Mike Burrows's Blog, page 43

September 14, 2017

Agendashift is 1 today

Exactly one year ago today, Agendashift had its public launch. We went live with 22 partners signed up, each of them licensed to 1) use our unique online assessment tool, 2) use our workshop material, and 3) claim a spot in the Agendashift partner directory.

In those 12 months we have grown nearly threefold to 60 partners in 18 countries – 21 in the UK, 13 in the US, 4 in Germany, 3 each in France, India, and Sweden, 2 in Belgium, and 1 each in Argentina, Austria, Canada, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, and Turkey. That’s quite a spread!

Since the first public workshop in Leeds, the tools and materials have undergone frequent revision, thanks in no small part to the input of partners and workshop participants. I myself will be taking the workshop outside Europe more often, visiting India, South Africa, and (very likely) the US in the coming months.

Then came the book. Agendashift has been a very different experience to my first book, Kanban from the Inside. Instead of rushing to get it into print, I released a completed part I online on Leanpub in May, expecting it to lurk there quietly while I got on with part II. Of course it didn’t quite work out that way – I’ve since published 3 revisions and I don’t promise that they’ll be the last, such is the ease by which they can now be done. And when it does go to print, Part I may well become Book 1.

I have more unfinished business in the area of machine learning. Back in June I announced the Agendashift unbenchmarking service, which uses so-called unsupervised learning techniques to help identify particular points of interest in survey results. I have since been experimenting with clustering – techniques that won’t just enhance the analytics, they will also create opportunities to connect people. eHarmony for Lean-Agile, if you like!

There have been a couple of surprises. The first is just how comfortably Clean Language and Cynefin have integrated themselves into Agendashift’s distinctively outcome-centric approach to transformation, to the extent that it’s now hard to imagine their absence. They compliment each other very well: our Clean Language-based workshop game ‘15-minute FOTO’ generates narrative fragments in the form of outcomes that are ideally suited to further interaction via the Cynefin four points contextualisation exercise. Furthermore, they both have wider impact, Clean Language in helping us minimise unhelpful assumptions and opening the door to valuable things that we practitioners might easily exclude, and Cynefin for allowing us to acknowledge the limits of some of our tools (which, ironically, makes them stronger).

The other surprise shouldn’t have been a surprise at all, the way that interacting with other people (many of whom I would have met were it not for Agendashift) has been so rewarding. In every respect that Agendashift has grown, it has grown through interaction. And overwhelmingly, those interactions have been a pleasure to participate in or even simply to observe. If you’ve been part of it, I want to thank you.

About Agendashift™

Agendashift is a modern, inclusive, non-prescriptive, and outcome-centric approach to organisational transformation. Notwithstanding its roots in Lean-Agile, Agendashift remains framework-neutral by intent and design. It is delivered via an online assessment/analytics tool, hands-on workshops, and follow-on coaching and technical training as needed. It is used both inside and outside of IT and across diverse industries, both technology-centric and otherwise.

Agendashift is brought to you by Positive Incline Ltd, UK-based specialists in Lean-Agile transformation. Founder Mike Burrows pioneered the values model for the Kanban Method that led to his definitive book, Kanban from the Inside (2014, Blue Hole Press). Part I of his new book Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation was published May 2017.

For further information, download our 4-page overview or get in touch.

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Published on September 14, 2017 03:14

September 7, 2017

Announcing corporate and associate partnerships

With just a week to go until the first anniversary of our launch, I’m delighted to announce Agendashift’s new corporate partnership plan. This is designed to meet the needs of a range of current and potential Agendashift users:

Service providers (eg consultancies, Agile coaching companies, or looser collectives) with multiple Lean-Agile practitioners and a shared corporate identity
Single-person (or larger) service operations who encourage their clients to use Agendashift under their own steam, as a help along their road to self-sufficiency
End user organisations managing their own Lean-Agile journey internally, with some internal coaching capability

Corporate Agendashift partnerships come with:

Two full partner memberships, ie two named individuals, fully onboarded
25% discounts on additional full partners, onboarded by us or your existing partners
50% discounts on associate partners, onboarded by you
The option for your corporate logo to appear on our home page, linked to the page of your choice

Once onboarded, full and associate partners have unrestricted access to the online tools (we don’t charge for usage) and are licensed to use our workshop materials. We include a free copy of the Agendashift book, even refunding existing purchases. Full partners have the option to be listed in the Agendashift partner directory and have their own private channel in the Agendashift Slack.

Pricing

Corporate Agendashift partnerships start at the annual cost of two full individual partners, or just £550 per year. Then £205 per year for additional full partners and £137 for associates. Single-person operations become eligible for corporate partnership after recruiting two clients as associate partners, the overall cost being the same.

We offer deep discounts on a country basis (eg 60% off for India) and to charitable, non-profit, educational, and public-sector organisations.

All of the above prices are reduced by £50 for the first year for each partner who has attended one of our Agendashift practitioner’s workshops (whether public or private).

Payment options:

1 year in advance
2 years in advance, 20% discount
3 years in advance, 30% discount

After the first year, a monthly payment option is available at a small premium.

Not ready for corporate partnership?

Three lower-commitment options:

1. The Agendashift™ unbenchmarking service

A different kind of assessment with unique, machine-assisted analysis. This is not the lazy consultant’s way of telling you that you’re not using their favourite practices; neither is it “everyone else is better than you” (they aren’t) or “you’re doing it wrong” (we’re not here to judge). It’s there to help you find a way forward from where you are now, wherever that happens to be.

2. Check out the free trial

For free, create your own Agendashift surveys for use with individuals or small groups. You’ll have access to the 18-prompt “mini edition” assessment template, which is available in English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Dutch, Spanish, and Greek.

Some limitations apply:

You won’t have access to the full 43-prompt Values-based delivery assessment template or its corresponding ‘pathway’ template
Your surveys will be limited to a maximum of 10 participants each
Your surveys will all be filed under a single ‘Free trial’ context that you won’t be able to rename

3. Join the authorised partner programme as an individual:

Full access to the the Agendashift tools, facilitation materials, and more:

Create your own contexts and surveys with our full range of assessment templates
Use them in one-to-one, team, or organisational settings
Analyse survey results, with full control over when you share them with participants
Facilitate your own Agendashift transformation mapping workshops and coaching sessions using our latest materials
Get listed in our partner directory (if you wish – your listing is under your control)

Read the small print: Partner licence agreement.

About Agendashift™

For further information, download our 4-page overview or get in touch.

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Published on September 07, 2017 07:13

August 31, 2017

Agendashift roundup, August 2017

In this edition: Launch anniversary; Book revisions; Scrum and Kanban; Public workshops; Speaking; Top posts

Launch anniversary

September 14th will be the first anniversary of the public launch of the Agendashift platform on www.agendashift.com and our partner programme. On the day I’ll publish and mail out a review of this very productive 12 month period.

Book revisions

Keeping to a regular schedule of fortnightly updates I pushed out a number of revisions to the Agendashift book this summer, most notably revision 3 incorporating the 5 principles highlighted in last month’s roundup:

Start with needs
Agree on outcomes
Keep the agenda for change visible
Manage options, testing assumptions
Organise for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability

Existing readers will have been notified of these updates. You can get your copy here:

Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation [leanpub.com]

You can also request a sample chapter.

Scrum and Kanban

It has only been out for a couple of days, but this week’s post Scrum and Kanban revisited (inspired by some thought-provoking headings from Steve Porter and Dan Vacanti) is already the Agendashift blog’s third most visited page of the year. If you haven’t already, go read it! See also the recording of Steve and Dan’s webinar Scrum and Kanban: Make your teams better by busting common myths [scrum.org].

Public workshops

Our September launch anniversary coincides with my fourth trip to India, a favourite destination of mine. I’ll be speaking at Lean Kanban India 2017 and then co-facilitating the Bengaluru Flow Days workshop (incorporating an Agendashift practitioner’s workshop) with Patrick Steyaert on the 17th & 18th. We’d love to see you there.

Coinciding with another big conference (Scrum Gathering South Africa 2017), I’ll be doing a 1-day Agendashift practitioner’s workshop in Cape Town on November 8th. It’s only my second trip to South Africa and my first to Cape Town. Can’t wait!

There will be at least one more practitioner’s workshop in the UK this year, possibly in the form of another Strategy Days in collaboration with Karl Scotland. Other collaborations are also under discussion. The planned workshop on Clean Language and Agendashift with Judy Rees has been postponed to 2018.

If none of these work for you and you think there’s an opportunity for a workshop in your city or at your company, get in touch. A trip to the US in 2018 is highly likely.

Speaking

India, UK, South Africa, and France:

15-16 September, Bengaluru, India: Lean Kanban India 2017
28 September, Sheffield, UK: Institution of Engineering and Technology (non-members welcome for this evening talk)
24th October, Coventry, UK: Coventry and local area Agile meetup
1-3 November, Bristol, UK: Agile in the City, Bristol 2017
9-10 November, Cape Town, South Africa: Scrum Gathering South Africa 2017
29-30 November, Paris, France: Lean Kanban France 2017

Top posts

Scrum and Kanban revisited
(Non-)Prescription, frameworks, and expertise
Agendashift in 5 principles (July)
Out today: Agendashift (part I) revision 3
A True North for Lean-Agile? (May)
Recommended reading (July)

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Published on August 31, 2017 06:17

August 29, 2017

Scrum and Kanban revisited

Late last week I was invited by Fasih Sandhu to contribute my reactions to a LinkedIn post on the topic of Scrum and Kanban. My initial reaction was “Oh, here we go, 2012 just called”, but I ended up leaving a comment big enough that I had to edit it down for it to fit. Here then is the director’s cut! I don’t for a moment suppose it will resolve the issues once and for all, but it does at least give an opportunity to explain how someone committed to thoughtful integration approaches it.

Do you think that combining the #Kanban principles and practices with the #Scrum Framework will enhance the collaboration across your agile teams?

Space did not permit me to address this question on LinkedIn, but had it not contained the phrase “enhance the collaboration across your agile teams” I would likely have not have engaged at all.

To understand why this phrase was so crucial, here’s the Agendashift True North [1]:

Everyone able to work consistently at their best:

• Individuals, teams, between teams, across the organisation

• Right conversations, right people, best possible moment

• Needs anticipated, met at just the right time

I’m interested in enhancing collaboration not just across agile teams (as per the question), but between teams (of all kinds) and across the organisation – the right conversations happening between the right people at the best possible moment, wherever in the organisation or outside of it they happen to reside. Do I believe that a combination of Scrum and Kanban can help to deliver this? Yes I do, and I can point to multiple projects where I’ve witnessed it happen.

In a week or so, I will be attending an event on #Scrum versus #Kanban and I am interested to the reaction of my LinkedIn followers to any of the following statements that will be discussed in that event:

1) Scrum is for product teams; Kanban is for service teams

2) Scrum is for complex work; Kanban is for simple work

3) Our Scrum team has evolved to become a Kanban team

4) We do Scrumban

5) We do Kanban because we can’t plan out for an entire Sprint

6) Scrum is revolutionary; Kanban is evolutionary

Oh dear. “Scrum versus Kanban”. 2012 really is calling. Moving on:

1) Scrum is for product teams; Kanban is for service teams

Quick gut reaction: Ugh. Propaganda (at best based on an error of logic, more bluntly a lie based on a misdirection).

Longer answer, explaining the above but leading to a much less controversial conclusion:

Yes, Scrum is, by design, for product teams. Scrum.org describes it as “a management and control process that cuts through complexity to focus on building products that meet business needs”. No argument there, and in that context it is well understood and well resourced. For some it’s the framework of choice, for others it’s a good starting point or something you have to know.

Is Scrum designed for service teams? Not really. Can Kanban help there? In other words, can service teams benefit from Kanban’s visual management, controls on work in progress, collaborative, feedback-driven process improvement, etc, etc? Many can and many do!

What is also true (and it’s what makes this statement so frustrating) is that visual management, controls on work in progress, collaborative, feedback-driven process improvement, etc, etc are also highly useful to product teams, whether or not they are using Scrum.

So… Kanban is not only for service teams, and Scrum and Kanban are not mutually exclusive. Boring, but true! And can your product teams afford to ignore the service dimension anyway? Probably not, and some would even start there…

2) Scrum is for complex work; Kanban is for simple work

Quick gut reaction: Double ugh. Like question 1, but with a dose of Appeal to authority thrown in.

I could give an extended answer here, but suffice it to say that if you don’t understand that Scrum and Kanban both seek – in their quite different ways, both technically and philosophically – to help their organisations (not just their products) evolve in the presence of internal friction and external competitive pressure, then you don’t understand them, Agile, Lean, or Lean-Agile very well at all.

3) Our Scrum team has evolved to become a Kanban team

Positive, negative, and mixed reactions might be appropriate here – it’s hard to comment on this one without knowing the specifics of the scenario.

Unfortunately a statement like this could mean a whole range of things, ranging from “We stopped doing a bunch of Scrum-related stuff and we don’t really know what we’re doing” to “We’re now using a number of new techniques in a the pursuit of flow, leaving some older practices behind once we established that it was safe and effective to do so”.

Minor technicality: By the design of both, ‘Kanban team’ isn’t as well defined as ‘Scrum team’, but I can see how this arises.

4) We do Scrumban

As documented [2, 3, and elsewhere], my personal experience of Scrumban has been very positive.

To celebrate the Scrum part, the teams I worked with very much appreciated the focus of the sprint in the early days of each project; for organisations unused to achieving anything quickly, the experience can be amazing!

As to the Kanban part, this helped immensely in the pursuit of end-to-end flow (see my answer to question 3 above). This isn’t just better task management, this is integrating a process that starts well before development and finishes long after delivery into production.

I’m glad to be able to say that Scrumban is better resourced now than previously; see for example the book [4] by my friend Ajay Reddy and (from the same stable) some tools [5, 6].

5) We do Kanban because we can’t plan out for an entire Sprint

Quick gut reaction: I find it hard to see this as anything other than a feeble cop out.

Every team is subject to sources of unpredictability – in fact most teams seem to generate a fair amount of the stuff themselves! And yet there’s so much that remains under your control:

How often you plan is up to you (clue: choose an appropriate sprint size)
Whether or not you plan with zero wiggle room is up to you (clue: don’t)
The confidence you attach to your plans is up to you (clue: understand that this is crucial to the planning process, and that your choices here should be informed by both capability and need)

6) Scrum is revolutionary; Kanban is evolutionary

Quick gut reaction: Some truth there, exaggerated for effect, not on its own a useful value judgement.

Scrum is revolutionary if you’ve done nothing like it before. Over time and as there is more of it about, it will become less and less revolutionary, (a victim of its own success perhaps). And don’t forget that it has evolutionary goals (see question 2 above).

Kanban is often described as the easier of the two to introduce, but try introducing it in an organisation allergic to transparency!

Frankly though, discussions about what does or doesn’t constitute evolutionary change quickly get very dry, and in any case I don’t believe that this is a sensible basis for serious decisions about tool integration (and like it or not, every successful Agile adoption is an integration, not just a selection). Nowadays therefore, I prefer to take a more principles-based approach: Start with needs, Agree on outcomes, and so on [7, 8].

References

[1] A True North for Lean-Agile? (See also chapters 1 and 5 of [2])

[2] Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation, Mike Burrows (yours truly) (2017, Leanpub)

[3] Kanban from the Inside (2014, Blue Hole Press)

[4] The Scrumban [R]Evolution: Getting the Most Out of Agile, Scrum, and Lean Kanban, Ajay Reddy (2015, Addison-Wesley Professional)

[5] GetScrumban

[6] ScrumDo

[7] Agendashift in 5 principles

[8] (Non-)Prescription, frameworks, and expertise

Links: Slack | LinkedIn group | Twitter | Agendashift home | Mike

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Published on August 29, 2017 05:52

August 17, 2017

Out today: Agendashift (part I) revision 3

Over the past few weeks I’ve published on a fortnightly basis three quick revisions of the Agendashift book. I did (and still do) consider it finished, but refinement is always possible and I have been soliciting feedback actively. Thank you Dragan Jojic, Kert Peterson, and Philippe Guenet for your recent comments – most helpful.

A quick run-down of recent changes, many many of them anticipated here on the blog:

Stronger chapter 5 intro based on the five principles of 21st century change leadership I’ve blogged about recently:

Agendashift in 5 principles
(Non-)Prescription, frameworks, and expertise

Made explicit reference to True North
Described ‘reject fast’ as an alternative to ‘fail fast’
Referenced the GDS design principles, the inspiration for principle #1, Start with needs. If you go to the Agendashift recommended reading page you’ll see that I’ve added a link.
Some Clean Language-related tweaks – see Revisions to the book and cue cards
Numerous minor edits – some on the theme of ‘mutual accountability’, others for the sake of readability

If you have bought the e-book already, you’ll be notified that there’s a new version to download. If you haven’t, get your copy here:

Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation

There are PDF, EPUB and MOBI formats available. For iOS devices (iPad and iPhone) I would recommend EPUB for viewing in iBooks in preference to MOBI for Kindle – we are experiencing formatting issues on the Kindle for iOS platform. Other platform combinations are unaffected as far as we know.

[image error]

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Published on August 17, 2017 06:19

August 2, 2017

(Non-)Prescription, frameworks, and expertise

Let’s look again at Agendashift in 5 principles, 5 principles for organisational adaptability and 21st century change leadership:

Start with needs
Agree on outcomes
Keep the agenda for change visible
Manage options, testing assumptions
Organise for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability

Alongside those principles let’s consider also Agendashift’s description as “inclusive, non-prescriptive, and methodology-neutral”. Taking all of that together, what place is there here for skills and expertise in methods, frameworks, and so on? As it happens, quite a lot. It might seem counter-intuitive, but non-prescriptive is an excellent stance for the serious change agent to take.

Just one of the several cool things about starting with needs and outcomes instead of requirements and (pre-selected) solutions is that you give yourself the opportunity to generate and evaluate options (part of principle 4). That’s an interesting process in itself, and here are some of the ways in which a skilled facilitator can encourage diversity and innovation:

For every option that involves implementing a tool, we try to think of one that doesn’t (eg to “Implement Slack” we might add the alternative “Get out more”)
For every option that involves someone outside our circle providing more accurate inputs, we try to think of one where we we take the responsibility for better and timelier conversations (eg to “Better requirements documents” we might add the alternative “Spend time with customers”)

And some questions:

“What has worked elsewhere?”
“What would experts from different backgrounds recommend?”
“What’s the most radical option we could try?”

To people and teams already familiar with a framework (Scrum, for example), it makes total sense to try things that have worked for similar teams, so long as there’s a decent chance that it will help you achieve the outcome you’re currently focused on. For non-trivial problems, it also makes a lot of sense to understand how other people have solved similar problems outside your framework. For all but the most unusual problems, an expert worthy of that title will have ready access to a range of options and will be able to provide insight into when and why some options work better than others under different conditions.

Industry experience and framework expertise come into their own again with principle 5, organising for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability. Many frameworks have their own answers (technical answers, at least) to how communication and decision-making should work, but only a fool would pretend that it won’t be a challenge to change how organisations operate, especially at scale. Without a good understanding of i) what’s possible and ii) how to help make it happen, you’re stuffed.

The majority of Agendashift partners have deep expertise in at least one Lean-Agile method or framework and a working knowledge of others. No less valuable are those that come from the organisation, facilitation, and change side as employees or external consultants and work with and respect the technical experts (and vice versa).

If this inclusive (“it’s all great”), non-prescriptive, methodology-neutral thing sounds attractive to you, give Agendashift a closer look. Check out our partner directory, either to find some local expertise or to help you decide that you’d belong there yourself. If you’re a practitioner, check out the partner programme. If a potential sponsor, the unbenchmarking service and the transformation mapping workshop will give you a flavour of the services we and our partners can offer. And for depth, there’s the book: Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation.

Links: Slack | LinkedIn group | Twitter | Agendashift home | Mike

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Published on August 02, 2017 02:35

July 31, 2017

Agendashift roundup, July 2017

In this edition: Latest on the Agendashift book; Cue card updates; Agendashift in 5 principles; #opportunities; Public workshops; Speaking; Top posts

Latest on the Agendashift book

Just a quick note to let you know how much I’m enjoying the Agendashift book. I haven’t read much in the Lean-Agile space for a few years as I felt nothing new was being said. Your book has changed that for me – great work!

That was from Alex Johnston. Thanks Alex!

To the main site I have added Recommended reading, a list of recommended books and other references extracted from the “behind the scenes” sections of each chapter of part I. The blog post that announced it was one of the top two posts this month, so clearly it was appreciated!

In case you don’t have it already, part I is published here: Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation [leanpub.com].

Cue card updates

The post Revisions to the book and cue cards describes some recent revisions to part I of the book and the inclusion of an additional Clean Language question on the cue cards for the 15-minute FOTO game described in chapter 1. Anyone registered for the preview chapter or the cue cards will have received new download links by email; if you’d like either or both of these, just shout.

Agendashift in 5 principles

In the race for top post of the month and catching up quickly with the recommended reading announcement is this one: Agendashift in 5 principles.

You can read these as 5 principles of 21st century change management (it came about as the rewritten conclusion of my keynote on that topic) or – and you’ll know where I’m coming from if you’ve read chapter 5 of the new book – 5 principles for organisational adaptability.

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#opportunities

This is the name of a new channel in our Slack community, available for the posting of relevant vacancies, availabilities, etc. If you need a Slack invite, ask here.

Public workshops

India, UK, and South Africa – the next public Agendashift workshops in the calendar:

September 17-18, Bengaluru, India: Bengaluru Flow Days – Flowlab and Agendashift with Patrick Steyaert and Mike Burrows
September 26-27, London: Clean Language and Agendashift with Judy Rees and Mike Burrows
November 8th, Cape Town, Agendashift practitioner’s workshop, Cape Town

Want a private workshop? Get in touch, or find a partner near you.

Speaking

India, UK, South Africa, and France:

15-16 September, Bengaluru, India: Lean Kanban India 2017
28 September, Sheffield, UK: Institution of Engineering and Technology (non-members welcome for this evening talk)
24th October, Coventry, UK: Coventry and local area Agile meetup
1-3 November, Bristol, UK: Agile in the City, Bristol 2017
9-10 November, Cape Town, South Africa: Scrum Gathering South Africa 2017
29-30 November, Paris, France: Lean Kanban France 2017

Top posts

Recommended reading
Agendashift in 5 principles
Revisions to the book and cue cards
Better user stories start with authentic situations of need (October 2016)
Video: Exercises in Lean-Agile transformation (June)
A True North for Lean-Agile? (May)

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Published on July 31, 2017 05:28

July 25, 2017

Agendashift in 5 principles

[image error]

If you see from me a list of five things, chances are that it maps forwards or backwards* to Discovery, Exploration, Mapping, Elaboration, Operation, the five sessions of an Agendashift workshop and the five chapters of part I of the book.

Here then is Agendashift in 5 principles:

Start with needs
Agree on outcomes
Keep the agenda for change visible
Manage options, testing assumptions
Organise for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability

You can read these as 5 principles of 21st century change management or 5 principles for organisational adaptability.

1. Start with needs

If you don’t know what the user needs are, you won’t build the right thing [gov.uk]

It’s no secret I’m an admirer of the UK Government Digital Services’ focus on needs. Here, “Start with needs – user needs not government needs” isn’t just spin, but a statement of strategic intent. I can tell you from firsthand experience that if your UK government digital service fails to demonstrate a serious ongoing commitment to exploring and meeting needs, you can expect trouble!

Whether it’s change to products and services or to organisation and process, if your idea of driving change consists of handing down requirements from your ivory tower, you don’t get the needs thing at all. Face it though: it is all too possible to satisfy a long list of requirements and still not meet needs. (See also: Better user stories start with authentic situations of need).

Neither do you get it if you think it’s ok for your improvement efforts are mainly inward-looking, attending mainly to your team’s efficiency and comfort. If you don’t take time to understand the needs of people outside your four walls, how do you know that you are improving in any meaningful sense?

2. Agree on outcomes

You’d be forgiven for thinking that 20th century change management was all about overcoming resistance to change: trying to convince people, and when all attempts at persuasion have failed, going ahead anyway.

Whether or not that’s fair (certainly there’s truth in it), I believe that 21st century change management is different. Just as we put needs ahead of requirements, we put outcomes ahead of solutions. Agreement on outcomes is gold; once you have that, it’s just a question of how those outcomes will be achieved, the kind of problem that motivates people (not everyone perhaps, but enough people if the outcome is sufficiently meaningful).

3. Keep the agenda for change visible

Agreeing on outcomes and then forgetting them would be quite a waste of effort! To quote the last chapter of my first book:

Shaping the agenda … with the explicit aim of producing a compelling set of agreed upon priorities, goals, and actions

Little did I know it at the time, but chapter 23 of Kanban from the Inside would be the springboard for Agendashift – you can even see where the name came from! Ever since, I have been motivated to help organisations produce their own compelling agendas for change, agendas that without discarding the start with what you do now principle still manage to convey a sense of challenge and ambition. You see that sense of challenge and ambition in my proposal A True North for Lean-Agile?, my distillation of what we strive towards.

4. Manage options, testing assumptions

Representing a real alternative to prescription, Agendashift is generative twice over (generative squared?) – containing repeatable and transferable tools first to generate outcomes, and then to generate options for their realisation.

We’ve adopted Lean Startup language for framing options as hypotheses, we take an initial look at assumptions when deciding on which options to select, reject, or hold, and we use an A3-based tool to develop this thinking further. At all three levels of detail we’re bringing assumptions to the surface and devising experiments by which they can be tested. Relentless validation becomes the engine of change; we learn and adapt quickly because we have both the courage and the humility to be wrong.

5. Organise for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability

… it reads like a list on how to align to purpose

Exactly! That was Damian Crawford commenting in the Agendashift Slack on alternative wordings to #5, endorsing this one.

We’re talking transparency, leadership, autonomy, alignment mechanisms, knowledge discovery processes, feedback loops, and so on. Right conversations, right people, best possible moment (an Agile-influenced element of our True North proposal). Pushing authority to the information (David Marquet, author of the fantastic Turn the Ship Around!). For leaders, it means more than just clarity of intent, it means a genuine commitment to the people who will carry it out. And it’s not just about personal style, it has significant implications for organisation design.

Recap

Here again is Agendashift in 5 principles:

Start with needs
Agree on outcomes
Keep the agenda for change visible
Manage options, testing assumptions
Organise for clarity, speed, and mutual accountability

Whether for 21st century change management or organisational adaptability, what principles would you choose? How do they align to these?

*(see Lean-Agile transformation as Lean-Agile process for a backwards example)

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Published on July 25, 2017 08:34

July 19, 2017

Revisions to the book and cue cards

Today I’m simultaneously releasing revisions to:

The Agendashift book (part I published on Leanpub in May)
The printable cue card for the 15-minute FOTO game, available from the Agendashift Resources page

If you’ve purchased the book and registered for updates (most readers have), you’ll be notified and reminded to download the new version. If you’ve requested the preview chapter or cue cards from me in the past, I’ll send you download links.

The changes

I’ve incorporated a seventh Clean Language question, “What is happening when X?”, impacting both the book and the cue cards
Chapter 1’s Behind the scenes now includes a True North section – as anticipated by the blog post A True North for Lean-Agile?
Lots of edits to the intro and Chapter 1 made in the interests of readability

To that last point, do please give feedback. Readability is key! If anything doesn’t flow as well as it should, let me know.

Grab your copy

Agendashift: clean conversations, coherent collaboration, continuous transformation [leanpub.com]
Request the preview chapter PDF [agendashift.com]
Request the cue card PDF [agendashift.com]

If you’ve requested downloads previously you should be updated automatically in the next few hours.

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