About

Welcome to mansell.nl

I help organisations ranging from institutions to enterprises to start-ups take 'agility' from being just a word in their strategy to sustainably changing their culture. I really love sailing, my career started as a yacht skipper and I have trained and been on some great sailing teams. I live in Amsterdam, the Netherlands with my wife and two children. 

I have always been deeply intrigued by teams and communities. I believe strongly in emergent leadership and commitment to each other and learning together as the keys to performing. Products and services are tools that should make their users fantastic and will therefore be fun to work on.

Enabling innovation and problem solving with Lean and Agile - where especially Scrum, Human Centric Design and Open Source are my weapons of choice - I have the advantage that I can take the perspective of a manager but also that of a start-up founder and a developer.>


This website is my online CV.



Dennis Mansell
+31 6 28 838 432

Popular posts from this blog

Why Scrum? Why Agile? My Sailing Friends

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 After a day's sailing, we've dropped anchor, cleaned the boat and poured ourselves a drink. “So - what is it you do again?” “I’m a Scrum Master.  It’s like the Master of Sail on tall ships.” “What - like the second-in-command?” “No, I don’t have a position in the hierarchy.  I just make sure the boat and crew are fit for purpose and help the sailors and staff understand what is going on.” “Why would an organisation need that?” “Many organisations approach products as if it were an industrial process like transport.  They load the cargo containers as full as they can get - calling it ‘scope’, then they plan very exactly how to drive from A to B to predict the costs and how long it will take to deliver. “For my clients, their product doesn’t actually match this industrial process very well.  I get them to think of it as if they were explorers trying to reach some distant shore. “They should pack very light and get great at teamwork so that they can travel
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The Scrum Guide for Dyslexics

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I have made a mind map that makes the Scrum Guide a little more visual for those of us who's brains navigate space better than letters: Click here for a full screen version This is a derivative work by Dennis Mansell based on The Scrum Guide. No endorsement is made by either Jeff Sutherland, Ken Schwaber, or any of their related commercial entities. The original Scrum Guide is offered for license under the Attribution Share-Alike license of Creative Commons, accessible at  http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode  and also described in summary form at  http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ . By utilizing this you acknowledge and agree that you have read and agree to be bound by the terms of the Attribution ShareAlike license of Creative Commons.
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Finding your Product Goal

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In November 2020, the new Scrum Guide was released, mentioning for the first time a ‘Product Goal’. This block is designed to help you find your product goal.  Attribution to The Liberators , the Scrum Guide and Harvard Business Review .   Preparation (online): Make a Mural from this template You need a video conferencing meeting with 'rooms' of up to 4 people Preparation (physical):  Super Sticky notes in at least 4 colours Print Elements of Value Pyramid as handout Flip-over sheets Flip-over of empty Elements of Value Flip-over of Wicked Questions Flip-over of Integrated ~ Autonomy Flip-over for Actions/Steps 15% Solutions
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