Agile 2015 Talk with Mike Lowery “They are resisting the changes I am trying to implement!” It’s a common refrain when people don’t embrace a change with the speed or enthusiasm desired. Do you keep pushing, give up or call in the big guns? How you respond to resistance can doom the change to failure, or boost the chance of success. As coaches, we introduce new ideas in many different contexts. Relying on positional authority (our role as coach), or calling on outside authority (the managers who hired us) isn't likely to get those ideas a fair hearing. In this talk, Mike and Esther will help you see resistance from a new perspective. By understanding how much influence you have, what forces are interacting around you and seeing different ways to re-frame your issues you can still get your message across without “inflicting help” on others.

1. Coaching Flow:
Moving Past Resistance
Mike Lowery || @plasticlizzard
&
Esther Derby || @estherderby

2. Who are we?
Why this talk?

4. People don’t embrace change because….
● They don’t think it’s broken
● The have knowledge of this practice which earns respect
● They don’t know how to do the new process
● They like working the current way
● They feel that it defines them within the company / society
● . . .

5. "It is difficult to get a man to understand
something when his salary depends
upon his not understanding it."
Upton Sinclair

6. People hold onto the status quo because….
● Status
● Control
● Perceived value
● Respect
● Self worth
● Employability
● Enjoyment

10. “The map is
not the
territory.”
Alfred Korzybski

11. But, a map can really help.

13. Time to talk about
Power

25. Reframing
Relationships

26. MEAT people where they are.
Memory
Empathy
Attention
Trustworthiness

31. “Why did you listen to her?” I asked. “She had
only a fraction of your experience.”
In the beginning, she didn’t, the nurse admitted.
“The first day she came, I felt the workload on my
head was increasing.” From the second time,
however, the nurse began feeling better about the
visits. She even began looking forward to them.
“Why?” I asked.
All the nurse could think to say was “She was
nice.”
“She was nice?”
“She smiled a lot.”
“That was it?”
“It wasn’t like talking to someone who was trying
to find mistakes,” she said. “It was like talking to a
friend.”
Atul Gawande
“Slow Ideas”

33. Change the demand not the supply.
Who should you really be coaching?

34. Wrap up and
questions…

35. Mike Lowery
@plasticlizzard
mike.lowery@mxi.com
Esther Derby
@estherderby
esther@estherderby.com
+1 612 239 1214