At this month’s meetup, Chris shared a version of his workshop “Save the World, Save Your Team” using the board game Pandemic.
In Pandemic, you are a team of specialists from the CDC setting out to save the world from 4 deadly diseases (sound familiar?). While each player is capable of doing the same basic actions (moving between cities, treating disease, finding a cure, and sharing knowledge), each player has a specific role with extra skills that either augment these actions or make them easier for that role to perform.
Through gameplay, the group explored the similarities and differences between Pandemic and Agile Teams. With teams, Chris uses these examples to show how, sometimes, teams are actually more cooperative and high-performing when playing a game than when they operate together at work. He has compiled a list of some of his observations, and the intro deck he used to explain the game, in the materials attached below.