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Jim Highsmith

2 articles by Jim Highsmith.

Career & Teams — Practitioner Voice

Practitioner Voice

Effective writing from a practitioner is a style distinct from academic writing or thought-leadership content. It relies on authority from experience (not credentials), naming tensions but letting them live, keeping the author in the writing, and the expectation that readers recognize the pattern from their own experience.

JHJim Highsmith·August 19, 2026Career & Teams
Security — Stop Picking Sides

Stop Picking Sides

Many teams have turned into tribes wedded to exclusively adaptation or optimization. But this misses the point that both of these are important, and we need to manage the tension between them. We can do this by thinking of two operating modes: explore (adaptation-dominant) and exploit (optimization dominant). We tailor a team's operating model to a particular blend of the two - considering uncerta

JHJim Highsmith·January 13, 2026Security