving; big business and government also have a crucial role to play. I participated in a panel debate at the Innovation Summit in Cape Town today where we discussed the importance of “enabling ecosystems for innovation.” As a banker I had already been told earlier in the day that …

Do techpreneurs need an ecosystem that supports innovation? Read More »

The (Lost) Art of Taking People With You

Leave a Comment / Coaching, General, Leadership, Programme Management / By Peter Alkema

If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together – but how? In two days, the world’s oldest and largest annual ultra marathon takes place in South Africa; the Comrades. The vast majority of participants tell you far more about their experiences with others along the way than …

The (Lost) Art of Taking People With You Read More »

Hero projects… and the rest of the team

Leave a Comment / General / By Peter Alkema

All teams have a couple of projects that get all the attention and focus; make sure everyone else feels like a hero as well The Google employees that worked on Maps, Android and Gmail probably feel like superstars. The software they wrote is used by hundreds of millions, has achieved cult-like status and set entirely new …

Hero projects… and the rest of the team Read More »

Winning the war for IT talent

Leave a Comment / General, IT / By Peter Alkema

How do you find and recruit top technical skills? If you have sufficient vacancies, hire or retain someone who has a track record of sourcing IT talent and give them everything they need to do it even better. The people you really want are unlikely to have their CVs in the market so you need to find them …

Winning the war for IT talent Read More »

Make action lists work for you

2 Comments / General, Personal mastery / By Peter Alkema

I’ve used a simple method for most of my career; here it is. While I actively use the latest technology to make my life easier and actually do the work that is expected of me, I’m certainly not paperless when it comes to taking notes in meetings and managing my actions. Confession: In this modern …

Make action lists work for you Read More »

Use Agile sprints to get out of the forest

Leave a Comment / Agile, Collaboration, General / By Peter Alkema

A sprint is a perfect name – it is simple, self-evident and the route is clear. Well written software is intuitive and doesn’t require manuals and long training courses – no one has been trained to use Facebook or a Playstation. Likewise, good software engineering methodologies are easily explained, quickly understood and avoid jargon and …

Use Agile sprints to get out of the forest Read More »

What does Agile say about documentation?

Leave a Comment / Agile, General, IT / By Peter Alkema

“Working software over comprehensive documentation… …That is, while there is value in the item on the right, we value the item on the left more.” (Agile Manifesto) These are not the words that an IT project auditor wants to hear; surely we need big documents describing every last detail of the software we are building? …

What does Agile say about documentation? Read More »

The Power of 10 Minutes

Leave a Comment / General, Personal mastery / By Peter Alkema

The Power of 10 Minutes is underestimated by most business people. Create hours of quality time from well used bursts of 10 minutes. Everyone is busy these days so I won’t tell you about having 5 children under 6, writing a book and running a transformational IT programme at a bank all at the same …

The Power of 10 Minutes Read More »