Agile Coaching, are we talking about the same thing?
Like many of my colleagues, I´m looking for new assignments in form of hiring or contracting.
Last thirteen years, I experienced agile in many contexts from start´ up to global finance. I have the arrogance to believe that I have an average good understanding of what agile coaching is and what an agile coach has to do.
My arrogance leads me to train people to become agile coaches or better agile coaches.
Unfortunately, the market sounds not be aligned with me or I´m not aligned with the market.
Another side effect, many senior agile coaches with huge experience and proven tracks records are sharing this feeling with me. A couple of them accepted the situation for money, others left the agile community. I choose to resist.
Thirteen years ago, I left the “lean thinking” community while Lean was polluted by Six Sigma. The consequence of that “pollution”, my customers closed the doors to Lean considering it as a “cost-cutting” and “people firing” solution. Agile came to me at the right time.
This year, 2020, SAFe has cannibalised agile moving a people-centric approach to a management centric approach. SAFe is, for me, the new Six Sigma. With the argument of continuous improvement, SAFe gave the label “agile” to a monolithic structure by reinforcing its rigidity.
Requirements are different than needs.
A requirement based structure is mostly linear. The goal is to build a factory with production lines. That factory has top making decisions and giving orders to low wages, low skilled line workers. This model is grounded in scientific management and function control.
In this context, most of the conversation doesn´t include the customer, the development, the testing, the business. It is upfront planning and rigid planning. There you find more roles, more experts. The system dynamic is stocked in “complicated”.
Some would say that it works. I can agree. Waterfall and command-and-control work to, but only for one moment in time.
Agile, the other way around is a need-centric organizational process. It means that you have to understand the difference between “faster horses” and “cars”.
Agile is something completely different.
Agile is non-linear grounded on collective problem-solving and customer-centric activities.
An effective Agile Framework has to put people first. In the 21-st century, the knowledge is in the ground with the developers and the customer. It is no longer at the top like in the early ages of scientific management.
Agile has demonstrated that a team of highly qualified, well-paid professionals are better and faster for every company. Faster means also faster return-of-investment. Guy Kawasaki quotes Steve Jobs with “A-players hire A+ players. B-players hire C-players”. Agile is about “A-players” or people willing to become “A-players”.
The Agile Way is considering a team as a profit centre. The Factory Way is considering teams are cost centre. Here comes the difference.
So what´s agile coaching?
Agile coaching is an evolution of Systemic Coaching where coaches are part of the continuously evolving system. Systemic Coaching uses patterns and intends to reduce the variability in the systems through the lens of these patterns.
Agile coaching is nurturing, protecting, dynamising systems to allow the emergence of new patterns.
The Agile Coach is methodological neutral. It has a couple of methods and tools used in different contexts to support the systems.
Its mission is to detect “the right, critical, or opportune moment”. Aristotle called it “kairos”. To detect that moment, you have to understand the context, the communication flow (interaction of people in the system) and to sense if the system hasn´t evolved (alignment).
As an agile coach, you will ensure what some of my colleagues call a mindset but I will refine it by Agile Modus Operandi or Way-of-Work (WoW in DA). Again, Aristotle comes for help by calling it Praxis. Praxis means negotiation, human negotiation… make it happen, influencing, delivering each time customs. The right word at the right time, acknowledgement > Kairology. Politics, Ethics.
This sounds trivial? Nope, in my book The new normal AO concepts and patterns of 21-st century agile organizations I quote Pr.Dr.Peter Kruse on complex systems: “complex systems are self-managed and anthropomorphic. They evolve from one negotiation point to another one”.
The evolution of agile coaching
At this moment in time and even when I started seven years later, agile was meant for small teams, technical competences mostly in the IT, and architectural skills. Then it evolved very rapidly in project management, product development and so on.
In the New Normal, today´s post-COVID-19 world, you have to differentiate most activities:
- Theory or Thesis: hypothesis, falsification, verification or trial and error, mathematic, > Chronology. It is the domain of trainers, facilitators or consultants. In Thesis, you are not performing or executing. This takes no more than 10% of your time.
- Poesis: build, adaptation, configuration. This is the pragmatic part where you create value, test your hypothesis. In this area, new coaches are needed such Technical Coaches, TDD Coaches, Project Coaches. This takes at least 60% of an agile coach´s time.
- Kairos, the right opportune time needs a deep connection with teams. It is at least 30% of your job and more if you have plenty of teams. Great coaches are using Kairos in Poesis. Here, you need to be “clean” of any biases (coaching level 2). You are part of the system, you understand the needs and propose ideas to unlock the situation.
Learn more:
- agilePRAXIS here
- agilePRAXIS videos here
- New Agile Coaching Program here
- My book The new normal AO concepts and patterns of 21-st century agile organizations
