This document discusses three insights for transforming strangers into teammates: listening, understanding different interaction styles, and responding to ego with gentleness. It emphasizes that listening is a fundamental human need but often neglected, causing conflicts. Different people have different preferred interaction styles, like being explained concepts or needing structure, and it is important to interact with others using their style. Ego is a habitual response that can be unhelpful and destructive, but gentleness based in positivity, authenticity and cooperation can suppress ego and build trust and teamwork. The challenge is habituating gentle responses over egoic ones through self-awareness, accepting imperfections, and setting an example for others.

1. From Strangers To Team Mates
Insights
Glenn Marshall
Scrum Master & Agile Coach
Patrick Li
Enterprise Agile Coach
Agile Launchpad Consulting Group

2. Three Insights
• The Neglected Art of Listening
• Why Different People Need Different Interaction Styles
• Gentleness as a response to Ego

3. #1 Listening
• fundamental human need; lack of listening is root of many conflicts
• #1 Talking over each other
• #2 Taking turns not listening
• #3 Listen to understand without judgement or agenda; HARD

4. Tip:
• #1 Confirm what you thought the person said
• #2 confirming does not mean agreement
• #3 pull in deeply what the person said - avoid hear, repeat, forget trap
• Once became habituate, it forms the foundation of a safe
environment and Teamwork
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5. #2 Interaction Styles
• True Colours - Don Lowry; simplification of Myers Briggs - Green, Gold,
Blue, Orange.
• Like handedness
• Green - Understanding - explain, give examples
• Gold - Structure
• Blue - Feeling
• Orange - Action
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6. Tips:
• #1 others ARE different, and that’s the way it’s supposed to be
• #2 discern the style by observing, respect it - interact in their
preferred style (not yours)
• be effective while honouring your values and objectives
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7. #3 What to do about Ego
• we see examples of repeated, habitual egoic responses. And they are
simplistic, generally unhelpful, often destructive
• listening helps suppress ego, as does skillful use of the other’s
preferred interaction style - one is perceived as friendly with a
compatible style
• what do we do with the ego that remains?
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8. Gentleness
• mindset of abundance - higher level brain. Cooperative interactions.
Positivity, hope regardless of circumstances
• openness, authenticity - leading to connection, the foundation of
teamwork, the foundation of Agile
• win/win or no deal style cooperation
• comfortable with being uncomfortable; habituated reflection and
growth
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9. • vulnerability, acknowledging imperfection = authenticity
• integrity (truthfulness, including with ourselves), trust
• joy, compassion. (unspoken) caring for one’s fellow humans thru
action selflessly. People sense this intuitively; you can’t fake it
• creativity - especially critical for software
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10. Ego
• mindset of scarcity - primitive survival response - fight/flight - reptile
brain. Negativity
• fear -> control (common in non Agile organizations); frustration, anger
• win/lose competition; forcefulness
• play small, “comfort zone”, hoarding
• avoiding, denying/justifying, selective hearing/selective memory
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11. • attention seeking, wanting to be right, perfectionism
• self image maintenance, self deception - “should”, “can’t”
• resisting growth, conserving resources and energy
• most people live in Ego most of the time, to a degree
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12. Gentleness vs. Ego
• awareness that we have both a Gentle response and an Ego response
available at choice points
• Ego the default reactive response, mostly habitual; defensive
• subtlety: Ego can be covert - playing victim, procrastinating, allowing
clutter
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13. The challenge:
• #1 habituate responding with Gentleness (quiet strength) to Ego (loud
or quiet weakness); HARD
• #2 accept our imperfections - “Ego burps”, clean up, learn, move on
• teamwork and Agile is based on Gentleness; set an example
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14. • said another way: People are Roses, with Ego as Thorns. The Rose is
our Gentle side, where the Better Angels of our nature come to
dance.
• dialing up Gentleness is like becoming Agile - it takes years of
sustained effort, courage and patience
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15. Conclusion
• listening is difficult but essential for successful Agile practice
• switching our interaction styles to that of the other person results in
much more effective interactions
• adopting the Gentle approach allows the learning and growth
essential to the Agile Journey we are all on
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