How Can Introverts Survive PI Planning?

How can introverts survive PI Planning?

Introversion

At a recent training the question can up: How do introverts handle PI Planning? Surely a big noisy room, full of people, is absolute hell from them?

Which led me to ask myself the question; as an introvert how do I survive PI Planning; and I’ve survived 15 years of planning events, mostly unscathed.

What is introversion?

My appreciation of introverts, and of myself as an introvert, changed significantly when someone recommended that I read “The Introvert Advantage; Marti Olsen Laney”. For a more complete explanation of what introversion is; read the book, which itself is a distilation of a significant body of scientific research. What follows is my brief summarisation:

Extroverts have brains that are wired so that just receiving information keeps them happy, then their brain can discard that information. Extroverts love social events like parties where there is lots of information (chit-chat), the information makes them happy, it invigorates them, even though they do nothing with it.

Introverts have brains that are wired to process and store information, all the extra brain activity involves in processing and storing information requires a lot more energy. Introverts hate social events like parties where there is a lot of information (chit-chat) because processing all that information tires them out. Introverts are happy when they get to do something useful with that information; because the information at the social event is idle chit-chat, they never get to actively use the information, so they never get to their happiness hit.

Therefore, introverts form coping strategies, hiding in the corners at parties, or just avoiding parties altogether. In their professional lives they’ll gravitate towards roles where they can control the flow of information, often by interacting with machines rather than other people, hence the preponderance of introverts in the engineering professions.

Beware small children
Children are unregulated, information radiators, forever chattering, arguing and fighting with each other. Introverts process all of that information that children generate, whether they want to or not. Whilst I do love my children, the act of getting them ready for school each morning can be utterly draining, all their petty little arguments. They will have forgotten about the arguments by the time they’ve stepped out the door, but my mind is still processing them, sometimes for hours. A tough start getting the kids out the door can wipe out the rest of the morning, little hope of doing anything creative until my brain has calmed down.
“Just ignore it” is a typical extrovert phrase, along with “Just forget it”. My brain isn’t wired that way, it’s processing the information presented to it, whether I want it to or not. With hindsight I now realise that prior to having children I could self-regulate, I would avoid situations which would result in information overload; by keeping to myself. When on the daily commute on the tube into central London I’d read a book, play a game on my phone, inwards focused activities to avoid taking in too much information and then struggling to process it.
Children are only small for a few years; I know I have to enjoy it whilst it lasts, even if it is painful for me. When they turn into teenagers they’ll disappear into their rooms and barely talk to me, except to complain that The Internet is down. The information overload problem is solved at the expense of social interactions.

This doesn’t mean that introverts aren’t creative; it’s just that an introverts creativity derives from the usage of the information that they’ve processed and stored, rather than an extrovert’s spur-of-the moment spontaneity. Using that information is what generates happiness in an introvert; however, the processing required to get answers from that information can take some time.

About a quarter of the population are introverts. The likelihood is that you’ve got one in your team. For the reasons outlined above my suspicion would be that engineering teams have above average numbers of introverts within them.

What is PI Planning?

PI Planning is an event where a number of teams are building their own plans for how they intend to get through the next 10-12 weeks, but this is all happening in the same big room so that if teams need to collaborate then they can interact with each other to ensure that their own plans are aligned with the other teams’ plans. PI Planning generates a lot of knowledge and insight in a very short space of time, which can be challenging for introverts who

For more insight into PI Planning there’s a webinar on PI Planning, with accompanying transcript.

How Can Introverts Survive PI Planning?

• Non-attendance isn’t an option, their knowledge and expertise is needed to contribute to the plan.
• Working as smaller independent groups isn’t an option, the reason that everyone is planning together is that alignment needs to generated across the teams on how and when they need to collaborate.

Those are the constraints; within them, what can be done to help introverts cope with PI Planning?

Introverts Tend To Like Structure

Structure allows introverts to focus on what they need to focus on rather than spending additional brain processing power monitoring an evolving social situation. The first PI Planning event is always going to be challenging because it’s new, it is an evolving social situation, everybody is learning the process for the first time; subsequent planning events should be easier because the process is the same each time, they shouldn’t have to worry about the process. Whilst the detail of how PI Planning is conducted will, and should, evolve over time, the over-arching process of PI Planning works and remains fairly fixed.

Introverts don’t want to have to process extra information

Extra information requires extra energy for introvert’s brains to process, and there isn’t a lot of spare energy available during PI Planning due to it’s intensity.

Those people that are presenting during PI Planning need to ensure that they present just the information that needs to be presented to everyone, and to defer the detail into localised discussions with just those people that need to know the detail.

If you’re presenting the vision, i.e. the list of features or enablers, just say what it is, why it’s important and who to talk to for the detail.

If you’re presenting a team plan, read through the objectives. Just read them, don’t elaborate or extemporise. Objectives should be an description of the outward delivery of value from the team, not the internal challenges the team needs to overcome to achieve that value, the team backlog is the repository for the detail of the internal challenges and is internal to the team. The other teams in the train need to know the outward delivery of value, they don’t need to know the internal challenges.

If the above is adhered to then the introverts get the information they need for PI Planning but not extraneous information that they don’t need to process.

Introverts Are Happy When They Use Their Knowledge

Unlike extroverts who gain a happiness hit from receiving information, introverts only gain their happiness hit once information is actively used. Introverts prefer deep conversations rather than superficial chit-chat. It’s also easier for introverts to engage in discussions when it’s something they know about rather than something they don’t, their brains have already stored all the information so it requires less energy to process and using the information gets them happiness hit.

The challenge in PI Planning is that it is “planning” not “doing the work”. Some of the introvert’s knowledge isn’t needed, yet. Realise that “planning how to solve the problems” is as important as “solving the problems” because it uncovers any necessary interactions between teams, and balances the demand from the business against what the teams think they can actually do. It’s different knowledge from the knowledge used to solve the problems but it is knowledge that is used, make sure that that creates closure so that introverts can be happy that their knowledge has been used, even when it’s not the full depth of their knowledge that’s been used.

Being In The Zone
When I was younger I used to design and build stage sets for various student and amateur theatre grousp around London. Setting up a theatrical show is not that dissimilar to PI Planning, in that there are lots of activities all going on in parallel: Lighting, Sound, Scenery, Costumes. A lot of noise, a lot of activity. As the Set Designer I would be inundated with questions about what goes where, what needs to be done next, all unsolicited, all happening as the challenges arise.
Normally this would be hell for an introvert, and for some introverts it might still be an overwhelming situation. What makes it a survivable situation, for me at least, is that all of the questions are on a topic that I know; it’s the stage set that I have designed, often I will have been designing and thinking through the set for months in advance, it’s all in my head. These are easy answers to retrieve and I am in context, thinking about the stage set and getting it built, recalling that information is easy for me.
What completely disrupts me are changes in context: I’m trying to concentrate on one item and someone asks me about something completely different. That change of context can take substantial time and energy to process. Extroverts jumping from topic to topic can destroy an introvert, but stick to an introvert’s area of knowledge and they can provide a lot of detailed insight rapidly. Indeed this is using their knowledge; this is what enthuses them, makes them happy.

Introverts Need Time to Think

Don’t rush PI Planning; introvert don’t make spur of the moment decisions, they make considered decisions.

PI Planning may look to the management like a colossal expense because everyone is in one place and not doing “real work”, it’s just that that thinking about the work is happening all in one place, at one time, rather than distributed through time and space. It’s also better that it happens pro-actively, i.e. planning, to generate alignment and reduce delays, rather than reactively, i.e. crisis management, which will cause disruption and delay.

Reducing the time available for PI Planning is a false optimisation. Trains that proclaim they can “do PI Planning in an afternoon” have just moved the decisions to somewhere else, somewhere where it will be harder to collaborate and align, resulting in delays^#1.

Introverts Want To Minimise The Number Of Interactions

It’s a big room, it’s a lot of people, but most of them you won’t need to interact with.

Encourage introverts to stick to their team and focus on their team; the people they know and that they work with day to day.

If a team needs to interact with another team to negotiate the collaborations that need to happen between the teams, then send the extroverts on the team rather than the introverts. If an introvert’s specialist knowledge is needed as part of the discussions keep the discussion group small, focused and ensure that it reaches a conclusion so that the introvert’s knowledge has been used. Introverts prefer deep conversations rather than superficial chit-chat.

The Environment Matters

If people struggle with being in a big room full of lots of other people, consider planning in a dispersed fashion.

When planning in a dispersed fashion teams go into their own breakout rooms. It’s their own little world, there isn’t the constant background noise of other teams planning. For those introverts that struggle to block out that noise, being in a team room with just their own team is often preferable to a massive room with other people.

Even during the “all-hands” sections of PI Planning, in a dispersed environment everyone is muted to automatically keep the background noise down, focus is entirely on the one person speaking.

There are trade-offs between planning together and planning in a dispersed fashion.

Social cohesion and trust is easier to build when people are together, it’s a lot harder when they are distributed. Interactions are harder in the online world; to negotiate with another team is often harder than walking across the room because it involves appearing in another team’s breakout room unannounced, rather than using the walk and non-verbal communications to indicate to another team that you want to speak with them.

Talk To Each Other, Form A Team

Discuss the situation as a team. It’s hard to get these challenges out into the open. It’s not an affliction, it’s not an illness, it just is. Everyone in the team will need to make adjustments for the team to work as a team. Part of the reason for assembling teams is to harness the different strengths of individuals to overcome weaknesses, introversion has strengths as much as it has weaknesses, extroversion has strengths as much as it has weaknesses.

These sometimes tricky discussions are the storming and norming phases of the Tuckmann cycle. This is where a good ScrumMaster/Team Coach is actively building a team rather than just steering people through a process.

Conclusions

Introversion is just one part of the neurodiverse landscape; it happens to be the part of the landscape that I have most empathy with by nature of inclusion in the group. It’s my experiences and observations, they might not be applicable to your particular scenario, every individual is a unique individual and everyone’s brains operate differently.

PI Planning can be challenging for introverts due to the amount of interactions and information that is being exchanged in a very short space of time. I hope I’ve outlined a few strategies for dealing with the situation, some of which individuals can do themselves, some of which require the support of the team and Agile Release Train. The support of the team and Agile Release train to include introverts in the process is import because their analytical minds will improve the plan when given time to process the information being generated.

It is still a challenging environment, it always will be. Even after 15 years of facilitating PI Planning events, once the adrenalin of being in the midst of event wears off, I collapse in a heap, but I have survived.

---

^#1 I have seen Agile Release Trains that can do PI Planning in an afternoon but they were:

1. small; just 4-5 teams that were themselves on the smaller end of team sizes recommendations. The whole Agile Release Train was less than 40 people.
2. stream aligned teams to minimise the amount of complex cross-team collaborations.
3. totally ruthless about deferring all the design decisions into the PI and just focusing on the few collaboration across the stream aligned teams.

It had taken years of evolving behaviours, skills and the underlying architecture of their system and tooling to get themselves to this position; it is not something that can be achieved by the second or third PI Planning event.

Where trains do try to shorten PI Planning too early in their evolution, they typically end up moving all of the activities of PI Planning ahead into the plannable sprints, thus disrupting the plannable sprints making the unpredictable, plus the planning is now being done in isolation rather than collaboratively which makes negotiating collaborations much harder and more time consuming. Time is saved in the planning event itself, but more time is consumed overall by the planning process and it has become invisible and unconstrained.