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Bringing Managers Back to Work
- 1. @jjschreuder • jason.schreuder@gmail.com • www.iterationsofjason.com Bringing Managers Back to Work
- 2. Agile Coach Jason Schreuder ▷ 10+ years of Agile, coaching, training and leading agile teams in the military and technology industries ▷ experience leading an Agile PMO and an Agile adoption in a global technology company developing manufactured devices, currently working on non-software applications for Agile in a large, private financial technology firm ▷ Graduate degrees in business and higher education, alphabet soup of certifications ▷ from Apex, North Carolina Helping people, teams, and organizations pursue the ability to engage and affect their environment so that they can adapt to a complex and ever changing world.
- 3. Menti Poll! Please go to menti.com on your device. Enter code: 68 04 45 Ask me Anything!
- 4. Esther Derby (2017) The “Middle” Manager Leadership is the ability to enhance the environment so that everyone is empowered to contribute creatively to solving problem(s) -- Gerald M. Weinberg
- 5. Where Are You? Adapted from the Leadership Circle Being invested in finishing deliverables Being invested in ongoing team improvement and growth Giving the team answers to avoid failures Asking the right questions to help team find answers Focus on achieving scope, schedule, budget delivery Focus on value delivery Finding what’s wrong with how the team does things Staying curious and seeing the best in team members Working with individuals almost exclusively 1:1 Working with the group as a whole Mentoring, directing, telling Asking, facilitating, coaching
- 8. ▷ Foster Shared Leadership ▷ Develop a Coaching Capability We need managers that . . .
- 9. “[There is a] growing body of evidence that suggests that teams do well when they rely on leadership provided by the team as a whole rather than looking to a single individual to lead them. Shared Leadership in Teams: An Investigation of Antecedent Conditions and Performance, The Academy of Management Journal · October 2007 Jay B. Carson, Southern Methodist University, Paul E. Teslu, University of Maryland, Jennifer A. Marrone, Seattle University
- 10. Shared Leadership ▷ an emergent team property that results from the distribution of leadership influence across multiple team members. ▷ mutual influence of team interactions that significantly improves team and organizational performance ▷ can also be the collective influence of team members on each other. Coming to Terms Shared Leadership in Teams: An Investigation of Antecedent Conditions and Performance, The Academy of Management Journal · October 2007 Jay B. Carson, Southern Methodist University, Paul E. Teslu, University of Maryland, Jennifer A. Marrone, Seattle University
- 11. ▷ Internal Team Environment ○ Shared Purpose -- understanding the primary objective (the goal) ○ Social Support -- encouragement and recognition (psychological strength) ○ Voice -- participation and input increases engagement, involvement, commitment (participatory decision-making) ▷ External Team Coaching ○ Develop team capabilities and motivation ○ Help them become autonomous and self-managed Antecedents to Shared Leadership Shared Leadership in Teams: An Investigation of Antecedent Conditions and Performance, The Academy of Management Journal · October 2007 Jay B. Carson, Southern Methodist University, Paul E. Teslu, University of Maryland, Jennifer A. Marrone, Seattle University
- 12. ▷ Intent -- the framework that outlines vision and purpose, providing enabling guidance. Then over-communicate it. ▷ Setting the conditions for others’ success ▷ Create shared understanding If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the people to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea. -- Antoine de Saint- Exupéry, the author of The Little Prince Shared Purpose: Vision & Missions
- 13. Social Support: The Key to Great Teams In a team with high psychological safety, teammates feel safe to take risks around their team members. They feel confident that no one on the team will embarrass or punish anyone else for admitting a mistake, asking a question, or offering a new idea.
- 14. Leader behaviors: ▷ Invite others to go first ▷ Withhold judgement ▷ Check-in with yourself first ▷ Engage the entire group Voice: Participation & Engagement
- 15. Menti Poll! Please go to menti.com on your device. Enter code: 68 04 45 Check-In
- 16. ▷ Shared Leadership is more useful predictor of team performance than vertical leadership of appointed team leaders. ▷ Failure of even a single member to exhibit leadership behavior was found to be detrimental to team performance. Shared Leadership Enhances Team Performance Shared Leadership in Teams: An Investigation of Antecedent Conditions and Performance, The Academy of Management Journal · October 2007 Jay B. Carson, Southern Methodist University, Paul E. Teslu, University of Maryland, Jennifer A. Marrone, Seattle University
- 17. “The goal of coaching is the goal of good management: to make the most of an organization’s valuable resources. -- Harvard Business Review
- 18. Role of External Team Coach ▷ Provide a good internal team environment (set conditions) ▷ Supportive Coaching -- Provides motivational and consultative functions that encourages, reinforces and rewards team leadership. ○ Building collective commitment to the team and its work ○ Assisting team with aligning activities, clarifying work and processes ○ Fostering self-competence and team independence The Impact of Coaching Shared Leadership in Teams: An Investigation of Antecedent Conditions and Performance, The Academy of Management Journal · October 2007 Jay B. Carson, Southern Methodist University, Paul E. Teslu, University of Maryland, Jennifer A. Marrone, Seattle University
- 19. Coaching is Not ▷ Mentoring ▷ Consulting ▷ Counseling the use of powerful questioning, framing, and exploration with a client to help them recognize their capacity to solve their own problems. ▷ “Fixing” ▷ Training/Teaching Coaching is
- 20. What Makes a Great Manager? 1. Is a good coach 2. Empowers team and does not micromanage 3. Creates an inclusive team environment, showing concern for success and well-being 4. Is productive and results-oriented 5. Is a good communicator--listens and shares information 6. Supports career development and discusses performance 7. Has a clear vision/strategy for the team 8. Has key technical skills to help advise the team 9. Collaborates across [the company] 10.Is a strong decision maker
- 21. Menti Poll! Please go to menti.com on your device. Enter code: 68 04 45 As we go to questions, I want your feedback!
- 22. @jjschreuder • jason.schreuder@gmail.com • www.iterationsofjason.com Thank You!
- 23. Key Shifts in Progressive Orgs 1. From Profit to Purpose & Values 2. From Hierarchical Pyramids to a Network of Teams 3. From Directive Leadership to Supportive Leadership 4. From Predict & Plan to Experiment & Adapt 5. From Rules & Control to Freedom & Trust 6. From Centralized Authority to Distribute Authority 7. From Secrecy to Radical Transparency 8. From Job Descriptions to Talents & Mastery Corporate Rebels, book coming soon
- 24. “The ultimate freedom for creative groups is the freedom to experiment with new ideas. Some skeptics insist that innovation is expensive. In the long run, innovation is cheap. Mediocrity is expensive—and autonomy can be the antidote. –Tom Kelley, General Manager, IDEO
- 25. ▷ Many people don’t like failing, but we don’t learn anything we when just repeat good practices. ▷ Fast-learner over first-mover advantage. The only way to win is to learn faster than anyone else. -- Eric Ries, The Lean Startup Learning Starts with Experiments Management 3.0
- 26. Retrospectives: Feedback for the Org ▷ The Retrospective Prime Directive: Regardless of what we discover, we understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job they could, given what they knew at the time, their skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand. -- Norm Kerth ▷ Derby & Larson Model: Opening, Gather Information, Generate Insights, Decide What to Do, Close ▷ Do you do these with your teams? This is not just the end of a sprint or project. What about personal introspectives?
Editor's Notes
- Leadership is the ability to enhance the environment so that everyone is empowered to contribute creatively to solving problem(s) -- Gerald M. Weinberg The old model of management . . . went something like this. 1) Information comes up, decisions come down. The manager is the person in the middle who transfers that information from on high to the mindless, replaceable, cogs-in-the-machine doing the work. This is a regrettable and dysfunctional aftereffect of scientific management championed by Frederick Winslow Taylor as a hallmark of factory work in the industrialized era. 2) The goal at work is to be like my boss. Emulate their managerial style and I will be promoted, get more pay, and a bigger title, and that is my motivation. I can do that making myself look as good as possible, often at the expense of others.Shift mindset (Copernican Revolution Blog Post ) In a typical hierarchy, Top Leaders set strategic objectives; middle leaders direct, coordinate and monitor activities; bottom people perform activities as directed. But this is a very mechanistic and unhuman approach to an organization, echoing from a time when workers were thought incapable of thought. Traditional orgs try to develop policies and procedures to avoid risk, dummy-proof everything, and this makes everyone like Gulliver, tied by a thousand strings We must get away from mechanistic thinking of organizations. We need simple rules or heuristics: team over individual, department over team, company over department
- Agile is like taking the red pill in The Matrix. You're in a whole new world or work, and you need to figure out how to cope. And many people are saying get rid of all the managers. ?? Many Scrum purists say there are no managers They key to management is to get rid of the managers. Ricardo semler Ted talk and Jurgen Apello champions this. Article explores this
- Want Real Agility? Change your Management Culture First. You have probably seen agile practices take root in teams throughout your organization. With frameworks and team-level practices designed to deliver more effectively, you have probably already seen great improvements. But this is only the tip of the iceberg. To get the real business benefits from a customer-centric, collaborative, learn-fast approach, you need to change your management culture. Team level practices, then organizational structure (OD)/process/technology, then leadership -- only after all three will you get the full gains (Agile fluency) A holistic agile approach is 1) a project management approach that it iterative (don’t build it all at once, process, visible work, framework) 2) a product leadership approach that is incremental (MVP, test and learn, smaller chunks) 3) product development approach (automation, DevOps, technical, lean) 4) leadership and culture Key mottos Managers shift from “what have you done for me lately” to “how can I help” Manager is a title that is given, leader is a ___ (responsibility? Trust?) that is earned. I am your manager, and I hope to earn your trust as your leader
- But we don’t need to go that far. In fact, today I want to present an argument that we need all the “right” kind of managers we can get in an agile context. These managers are force multipliers, if they can retool. So, I am issuing a call to all managers out there to come back to work, and do these two things: Foster Shared Leadership Develop a Coaching Capability
- First, let’s talk about shared leadership
- Self-managing and autonomous – team members have greater responsibility for setting their own goals, monitoring their own progress and making their own decisions. Team empowerment motivational construct collective experience of heightened levels of task motivation Derives meaningfulness, autonomy, impact, and potency (aka effectiveness, power, influence). This is the very essence of an agile team. Remember, the 17 software engineers that went to Utah in 2001 were not trying to start a revolution. They only wanted to make life better for software engineers. They wanted to have some autonomy and ability to self-manage.
- Internal Team Environment – the 3 constructs are complementary and mutually reinforcing Shared Purpose – understanding of primary objective (the goal) all team members have a similar understanding of their team’s primary objectives all team members take steps to ensure a focus on collective goals Social Support – give encouragement and recognition to each other Team members’ efforts to provide emotional and psychological strength to one another. This is done by encouraging and recognizing individual and team contributions and accomplishments. People are more likely to work cooperatively and develop a sense of shared responsibility for team outcomes. Voice – participation and input increases engagement, involvement and commitment The degree to which a team’s members have input into how the team carries out its purpose. Results in higher levels of social influence via increased engagement and involvement. Associated with participation in decision making, constructive discussion and debate around alternative approaches to goals, tasks and procedures which improves collective influence, involvement and commitment External Team Coaching -- team coach role, good scrum masters can do this. It is the reason for the team agile coach role
- Internal Team Environment Shared Purpose Part of establishing the why is clearly articulating a vision for your organization. This can be done in a variety of ways, but ritual, storytelling, and reinforcement are key. Leaders must create a framework of intent that clarifies the vision and enables people in the organization to act in the absence of orders. This is how modern militaries operate.
- Internal Team Environment Social Support 2012, Google’s Project Aristotle. Set out to define what makes a great team They did what you’d expect — they studied the characteristics of the managers, tried to compare team composition in terms of strengths and skillsets, checked the effect of different personality type combinations, looked at leadership skills, etcetera etcetera. But… nada. They got nowhere. Back to the drawing board…They decided to return to the most effective teams across Google and start an ethnographic study looking at the qualitative side of what those teams tick. As the research progressed, two behaviors started to emerge that practically all of their high-performing teams shared… everyone spoke roughly the same amount. They later described this as “equality in distribution of conversational turn-taking.” high “social sensitivity” — which was a complicated way of saying that individuals were good at reading “how others felt based on their tone of voice, their expressions and other nonverbal cues.” These two behaviors are part of what is called psychological safety. This is the #1 thing that makes great teams. There are threads of this idea in academic research. It is ‘‘a sense of confidence that the team will not embarrass, reject or punish someone for speaking up,’’ (Amy Edmunson, Professor at HBS, 1999)‘‘It describes a team climate characterized by interpersonal trust and mutual respect in which people are comfortable being themselves.’’ Teams that demonstrate both equality in turn-taking and high levels of social sensitivity are teams where people are motivated and engaged because they can bring their whole selves to work. These teams operate in an environment of psychological safety. This increases a team’s ability to take risks, fail quickly, and learn rapidly. These ideas are from Will Watson @The Ready article
- Internal Team Environment Voice These are key attributes of a leader trying to create collaboration. What I call facilitative leadership. It is how we get every voice engaged, and make sure we are mining the crowd for all of its wisdom.
- Next, a Coaching Capability, or Coaching Muscle
- External Team Coaching External team leaders play a critical role in development of team members’ motivation and capabilities to lead themselves and become self-directed. Can enable Shared Leadership to emerge in a team even if they haven’t yet developed a high level of social support, shared purpose and voice. Coaching behaviors – direct interaction with a team intended to help members make coordinated and task-appropriate use of their collective resources in accomplishing the team’s task. This is not sport coaching, this is not “telling it like it is
- Mentoring - passing on of knowledge, experiences, and skills • Usually by someone who is older and wiser. • Has normally achieved the goal themselves • A Coach may not have any experience in the given coaching area. Consulting • A Consultant uses his/her own skills to improve a given situation. • Whereas, a Coach brings out the Client's expertise to do so. Counseling • focus on feelings related to past events • Coaching is oriented towards goal setting and encouraging the Client to actively move forward. Fixing • No Coach can ‘fix’ a problem for a Client. For that matter no Coach can ‘change’ a Client. Only a Client can do that. • It is not the job of the Coach to direct the Client to any given way forward. • The Coach lives by the motto that every Client presents himself or herself to the Coach whole and complete, able to generate his or her own perfect answers. Training/ Teaching • Training is directive, driven by the Trainer who will tell, instruct and generally control most of both the process and the content. • In coaching it is the Client who does most of the talking and with the facilitation of the Coach increases his/her level of self-awareness and clarity around the goal and the way forward.
- Earlier project, 2008, Project Oxygen, set out to determine what makes a good manager ACTIVITY: What Makes a Great Manager Turn to your neighbor, make triads if someone is out. You will have 5 minutes to review these attributes of a great manager from Project Oxygen. Identify your top 1 or 2 and explain to your new friend why this is important to you. The first one is already taken! “Think about the best manager you have ever had They were probably not perfect, but they had some key attributes that you really admired Now, what makes a great manager to you?” 1. Is a good coach -- A good coach avoids the trap of solving every problem for their team as soon as it arises. Rather they use these problems as teaching moments. They guide and share insights at the right time, letting their team gain valuable experience along the way. 2. Empowers team and does not micromanage -- Everybody hates a micromanager. In contrast, a good team lead gives their people enough freedom--to explore new ideas, to experiment, and to develop (and adapt) their own working style. In addition, great managers make sure their people have the tools and flexibility they need to do their jobs. 3. Creates an inclusive team environment, showing concern for success and well-being -- Great managers make it a priority to build trust in their teams. 4. Is productive and results-oriented -- The best managers make those around them better. They realize what their teams are capable of, and they use emotional intelligence to motivate their people and help them realize their potential. 5. Is a good communicator--listens and shares information - Great managers are great listeners--this enables understanding. They also share what they can, realizing transparency is beneficial for the team as a whole. They share sincere and specific praise, early and often. But they also don't hold back from giving necessary (negative) feedback--making sure to frame it in a way that is constructive and easy to learn from. 6. Supports career development and discusses performance -- Great managers are invested in their people. They provide career path options, realizing not everyone wants to follow the same road. They also don't hold their people back for personal gain. Rather, they support team members and help them to reach their goals. 7. Has a clear vision/strategy for the team -- Great managers know where they're going, but they make sure the whole team knows, too--rather than keeping them in the dark. They are also careful to communicate "scope," realistic expectations as to what specific actions are needed to execute a strategy, and each team member's role in delivering. 8. Has key technical skills to help advise the team -- Great bosses understand a job well and are skilled at the work they oversee. If an effective manager is brought into a new department, they take time in the beginning to familiarize themselves with their people's everyday work and challenges. This earns them the respect of their team. 9. Collaborates across [the company] -- Some managers create silos, running their teams with an "us versus them" mentality, competing against other teams within the company. Great managers have the ability to see the big picture, and work for the good of a company as a whole. 10. Is a strong decision maker -- Great managers take the lead. They make the tough decisions, and make sure everyone understands the reasons behind those decisions. Then, they commit to following through. From Justin Bariso article on Inc.
- You have your own version of this on the notes page 1. FROM PROFIT TO PURPOSE & VALUES WHAT TO DO? Finding purpose, or meaning in work gives energy, passion and motivation to get out of bed in the morning. An inspiring mission can overcome bureaucracy, silos and egos and helps to unleash the full potential of the organization. With a clear and inspiring mission comes a set of common values, the behaviour and skills that we value in our fellow colleagues. HOW TO GET THERE? Craft a crisp and clear mission that unites and activates all people within the organization. Translate this purpose to departments, teams and even individuals. Replace rules and protocols by a set of clear values. 2. FROM HIERARCHICAL PYRAMIDS TO A NETWORK OF TEAMS WHAT TO DO? Tear down the familiar hierarchical pyramid and let the changing nature of the work impact the structure of roles and teams in a fluid way. Allow individuals to gather and work as members of multiple teams with multiple contexts and they will go far beyond the disingenuous ‘dotted line’ nonsense of traditional organizations. Welcome a network of teams. HOW TO GET THERE? Create a network of multidisciplinary teams that are result and mission driven. Make teams responsible for their own results and give them a (financial) stake in the outcome. 3. FROM DIRECTIVE LEADERSHIP TO SUPPORTIVE LEADERSHIP WHAT TO DO? Stop pushing decisions down the chain of command. It neglects the wisdom of the crowd and disengages those who are closest to the customer. The most inspiring leaders craft a mission, walk the talk and inspire to act. Authority is no longer linked to hierarchical positions, but by the ability to lead by example and by building and guiding teams that flourish. HOW TO GET THERE? Destroy ivory towers and get rid of status symbols, job-titles, and privileges. Don’t assume you know best, ask your employees what it is they need to thrive. 4. FROM PREDICT & PLAN TO EXPERIMENT & ADAPT WHAT TO DO? Long term strategic business planning and budgeting are all based on the outdated belief that we can predict the future. Let go of your extensive predictions and start embracing experimentation in your daily work. Experiment, learn and adapt. And don’t be afraid to fail, it is an important part of the process. HOW TO GET THERE? Encourage experimentation, make it visible and award it. Communicate successes and failures during Fuck-up nights. 5. FROM RULES & CONTROL TO FREEDOM & TRUST WHAT TO DO? Get rid of the old-fashioned command-and-control structures, allow people to work autonomously and trust that they will act in the company’s best interest. This freedom, however, is not a one way street. A high degree of freedom should come hand in hand with a high degree of responsibility. HOW TO GET THERE? Get rid of most rules and liberate people from structural control mechanisms. Let people decide themselves how to work, where to work and when to work. 6. FROM CENTRALIZED AUTHORITY TO DISTRIBUTED AUTHORITY WHAT TO DO? Aim to distribute authority to individuals and teams in order to be able to adapt constantly to the rapidly changing business environment. Trust your people to make the right decisions. Be aware, with the responsibility of decision making comes the accountability for the result. HOW TO GET THERE? Push authority down the organization chart as much as possible. Make better decisions with “the advice process”. 7. FROM SECRECY TO RADICAL TRANSPARENCY WHAT TO DO? Avoid secrecy by applying an ‘open by default’ policy, and an ‘ask me anything’ mentality. Make data available in real-time, and provide people with the right information at the right moment in order to increase decision making speed and accuracy. Don’t be shy and leverage the power of technology. HOW TO GET THERE? Grant company-wide access to data, documents, financials and other information. Boost transparency through town hall meetings. 8. FROM JOB DESCRIPTIONS TO TALENTS & MASTERY WHAT TO DO? Make better use of the diversity of skills and talents that are present within your organization. Get rid of the job descriptions that are obsolete from the moment they are crafted. Let people work on things they like and which best fit their interest, talents and strengths. Doing what you are good at increases motivation and engagement. HOW TO GET THERE? Let people choose their own tasks and responsibilities. Let them sculpt and tailor their job. Design the organization around a talent model allowing people to grow.
- Finally, the Developmental Organization Agile is all about feedback. Essentially BIG IDEAS for me with Agile: real teams, breaking big things into small chunks (iterative and incremental), and feedback loops. Experimentation provides a feedback loop on your process and the organization as a whole. Helps you move along the path toward becoming a developmental organization. Giving and receiving feedback is also an important aspect here, but that is another talk.
- The middle column, experiments, is best accomplished through a network of teams. The goal is to maximize the number of experiments you can do, and then evolve your practices accordingly. Once learning occurs, and we want to optimize, we shift it to the practices column for hierarchy to take over and institutionalize. The first iPhone was an experiment, but to get it into the mass market, thousands of people in a hierarchy had to establish a process for development and distribution.
- Should we do one real quick before we open it up to questions?