Step 1: Get the team together

Call everyone over. Set up a meeting. Whatever. Aim to get all roles: product, dev, QA.

Step 2: Assess Understanding of Scope

It is a good idea to see how well people understand the scope of the project/release. This will tell you how much stock to put in their estimates/understanding. It will also tell you how much people are working in silos. On healthier teams I coach, everyone on the team knows the whole release scope and can walk people through it. It’s sitting on the wall in the team room where they can see it every day.

This team came up with about 6/10 where 10 = full understanding.

We can see that the team thinks it has an OK handle on the work.

Step 3: Confidence in the Existing Release Date

The next step is to ask the team how confident they are in hitting the release date. This team came up with about 5 wisonout of 10 where 10 = Yes, we will make it for sure.

As you can see the team is strongly divided between “not a chance” and “confident”.

Step 4: Estimate Time Remaining

The final question is where the real gold is: How many months before we will ship?

As we can see there are three votes for 5 months and three votes for 6 months. (Sorry, didn’t notice some of the 5 month votes were in the wrong place before taking the picture). Using Wisdom of Crowds, we can see that the release is about 5 months away. Not the 3 months that was expected. Bad news for sure, but good to know now.

Step 5: Conduct a Retrospective (optional)

While you have the team together, you may as well conduct a retrospective to identify what the team can do immediately to work more effectively. Chances are if a project is in bad shape, they cut retrospectives a while ago. You will need another 1 to 2 hours for this. In the case of the example client above, we did a retrospective and the team started acting on their findings immediately to turn their ship around.

Caveats

Many organizations, even “Agile” ones do not like talk about inconvenient truths such as not making a release date.  See: Red Pill, Blue Pill

Why Do We Need This?

You may be on a well-run Agile project. In which case, release forecasts are updated on a regular basis and tough decisions are made about scope and date. But many Agile teams still face the challenges of fixed scope + fixed date and the pressure that comes with it.

The team I was working with in this story was supposed to be doing Scrum but was in an ad-hoc mess that bore no resemblance to the Agile I know and love.

Here’s the list with some handy links:

1. Agile Is Mainstream
   
2. Many Benefits from Agile
   
3. Agile is not a Silver Bullet
4. Agile Fails Due to Culture
5. Agile Differs from Most Company Cultures
6. Most Value Comes from Mindset/Culture, not Practices
7. Adopt Agile Practices that fit Culture (Option 1)
8. Change Culture through Organizational Transformation (Option 2)
9. Culture Mismatch will Slow and Ultimately Fail Your Agile Initiative
10. Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast

Of course, it is fine to proceed with either option – adoption or transformation – it’s about what is the best fit for the client environment and their wishes.

There are two conversations around transformation that this deck is designed to trigger/encourage:

• What does break-through organizational culture look like?
• What does organizational transformation look like?

My Favourite Slide in the Deck

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the hundreds of people who have attended my workshops and talks over the last two years to help clarify and refine this message.

Their organization is just sitting there, ready to change in wonderful ways. We just have to tell people how great our new initiative is and they will be lining up to learn more and make things happen. Right?

Unfortunately, organizations are complex adaptive systems with their own dynamics and forces at play.

Note: we could be talking about the whole organization, a group, or a team here.

Forces Acting on an Organization

In the following diagram, I will use the word Culture to capture the existing forces at play in an organization. The real situation will be of course much more complex with various attractors influencing the system in different ways, but this will reveal the essence of what I have seen with change initiatives around Agile.

Some remarks on the diagram:

1. It is difficult for a change initiative to make real progress if it runs against the culture of the organizations (as is usually the case with Agile). It’s like trying to roll a giant boulder up hill.
2. When forces pull an object in different directions, the object is under tension. Too much tension and the organization will be damaged (red squiggles). So, when you notice resistance, applying more force will damage your organization. A few weeks ago, this simple explanation helped a client reduce tension by shifting the blue rather than adding more green.
3. The change initiative will eventually fail. Why? Energy is required to keep the change initiative going. Eventually, people will just declare victory or give up and move on to the next initiative. At this point the boulder rolls down the hill, crushing supporters of the initiative on the way.

Rolling Rocks Downhill

A much better way to go about this is to forget about change strategies and work on an organization’s culture so that it moves the organization towards the desired outcome without conflict. This is of course a vastly simplified version of reality, but it helps us stop and consider the root cause of dynamics and forces in an organization.

Acknowledgments

There is a great exercise on force-field analysis called “May the Forces Be With You” that I learned from The big book of humorous training games.

Olivier Lafontan wrote the insightful post Being an Agile transition coach feels like Sisyphus that inspired the boulder in my narrative.

The phrase “Rolling Rocks Downhill” came to mind from Clarke Ching’s new book by that title.

In his seminal work, John Kotter identifies a Sense of Urgency as the key first step to any major change initiative. Success requires that “75% of a company’s management is honestly convinced that business as usual is totally unacceptable.”

In this post, additional considerations are considered.

Transformation is #1 Organizational Priority

In addition to Kotter’s remarks we add the following litmus test for undertaking transformation.

A common symptom of failure is that transformation or improving culture is listed as the fourth bullet point in the yearly objectives.

Leadership Team Readiness Checklist

What follows is one readiness checklist to assess whether the leadership in an organization is really ready. The text in blue indicates activities that can support a leadership team in understanding where it stands on each item.

Red Flags is a term from Good to Great where great companies have hope and faith to see the red flags or difficult truths.
Red Pill is a term from the movie the Matrix that denotes the willingness to explore disconnects in our belief system to understand the true and perhaps discomforting reality.

Dear leaders, how are you doing?

The following diagram shows a set of diagnostics that can start a real discussion around the perception of the current state of the organization. It is intended to be used for one or more people to put an “x” on the line indicating where they see that aspect. The scale increases from left to right with either a rating of 1 to 10 or from ☹ to ☺

The astute reader will notice the last question is not a scale, but an open-ended exploration called My Worst Nightmare.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the participants in this session including Don Gray and Claudia Melo. I would also like to acknowledge the financial contribution of the Agile Alliance for sponsoring this workshop through the Supporting Agile Adoption Program.

I realized that I have drawn the diagram below dozens of times with clients, prospects and colleagues over the last year and realized other people may be interested in it.

The drawing below shows the hierarchy of a typical organization with a dominant culture (in blue) and a new culture bubble formed (in green).

Given the nature of a power hierarchy in traditional organizations, a leader/manager can induce a culture shift in the organization that reports into her. See Transformation? Leaders Go First! for an explanation of how leaders can support a transformation process.

It is of course, critically important to build adapters around your bubble so that it can safely interface with the rest of the organization and avoid trigger the attack of organizational anti-bodies.

A final comment is regarding the cooperation of partner groups (in light blue) that are tightly bound to the same customer value stream. The close cooperation required for success necessitates a higher level of alignment. This means that the partner group must either help lead the culture change (and go green) or at a minimum be neutral (as show in light blue).

In a software context, a very tight relationship exists between the product and development groups since they need to work together to create customer value. A common pattern is for the green bubble to be the development and the blue bubble to be product.

When and How to Use This Diagram

I typically draw this picture and provide this explanation when socializing alternative approaches to Agile. In virtually all cases, the change agent leading the Agile initiative is not the CEO and does not have a span of control or influence over the whole organization. It is usually the case that typical “modern” management practices are in place that are regressive and hostile to fostering an Agile culture. So most leaders have the option of sticking to the adoption of practices that are consistent with the existing organizational culture or undertake a transformation of their group to realize a new culture that is supportive of Agile.

It is of particular importance, that as an external change artist, we are fully respectful of our client’s wishes and intents. It’s their organization after all. For some coaches this means letting go of the dream of helping the organization move forward on the road towards an Agile mindset – or “real” Agile.

Related Work?

Some time ago I shared George Schlitz and Giora Morein’s Agile Enablement Battlefield model to help understand how a transition is progressing. I am no longer a big fan of the metaphor of war, however, the notions of “fog of war” can be helpful. As well, I have seen increasing danger and harm caused by wolves in sheep’s clothing. These are the folks who say they are on board and go along with changes, but resist in passive ways. Of course, this is a natural and understandable response to coercion. If we really want to change our organizations then coercion is a tool that we need to leave behind.

Acknowledgments

The basic ideas of managing gaps in culture comes from William Schneider’s book How to Make you Culture Work. Many thanks also to all the various workshop participants who validated that these patterns apply.

It is by now well known that Agile is a mindset and culture system and that it is incompatible with most organizational cultures.

Let’s talk about one way of moving forward with Agile – building adapters. This is an effective approach when the span of control and influence of the leadership does not cover the whole of the organization.

Start with A Successful Agile Team

Here is my current roadmap of focus areas related to rebooting organizational culture:

The arrows indicate support. For example, People Skills such as communication models lead to Relational Flow where people trust one another and are emotional supportive. This in turn leads to or supports High Performance Culture.

High Performance Culture is the Goal, but Need to Focus Elsewhere

My goal is to help organizations develop high performance culture through the creation of environments where people can bring their best every day. We can see there are a variety of things to focus on that will lead to support this goal.

Let’s take meditation as an example. There is no direct connection to high performance culture – it’s indirect. But in my experience it is 100% relevant and salient for bringing about a sequence of changes that support the goal. So, we need to focus on the things that will lead to a great culture and the ensuing results. Of course, there are many routes and practices – so nothing is mandatory: meditation works for me, but you may have an alternate route to personal growth.

This is not an exhaustive map of all the elements that lead to High Performance Culture – for sure there are lot’s of things we could add. My purpose in creating and sharing this is to create a call to action to focus on these or related elements so that we can really help organizations succeed.

Examples of Posts on these Topics

My hope is that you are curious about some of these content areas, so I will share some of my blog posts for further reading.

What is High-Performance Culture?

• Workshop on Characteristics of High-Performance Organizations
• Diverse Paths to High-Performance Organizational Culture
• Lululemon – A Stellar Example of Break-Through Organizational Culture

Relational Flow

• Relatedness trumps Responsibility, Accountability

People Skills

• Anatomy of Peace – A Model for Communication
• How to Express Empathy – Avoid the Traps!

Personal Growth

• The Power of Vulnerability
• Understand Shame to get to Root-Cause in Your Life
• Deep Insights around Fear, Risk, Safety and Vulnerability

Organizational Transformation

• Change your Culture or Die
• Tactics, Strategy, & Culture – A Model for Thinking about Organizational Change
• KrisMap: An Organisation’s Persona
• Ways to Make Progress with Culture Gaps
• An Influencer’s Playbook
• Hierarchy = The Matrix
• Visual Summary of Agile Adoption and Transformation Survival Guide
• Agile Failure and Culture – Agile 2012 Workshop Results

Transformational Leadership

• Transformation? Leaders Go First!
• Personal Transformation is the Heart of Organizational Transformation
• How to Incubate Transformational Leadership

Temenos Workshop

• Temenos – A Workshop for Healing, Connection and Relational Flow
• Create Authentic Connections with Influence Maps
• Temenos: Containers for Growing Relationships

“If we’re serious about exploring the world around us, we have to explore the world within us.” - Ken Robinson

(Joint post with Olaf Lewitz - Temenos Series)

The Temenos container provides a powerful mental model for understanding and improving relationships with others.

Often we do not consider the larger context of the situations we are in. When we explicitly look beyond the specifics of a conversation or interaction to the relationship itself, we may more easily achieve relational flow.

We use the term container to talk about the underlying fabric of our relationship with another person. The same notion can be used to understand groups we are part of as well as our relationship with ourselves.

Consider the diagram below illustrating how containers may be used. For example, we may wish to imagine our vision for the relationship, the baggage of our history or the roles we play.

Roles We Play

Dave Snowden has frequently pointed out that one specific dimension of the complexity of human systems is our ability to change roles (containers) from one second to the other. For example, when my wife calls me at work my role changes from colleague to husband. One set of beliefs, principles and values is replaced with another, potentially conflicting one.

Each role we play applies to a specific context. We share most of these contexts with other beings. A container is the Temenos term to talk about these specific contexts. Within these containers we evolve the different roles we play in life.

When we consciously examine our containers we can evolve the roles we play. Or evolve ourselves so that we behave the same across containers – to our true authentic self.

What is a Temenos?

Temenos is a Greek word for a transformational container, such as a separate piece of land dedicated to a king or god. It is a contained space of spiritual importance. With Temenos we hold all our containers as a sacred enabler to connection and relation with other human beings.

The focus of this post is on the use of the container in the context of a relationship with another person and with ourself. The creation of a transformational Temenos container and how to leverage symbols of transformation will be the subject of another post.
Containers In Our Lives
In the history of our lives, these containers are formed: shared spaces for ourselves or others, each of which defines a unique identity (the role we play), unique habits we acquire, and adds specific emotional baggage to the load we carry around in our lives.

We spend our lives in different containers. Each of them helps us to grow and be more of ourselves. For every container, we have needs that we want fulfilled and expectations we feel obliged to fulfill. Every time those needs are not met (or we think we don’t fulfill the needs) we are hurt: we think we fail the container or the container fails us. Some examplesy of such containers:

• Our self. This is the most important and challenging container for each of us.
• The family we grow up in.
• The friends we make, and lose, over the years.
• Teams we join, and leave, workplaces, clients…
• People who die.
• Relationships we start, and finish.
• Our children, the mutual unconditional love that challenges us and makes us whole.

All of these relationships, the roles we play in these and how they affect us can be framed as containers:

• Containers we join (some deliberately, some by chance)—born into a family
• Containers we leave (or that leave us)—divorce, death
• Containers we enter—coming home from work
• Containers we exit—leaving home for work

Olaf’s Story

When I created my first influence map and reflected on the containers which have been important in my life, I noticed I had unconsciously (though still deliberately) removed roles from my portfolio. For example, the relationship to my parents had transformed into a mutual friendship on eye level; same with my brother. I had effectively stopped acting as a son, and brother. Don’t get me wrong: we didn’t break up, the relationship became closer. Its quality had changed, and I noticed that not playing these roles gave me ease. So I thought: why not continue deliberately in that direction? How many roles do I want to and do I need to play? I haven’t found a definite answer yet. And I’ll stop being an employee soon, which is a step on this path.

Michael’s Story

One example of using the container model to improve a relationship is with my younger son, Sean. When I considered the whole of our relationship, I could see that I was failing him in providing attention to him as an individual (rather than as part of my pack of three kids). Once I had taken stock of the current situation and our history, I was able to create a vision for how I wanted our relationship to be. For this container, what I want is for me to really see him and for him to know that I really see the special, unique person he is. Our relationship has improved. And that for me is the whole point of containers: an opportunity to reflect and create a different path for ourselves.

Origins of Temenos

Temenos is a special kind of experiential laboratory (usually delivered as a weekend lab) that Siraj Sirajuddin has created over many years integrating diverse influences such as Buddhist, Islamic, Jesuit and Hindu spirituality, mythology and Jungian psychology. He’s been using these labs to support lean and agile transformations in his practice as an Organisational Transformation Mentor.

Upcoming Workshops

• Toronto, April 27/28 - Michael
• Germany, July 19-20 (details tbd) — Olaf and Christine Heider
• Nashville, TN, August 2/3/4 – Before Agile 2013 – Olaf & Michael
• Washington, DC, monthly events (with Siraj)

Ping us if you are interested.

Jeff Sutherland points out the the best way to go fast is to have a definition of done (or “done done”) that means the software is shippable (coded, tested, documented, etc.).

The second best accelerator is to get stories ready (or “ready ready”) before the sprint planning meeting. For me, “ready ready” means that people understand stories well enough for the team to have a productive Sprint Planning meeting. Not one that takes ages and ages and stops because people have to catch a train or pick up their kids at daycare.

The purpose of the diagram is to provide a conceptual model for how stories get to be in a “ready” state. People need to talk about them and maybe do a little leg work. Who is responsible for getting stories ready? The Team! (Not the Product Owner as some might say). So good teams spend ~10% or their time getting ready for the next Sprint and ~90% on the current Sprint. Please note the amount of time will vary by team and project – 10% is a conceptual number.

Of course, most teams fall into the trap of focussing so much energy on the current Sprint they fall into the vicious cycle of low quality planning meetings and disorganized Sprints.

What if it takes more than “a little work” to get a story ready or to spilt a story? No problem, just create a Technical Spike story so that the whole team can tackle this tough story together. The outcome or acceptance test of the spike is that the story is split and that all the upcoming stories are “ready”.

The next rows in the diagram show that some people on the team may spend more time getting stories ready than others. For example, architects, SME (Subject Matter Experts), etc.  User Experience designers are often focussed on the Sprint ahead while docs folks are mostly on the last Sprint. Again the numbers here are conceptual.

Here are some other good posts on getting stories Ready:

• The Definition of Ready
• Ready-ready: the Definition of Ready for User Stories going into sprint planning

Happy Scrum!

In the course of our lives, we all encounter events that shape us, allow us to change and grow, that have made us who we are. We don’t tend to acknowledge or appreciate these events, and we rarely share them. Understanding our own path, reflecting how we became who we are, which influences determined what we value and what we want, is a powerful source of personal growth. We better understand our own unique identity, our relationships with others and the related emotional baggage to the load we carry around in our lives.

Influence Maps is the module in a Temenos lab that allows you to reflect, visualise (map) and articulate your personal history, and share it with the group—as detailed and deep as you choose to. Like every Temenos module, Influence Maps works on its own, too.

Influence Maps

Influence Maps (the key/main part of a Temenos lab) are used in group workshops to:

1. Create deep personal learning and growth,
2. Connect with other participants and develop a deep level of trust,
3. Allow ourselves to be seen and accepted as human beings,
4. Create the opportunity for participants to heal one another’s emotional wounds.

An influence map is a visual depiction of the influences in our lives that have led to us becoming the person we are.

The diagram below shows the main elements of Influence Maps and how the Tememos container serves as a safe and caring environment.

Influence Maps help you understand and appreciate your past. This will hurt as you share past trauma, and makes you ready to be healed.

The healing and personal growth results are emergent from the container we collectively create. A high-quality container will lead to a myriad of opportunities.

Don’t mistake the Temenos’ healing effect with therapy. While we all have our unique history and individual and specific things we did and had happen to us, the strategies we use to deal with them tend to show common patterns. Many people who lose a dear person, for example, go through a stage of denial. Through sharing our history we create resonance with others who’ve been employing similar strategies.

“People heal from their pain when they have an authentic connection with another human being.”

Marshall Rosenberg

Example Influence Maps

Before we explain the workshop setup and mechanics, here are some example influence maps.

Michael presenting his Influence Map

Olaf presenting his Influence Map

As influence maps are a creative expression of one’s identity, there is no one “right” way to do them.

Workshop Setup

Trust. Safety. Caring. These are the properties that participants are asked to create and nurture in a Temenos. The role of the facilitator is to work with participants to have these properties rapidly emerge. For example, supporting and encouraging vulnerability so that we can speak about the issues that shame us and hold us from our potential.

From our experience, the group size should not exceed 6-8 voluntary participants who are interested in personal growth.

Workshop Mechanics

The first exercise in a Temenos lab (and the one taking up most of the time) is drawing and sharing of Influence Maps. The process is very simple:

1. Introspect: Through a guided meditation with music, we ask you to reflect on your life. Use your timeline to guide your memories. Imagine a trusted friend asked you: What do I need to know about you that will help me understand who you really are? Ask yourself: What about me do I not dare to tell anyone? How much of that might I be willing to share to understand myself better?
2. Visualise: Each participant uses a large flipchart paper and creates their life’s story with an eye towards defining moments and key influences. Many people find it useful to draw a timeline, but any expression of your deepest self will work. It’s not about the drawing, it’s about the story you tell.
3. Articulate: Participants take turns telling their stories through their influence map. Before any person shares their story, another participant will set the stage for her, to initialise the Temenos: “Sit down, slow down, breathe, and focus on the whole person who will present herself.” Then share your story with the group. The group will help you understand yourself better: You mentioned <…>. Could you slow that down for us? How did that make you feel?
4. As a member of the group (or a facilitator): Observe for patterns. Participants are able to help each other learn and heal in two ways. When we are similar in a trait, we can see ourselves better through the other person. One person struggling with a loss will be able to help another: “If you can forgive yourself for doing <…>, I can forgive myself for doing <…>”.  An example from a recent Temenos: “If you can forgive yourself for being an average parent and making mistakes, then I can forgive myself for doing the same.” When we are dissimilar, we can see what is missing in ourselves or help others see what they may be missing.

At least two people in the group should know how to ask open (coaching) questions.

The Influence Maps add depth to the Temenos. Without them you will still identify improvement options, and have less probability for moments of true transformation.

Healing Conversations in Buddhism

Thich Nhat Hanh  has this to say:

Deep listening is the kind of listening that can help relieve the suffering of another person. You can call it compassionate listening. You listen with only one purpose: to help him or her to empty his heart. Even if he says things that are full of wrong perceptions, full of bitterness, you are still capable of continuing to listen with compassion. Because you know that listening like that, you give that person a chance to suffer less. If you want to help him to correct his perception, you wait for another time. For now, you don’t interrupt. You don’t argue. If you do, he loses his chance. You just listen with compassion and help him to suffer less. One hour like that can bring transformation and healing.

Testimonials

“Inspiring, Healing, Present. Michael’s presence facilitates the creation of a strong container to support making the connection from the heart, not the mind. The influence map is a powerful tool for building connection.” – An Agile Coach

“Moving, Revealing, Balancing. I found that deep connections to other human beings can be found and made a lot more often than I expected. A safe space was created and held all the way through it.” – Melanie Meinen

Origins of Temenos

Temenos is a special kind of experiential laboratory (usually delivered as a weekend lab) that Siraj Sirajuddin has created over many years integrating diverse influences such as Buddhist, Islamic, Jesuit and Hindu spirituality, mythology and Jungian psychology. He’s been using these labs to support lean and agile transformations in his practice as an Organisational Transformation Mentor.

Upcoming Workshops

• Toronto, April 27/28 - Michael
• Germany, July 19-20 (details tbd) — Olaf and Christine Heider
• Nashville, TN, August 2/3/4 – Before Agile 2013 - Olaf & Michael
• Washington, DC, monthly events (with Siraj)

Ping us if you are interested.