Shows
SPCs UnleashedDecouple, Contextualize, Evolve: A Sorrento Summit Debrief“Safe is evolving in small batches now—not just big bangs.” - Nikolaos Kaintantzis
Introduction
Niko moderates this debrief of the 2024 SAFe Summit in Sorrento—but it quickly becomes more than a recap. While only he and Ali attended in person, Stephan and Mark bring layered reflection from the sidelines. What begins as a highlight reel turns into a conversation about direction: not just where the framework is going, but how change agents are meant to meet it. What does it mean to decouple without diluting? How do we contextualize without fragment...2025-05-0554 minSPCs UnleashedValue Stream Mapping: When it Works, and Why it Fails“There are at least four different versions of a process: how managers believe it operates, how it's supposed to operate, how it really operates, and how it could operate.” —Mark Richards
Introduction
This episode begins with beach envy and ends with facilitation mastery. In between: a sharp, field-grounded discussion about Value Stream Mapping—its purpose, practice, and perils.
Ali, Stephan, and Mark trace their own learning curves, revisit facilitation misfires, and offer clear-eyed advice to SPCs who want more than “a map on the wall.” They’re not trying to convince anyone that Va...2025-05-0249 minSPCs UnleashedRunning a Smarter Value Stream and ART Identification workshop"Don't underestimate how much fear is in the room" - Ali Hajou
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Mark Richards, Stephan Neck, Ali Hajou, and Nikolaos Kaintantzis bring their collective experience to one of the most pivotal—and high-risk—moments in a SAFe transformation: the Value Stream and ART Identification Workshop.
Each voice brings a distinct perspective. Stephan sets the stage with a sharp metaphor and a focus on structure. Ali warns of the workshop’s destructive potential if rushed or misused. Nikolaos grounds the conversation in organizational reality and lon...2025-04-251h 07SPCs UnleashedThe software behind high-impact virtual workshops“Good flow is invisible, but it takes a lot of work to get there” - Nikolaos Kaintantzis
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Mark Richards, Ali Hajou, Nikolaos Kaintantzis, and Stephan Neck take you behind the scenes of their virtual facilitation setups. It’s a follow-up to their earlier hardware episode—but this time, the spotlight is on software: the tools, flows, and tweaks that help them deliver seamless, engaging remote workshops.
What emerges is less about specific apps and more about a mindset—crafting experiences that support le...2025-04-181h 01SPCs UnleashedAgile: Dead, Misunderstood, or Evolving?“It’s weeding time, right? Sometimes you have to weed out stuff that doesn’t work. Dead wood is not good on a tree.” - Stephan Neck
Is Agile really “dead,” or just misunderstood and badly applied? In this lively podcast episode, Mark, Stephan, and Niko challenge the buzz about Agile’s demise and share why core principles of flexibility, fast feedback, and collaboration remain essential—even if the word “Agile” has lost some of its shine.
The Agile Hype and the Reality Check
Over the past year, you may have h...2025-04-1154 minSPCs UnleashedStand, Share, Engage: Innovating your Remote Facilitation Setup“A cheap writing tablet can transform your PowerPoint into a shared canvas.” - Ali Hajou
Remote facilitation has come a long way since the early days of clunky video calls. In this lively episode, four experienced facilitators—Mark, Ali, Stephan, and Niko—swap stories about how they transformed their home offices into high-energy digital studios. From teleprompters and standing desks to iPhone cameras strapped to arms, they prove that you don’t necessarily need massive budgets to build an engaging remote-training setup.
Key Insights & Highlights
Start Small, Then Iterate: Al...2025-04-051h 04SPCs UnleashedThe Dual Operating System in Practice“Leaders have to do more than simply say ‘we have two systems.’ They have to actively steer the organization so it’s both robust and free to innovate.” - Stephan Neck
What happens when an organization outgrows the myth that “all you need is cross-functional teams”? In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Stephan, Ali, Niko, and Mark dig into the Dual Operating System—the concept that healthy enterprises need both a stable hierarchy and a network of agile teams. Balancing these two “systems” can be tricky: too much network, and chaos creeps in; too much hierarchy, a...2025-03-2957 minSPCs UnleashedDesigning for Distance: Remote Facilitation Done Right“If you do no pre-work, the first 20 minutes are lost—someone can’t open Miro, doesn’t have the password, so you lose that time sorting out technical difficulties.” - Mark Richards
Remote facilitation may feel like juggling blindfolded—especially when every participant has a muted mic and a hidden camera. In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, our hosts (Mark Richards, Ali Hajou, Stephan Neck, and Nikolaos Kaintantzis) share what they’ve learned about driving engagement when no one’s in the same room. From innovative digit...2025-03-221h 00SPCs UnleashedSparking Change through Scaled Retrospectives“If you ask questions about the past, it’s always about going to a corpse and opening it up... If you ask questions about the future, it’s always about values" - Nikolaos Kaintantzis
“Are you all dumb?” When a senior stakeholder dropped that bombshell mid-retro, chaos threatened to derail everything. In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Mark, Ali, Stephan, and Niko reflect on what makes art-level retros truly transformative. Spoiler: It’s a balance of authentic emotion, precise data, and a willingness to experiment with new formats.
Key Highlights
Data as a Com...2025-03-1558 minSPCs UnleashedMastering Distributed PI Planning“If you do it right, if you have the right people, and if you have some nerds and lots of engineering DNA, it really works on the tool side" - Stephan Neck
If you’ve ever believed that failing once in remote PI Planning means catastrophe, this episode of SPCs Unleashed proves otherwise. Mark Richards, Ali Hajou, Stephan Neck, and Nikolaos Kaintantzis discuss how their early horror stories—teams flying to the wrong city, frantic breakout links—led them to design stronger approaches for future PI event...2025-03-1258 minSPCs UnleashedDashboards and ART InsightsEffective dashboards and ART insights are crucial to navigating the complexities of Agile Release Trains (ARTs) and organizational alignment.
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Mark Richards, Stephan Neck, Niko Kaintantzis, and Ali Hajou delve into the strategic role of dashboards in improving alignment, transparency, and performance. They explore the balance between automation, stakeholder engagement, and avoiding vanity metrics.
Key Takeaways:
Purpose-driven dashboards: Focus on real-time guidance, stakeholder alignment, and context-driven insights rather than just data aggregation.“Dashboards should facilitate conversations; it’s not just about showing data.” - Mark Richards
Avoiding “vanity m...2025-02-0859 minSPCs UnleashedAlignment, Adaptability, and Politics: The Secrets of Successful LPM Coaching“If you want to coach senior leaders, you need to start by understanding what’s important to them—even if it has nothing to do with Lean Portfolio Management.” - Mark Richards.
In this lively and thought-provoking episode of SPCs Unleashed, Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Mark Richards, and Stephan Neck explore the unique challenges and opportunities of coaching in the Lean Portfolio Management (LPM) space. With engaging stories and practical insights, the team highlights how coaching at this level requires stepping into "big shoes" and mastering new complexities.
Key Takeaways:
The Rol...2025-01-2554 minSPCs UnleashedFacilitation - The Catalyst for Change"A facilitator lights the spark of collaboration, then steps back to let the fire grow" - Stephan Neck
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, hosts Mark Richards, Niko Kaintantzis, and Stephan Neck delve into the art and science of facilitation—a skill often confused with coaching yet distinct in its purpose and impact.
Mark kicks off with a surprise question, challenging Niko and Stephan to identify the greatest difference between coaching and facilitation. Stephan's response lays the foundation for a rich discussion: facilitation, he suggests, is about sparking action and empowering others to ta...2025-01-111h 01SPCs UnleashedGuiding Without Giving Answers - Redefining Coaching as a Skill“Coaching isn’t about being the answering machine; it’s about giving space for people to find their own answers..” - Niko Kaintantzis.
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Mark Richards, and Stephan Neck explore coaching—its essence, techniques, and the subtle distinctions between Agile coaching, systemic coaching, consulting, and mentoring. Packed with real-world anecdotes and thought-provoking metaphors, this discussion dives into what truly makes a great coach.
Key Takeaways:
The Heart of Coaching: Coaching isn't about giving answers; it's about creating space for...2025-01-0355 minSPCs UnleashedEffective onboarding of leaders into SAFe“Leadership is 'the art of getting people to want to do what must be done' - and this means not just the people who report to them but their peers and those they report to.” - Mark Richards.
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Mark Richards, and Stephan Neck explore Effective Onboarding of Leadership into SAFe — the essence of pivotal factors and ensuring that leaders not only understand the framework but can also adopt and champion its principles is key to driving long-term transformation.
Key Takeaways:...2025-01-0352 min
Shaping Portfolio AgilityEvan Leybourn on the Vicious and Virtuous Cycles of Change“Just as delegation is a skill that can get taught to leaders and often is, the ability to take ownership is a skill that needs to be developed in people, and organizations often do not invest in training that.” - Evan Leybourn
In this episode, we are joined by Evan Leybourn, the founder and CEO of the Business Agility Institute. Evan has been a thought leader in the realm of Business Agility since 2008, advocating for organizations to rethink how they operate, lead, and govern to become more human-centric and adaptable in the f...2025-01-0359 min
The Opperman Report'Capt Mark Richards Pandragon Plot/ Kerry Cassidy HoaxMark Richards (1953–) is a convicted murderer serving life without parole in California State Prison, SolanoWikipedia's W.svg at Vacaville, California.[1] He prefers to be known as "Captain" Richards, although he never served in the military. After graduating from high school in 1971, he attended the College of Marin and then graduated from Dominican College in San Rafael in 1976. He has spun multiple bizarre yarns about his service in the so-called "Secret Space Program" battling alien forces, in addition to his imaginary service in the US NavyInvestigation by a journalist from the Marin Independent Journal revealed a dimension to the mu...2024-12-1258 minSPCs UnleashedThe Art of Strategy Agility: How to Sense, Adapt, and Lead in a Dynamic World“Strategy agility isn't about waiting for a crisis. It's about building the muscle to stop, pivot, and adapt before disaster strikes.” - Mark Richards
This episode sees hosts Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Stephan Neck, Mark Richards, and Ali Hajou conclude their exploration of SAFe’s competency framework by focusing on Strategy Agility. It's packed with insightful discussions about market sensing, organizing around value, and the need for continuous adaptation in today’s dynamic business environment.
The Importance of Market Sensing: Ali shares a compelling story about a small electronics team that ide...2024-10-0557 minSPCs UnleashedLean Business Operations - Dancing Across Silos (#21)“You will cross some silos, stretch some rules, but in the end, you work together, have joy, and achieve greatness.” - Nikolaos Kaintantzis
In this penultimate episode of the SPCs Unleashed Competency journey, hosts Mark Richards, Nikolaos (Niko) Kaintantzis, and Stephan Neck dive into the dimension of Lean Business Operations within the SAFe competency model. The trio explores the critical role of leveraging value stream thinking to enhance flow in business operations and product development, emphasizing the symbiotic relationship.
Mark starts the discussion by addressing the often-confused concepts of the Operational Valu...2024-09-2855 min
Shaping Portfolio AgilityKarl Scotland on Strategy Deployment (#11)"Real strategy deployment empowers teams to act on strategic intent with ownership and clarity." - Karl Scotland
We’re joined by Strategy Deployment expert Karl Scotland in this episode.
Karl helps businesses become Learning Organisations through outcome-oriented, continuous transformation, engaging everyone, everywhere.
Over the last 20+ years, he has been an advocate of Lean and Agile approaches to achieve this, working with companies including the BBC, Yahoo!, EMC Consulting, Rally Software, Cisco, SDL, Legal & General, Allegis, HSBC, Bank of America, Vocalink, Sky, and Irwin Mitchel.
During this time, he...2024-09-1857 minSPCs UnleashedFind the Balance between Sugar and Sustainability with Agile Portfolio Operations (#20)“Without consistency and standards none of this works. With too much consistency nothing changes. You have to steer and constantly sense and course-correct.” - Mark Richards
Mark Richards and Niko Kaintantzis join Stephan Neck in this episode with Agile Portfolio Operations from Lean Portfolio Management.
We kick off by sharing our passions: Mark’s thoughts about finding the balance between consistency and standards so that it works, but not too much of it so that nothing changes; Niko’s emphasis on avoiding large solutions by mastering this dimension correctly.
In the fi...2024-09-1254 min
Shaping Portfolio AgilityNavigating Change and Building Empathy - Christine Babowicz on the Path to Portfolio Agility"So on any given day, I'm just managing those planes and flight patterns and trying to make sense and create that sequencing of road maps. Or at least highlight, hey, you're not going to achieve that, because this strategy over here in this portfolio isn't even thinking that way” - Christine Babowicz
When we decided to start inviting guests to join us, we were passionate about finding people with real lived experience to share their hard-won insights and wisdom. We were very grateful when Christine Babowicz agreed to join us as our second gues...2024-08-281h 03SPCs UnleashedIn control of complexity with Lean Governance (#19)"If you can start talking to audit, you can find solutions that they will help you reach that nobody else would have thought about" - Mark Richards
In Episode 19, hosted by Stephan Neck, Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Ali Hajou, and Mark Richards, the focus is on Lean Portfolio Management (LPM), specifically Lean Governance. The hosts stress the importance of governance in balancing spending oversight, compliance, and alignment between agile and non-agile teams. They highlight the need for engagement from roles like Value Management Offices (VMOs), business owners, and enterprise architects.
We discuss the...2024-08-2759 min
Shaping Portfolio AgilityLuke Hohmann on Building Sustainable and Profitable Portfolios“The right collective organization tends to have fewer blind spots, because, by definition, a team is a transactional memory system of sufficient predictive power that we can know how to work together” - Luke Hohmann
When we decided to start inviting interesting guests to join our portfolio conversations, Luke Hohmann was an obvious first choice.
Luke is a four time author, three time founder, SAFe® Fellow, keynote speaker, and internationally recognized expert in Agile Software Development. His passion is sustainably profitable businesses, because it is only through sustainable profits that a busine...2024-08-2159 min
Shaping Portfolio AgilityWhat to expect as a member of a portfolio ’going lean’ (#8)"The journey to get there isn’t easy. The outcomes, when it works, are pretty amazing and unbelievable, but you’ll find a whole new set of problems you never imagined could go wrong"
Eric Willeke
With the initial arc complete, this episode adopts a new perspective triggered by our conversations at the SAFe Summit in Berlin. We step into the shoes of portfolio members, embarking on a lean journey. The conversation begins by exploring how their first steps into lean portfolio management will look different from your first steps into agility. As the e...2024-08-161h 08SPCs UnleashedThe severe impact of Lean and Agile Leadership on the success, effectiveness, and motivation of your Agile Teams (#4)"When joining, the all-blacks gave you a book with all jerseys of the team across all times, with blank pages at the end for you to fill in" - Stephan Neck
In this episode of SPCs Unleashed, the hosts Stephan Neck, Niko Kaintantzis, Ali Hajou, and Mark Richards delve into the Lean-Agile Leadership core competency, focusing on mindset, values, and principles. The discussion emphasizes going beyond superficial understandings of these concepts to explore their practical applications in real-world scenarios. They discuss the importance of embedding Lean-Agile values in leadership, decision-making, and a...2024-08-1657 minSPCs UnleashedAuthentic Leadership - Inspiring Future Leaders Through Coaching and Example (#5)“the drummer sets the beat and the rhythm that the band shines against… a good leader sets the beat, and they create the backdrop against which great performances happen from their people.” - Mark Richards
In this enlightening podcast episode about Leading by Example, Mark, Stephan, and Niko emphasize the critical role of leaders in fostering an environment where team members feel safe to express their ideas, which is essential for innovation. Mark highlights that leaders must listen to their teams, understand their perspectives, and value their input. Stefan adds that creating psychological safety is crucial...2024-08-1654 minSPCs UnleashedEffective Collaboration is the Backbone of Large Solution success (#15)“It's a wonderful toolbox, but you don't have to stand up a large solution to start using the toolbox.” - Mark Richards
In this engaging episode of SPCs Unleashed, hosts Nikolaos Kaintantzis, Mark Richards, Stephan Neck, and Ali Hajou dive deep into the complexities of enterprise solution delivery, focusing on coordinating large solutions, managing suppliers, and integrating hardware. The conversation touches on the challenges and strategies SPCs can use to navigate this intricate terrain. Profit even if you have no large solutions.
Key Takeaways:
The Importance of Integration: Niko emphasizes that...2024-08-161h 00SPCs UnleashedBuilding large, complex, interlinked, cyber-physical systems the lean way (#16)"Experiment like a scientist, not a mad scientist" - Mark Richards
Have you ever pondered, "How can a lean approach work wonders for massive systems?" That’s exactly where we dive into this episode of SPCs Unleashed. Hosted by Swiss SPCTs Stephan and Niko, Dutch SPCT Ali, and Aussie SAFE Fellow Mark Richards, the show continues to unravel the complexities of enterprise solution delivery, this time with a focus on lean systems engineering.
Ali kicks off by revisiting the less glamorous but crucial core competency of lean systems engineering, which aims to trim the fat fr...2024-08-1659 min