This describes the playbook for running the Penny Game game.
Process 20 coins through system of the workers using different batch sizes.
- min 10 people
- 20 coins
- a flipchart to record the scores
- 6 stopwatches (for 12: 7, 14: 8, ...)
For a team of 14 people:
- 7 people sitting at a table: 6 of them are workers for department 1 through 6; the last one is the customer.
- 7 people standing behind one of the people seated at the table. Those behind the workers are the department managers; the one behind the customer is the company president.
- All of the people standing have a stopwatch as well as the customer.
- Process means flipping the coin one at a time using your left hand only and then pass to the next worker in the chain.
- Coins processing is considered done once they pass through the whole system of workers.
- Workers may only pass the coins once the full batch of coins is processed.
- A batch is delivered once the customer touches the batch.
- Managers of each worker time how long it takes for their worker to process the batch of coins. Manager 1 starts the stopwatch as soon as worker 1 starts flipping coins and stops their stopwatch when the last coin is passed to worker 2.
- The customer starts his stopwatch as soon as worker 1 starts flipping coins and stops his stopwatch when the first penny is moved to the customer from worker 6 = time to market.
- The president starts his stopwatch as soon as worker 1 starts flipping coins and stops his stopwatch when the last coin is moved to the customer from worker 6 = time to complete.
A process starts with a batch of coins head up in front of worker 1.
After each iteration timings are captured on the flipchart.
| 20 | 20 | 10 | 5 | 1 | 1 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| D1 | ||||||
| D2 | ||||||
| D3 | ||||||
| D4 | ||||||
| D5 | ||||||
| D6 | ||||||
| 1st | ||||||
| last |
Batches of 20 coins: coins may only be passed to the next worker once all 20 coins have been flipped.
Repeat the previous iteration.
Batches of 10 coins: coins may only be passed to the next worker once all 10 coins have been flipped.
Batches of 5 coins: coins may only be passed to the next worker once all 5 coins have been flipped.
Batches of 1 coin: each coin may be passed to the next worker once it has been flipped.
Repeat the previous iteration.
- repeating the process with the same batch size generally results in better individual and process productivity.
- as the batch size ⬇️, individual department's/worker's productivity ⬇️ and time to market and time to complete ⬇️.
- throw a different sized coin in to the process to see how teams cope with variations.
- tracking how long it takes for an urgent request to get through the various batch-sized systems. (add a rule: if a worker started processing a batch, he needs to finish the batch before taking a new batch)
- hand-offs and approvals: whenever a worker processed the batch, he look at the manager and get his nod/yes (with from time to time some unavailability).
- work with 2 minutes round, 30 coins (5 x 2EUR, 5 x 1EUR, 5 x .5EUR, 5 x .2EUR, 5 x .1EUR, 5 x .05EUR), count the value delivered to the customer after 2 minutes. See https://scrumcoaching.wordpress.com/2010/04/19/the-scrum-penny-game-a-modification/