Agile Games Night Report

Agile Games?

Some participants at the Agile Belgium Drinkup wanted to try out some Agile Games they had been talking about. As a pub is not the best place to play most of the games, Touring Assurances gracefully offered the use of their remarkable office in Brussels.

We started the evening by listing agile games we knew and dot voting to see which games interested participants most. Unfortunately, we couldn’t play many of the favourite games because they take too long or require props that we didn’t have available.

Play!

The best way to learn about Agile Games is to play them and debrief afterwards. This evening we played three games:

• Alan Cyment’s Multitasking Game to show the detrimental effects of task switching (facilitated by Yves)
• A version of the Matchstick Game (with pennies instead of matches because no one smokes any more) to illustrate the idea of bottlenecks and dependencies (facilitated by Pascal)
• Non-musical chairs to show team-organisation and improvement with retrospectives (facilitated by Bruno)

Participants were very serious and committed to play the Multitasking Game but soon broke down in laughter.

Looking back. Looking Forward.

The evening ended with a short retrospective to gather “What did you like?” and “What can we improve?”

There will certainly be a followup session where we can play some of the larger games. Watch this space, the Meetup group  or subscribe to the mailing list.

Want to know more?

Yves Hanoulle has also written a report about the event.

You can find more games and simulations at the following excellent sites:

• Tasty Cupcakes
• Agile Coach
• Agile Fairytales
• Innovation Games
• Lego Serious Play
• Agile Games Google group

Thanks to all participants. Hope to see you at the next Games Night.

Please, try this at home!