Agile shines a light on dysfunction. Once the dysfunction is exposed, you have 2 options: 1) fix it or 2) sweep it back under the rug. Which will you choose?
How does Agile shine a light on dysfunction? All Agile practices are designed to unearth sub-optimizations.
I saw someone today carrying a notebook that said: “I am an early adopter!”... Why is this a genius move for change effort? Let’s find out.
Implementing change in a dictatorship is a change manager’s dream job. Once the decision is made at the very top, the masses are told what to do and the decision holds as an unbreakable edict that no one would dare challenge. It might take a bit of effort to communicate the changes to the people, but all in all, as long as the rules are clearly spelled out, there is no need to convince anyone that the dictator’s decision is the best way forward.
In the previous posts I described how we designed cross-functional squads aligned around strategic goals. A key benefit of alignment is that it automatically delivers an increase in speed of delivery by dramatically reducing, or eliminating, the dependencies and bottlenecks which so often slow us down. By aligning people around goals and outcomes you essentially streamline your organisation and expose the bottlenecks in resource.
In this exclusive video, Jo Franco-Wheeler (Business Transformation Director at Inmarsat) discusses managing business change in the lead up to her talk at IRM UK's Business Change and Transformation Conference Europe in London on the 18th-20th March.
Delivering change is almost an art-form, and done well, can see the difference between a successful anti-climax that delivers real business value and one of abject chaos striking fear and confusion into the hearts of those who are just not prepared for it.
A ‘Sacred Cow’ is an idea, custom, or institution held to be above criticism (with reference to the Hindus’ respect for the cow as a holy animal).
I would imagine that the majority of us when we were kids had a Lego set bought for us and of course, Lego is still around today … what a great success story. The kind of Lego sets that you probably had bought for you normally consisted of specific bricks and pieces + a set of instructions that showed you how to build whatever it was on the box. Great so away you went opening the box and tipping out all the individual pieces onto the table or floor or whatever.
Before we start as always let me give you a few definitions of "Digital Transformation":
I like the last one but then again I would because I'm biased
So I started my usual journey of discovery and back onto my trusted Google I went using the search string “digital transformation” … guess what … 302,000,000 hits … aaaaaarrrrrggggghhhhhhhhh!
However, one initial thing I found of interest was this:
Connections are a common point of failure in organizations. In response, most companies create roles for people to manage those connections and ensure that things don’t “fall through the cracks.” The project manager is a popular role that serves this function.
Traditionally, project managers ensure that things don’t fall between the cracks by coordinating and tracking each and every connection. The project manager makes sure the gears line up and mesh properly. In an increasingly complex world, this has become a herculean task.
In the previous post I described our squad principles and roles. In this post I’ll talk about the broader framework in which the squads operated — some of the ceremonies and practices we introduced to provide visibility and coordination between squads.