Is there a silver bullet to become "agile"? The answer is No - The Manager
CULTIVATED MANAGEMENT
Cultivated Management Newsletter - Edition 16
Hi,
I do hope you're having a smashing weekend and are all set for the week ahead.
It's been crazy here : recording podcasts, my son's Birthday party (the loudest event I've ever been to), starting a vlog (more on that in the next few weeks), personal coaching, preparing a talk on Agile and HR for Aginext 2018 and consulting in a city three counties away from the one I live in!
All good though.
I noticed something at my son's birthday party which I thought relevant to the world of work, and especially to the world of management.
My middle son decided he wanted to do a climbing party at an indoor children's climbing centre. In this centre there are about 20 different walls and objects to clamber over, all whilst securely strapped to a guide rope and pulley mechanism to catch you should you slip and fall.
We took 8 kids including my middle and eldest son. And what was immediately obvious was that no two kids were alike. Some harnessed up and crawled the walls like they were born to do it. Some took a little longer to get going but were soon scaling the highest of high walls. Some only went half way before being overwhelmed. Others spent the hour only a few feet off the floor.
And it's the same with the world of work. People and teams are different. We're all at different places in our lives, abilities and skills. Some people get to their high performance capacity faster than others, some people never make it there, some people are simply climbing the wrong wall, and some people are in the wrong place entirely.
One of the greatest things you can do as a manager is to give people the security and safety they need in order to try and climb to where they want to get to. Enough comfort and security to scale the wall. Enough support to catch them if they fall, and enough of a safety blanket for them to fall but try again. And it will be different for each person. Some people will exceed your support and go on and achieve bigger things than you may have done. Some people may require a tough conversation about their performance. But mostly, your job is about giving people the direction, the right tools, the right support and the right encouragement to keep trying.
Above all though, you need to be patient. And you need to treat each person as an individual.
In many ways, my son's climbing party was a lot like the world of work. Only with a lot more noise, a lot more screaming and a lot more giddiness - well, I guess a lot depends on where you work.
Releasing Agility through habits and discipline - Workshop in Winchester
It's now all set to go! Me and Helen Lisowski (very talented Agile Coach and Engineering Manager) are running our new Habits and Discipline course in Winchester.
It's for managers, agile coaches and scrum masters, or anyone else tasked with "releasing agility" in a team or organisation.
This is a course for people who want to actually release agility and achieve their goals - not for those who want a framework or silver bullet path to "agile". You will receive zero certifications on this course :) but you will be armed with the skills, information and insights for:
Creating a compelling vision
Creating a path and plan
Developing the habits that lead to agility
Building strong habits and being disciplined
Setting high standards and holding people accountable for them
Discovering how to identify and remove blockers on your journey.
The course is based on mine and Helen's experience of building a "frighteningly" agile team (and then my experience of doing the same in HR) and growing it across the UK and Poland.
The event will be in Winchester, UK at The Winchester Hotel (seriously nice hotel) on Thursday 19th April. Tickets are £250 per person. If you want to buy more than 2 drop me an email - you can get a third ticket for free!
Here's the link!
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/releasing-agility-through-habits-and-discipline-tickets-43876956157
It would be great to see you there.
Thanks
Rob and Helen.