Perhaps You’re the Problem – Let’s Fix That

I know a three-step way that’ll help you be an effective agile coach or scrum leader anywhere you go and improve your agile teams in the process. In fact, I’m surprised that I’ve never seen anyone offer this up previously, and it’s actually quite simple.

The devil is in the details, and navigating the nuance of all three steps is where the real work in improving agile teams is found.

Get to know the humans behind the work.

Too often, we dig right into the work without getting to know the people behind it. Meet individually with everyone you can. This is doubly true for any members of the teams you support.

Here’s one way I do this. And if that’s not a fit for you, maybe this one will be. Some might not feel comfortable opening up, and that’s okay. For those that engage though, ask about what they enjoy about their work, what they don’t, and if they’re open to it, what hobbies they have outside the office.

Lay the foundation for a solid professional relationship.

Make retros something valuable.

Make the retro the place where agile teams uncover new ways of working together. But here’s the important bit.

The people required to change should also be the people who decide how they change.

Good facilitation is a must for a successful retro. And constraints are helpful too. Here are some I like:

• It has to be something small that we can begin doing on day 1 or 2 of the next sprint.
• We’ll try it for a whole sprint, and if we hate it, we can choose to dump it at our next retro.
• The tweaks only apply to the people on our team since that’s as far as our sphere of control extends.

If you’re curious about more constraints that make for impactful experiments, check out this post.

At no point should you start offering up things they should experiment with. You’re there to facilitate so keep your opinions to yourself. At least for now. Ask them questions so they can give shape to their own ideas.

It won’t take long before they start asking you what you think they should try. Only then should you offer your ideas, but judiciously to avoid learned helplessness.

Create mutual accountability with leadership.

Set up a periodic (but semi-frequent) meeting with the team’s leaders. Just as the leaders expect the team to perform, the team requires leadership support, and the team also has expectations.

Enumerate those expectations. Tell their leaders why those expectations are important. At each meeting, jot down action items for the leaders to complete and review what previous items were completed. Show gratitude for the support, or if things aren’t being struck off the list, dig into why and talk about how mutual accountability will build trust and improve their agile teams.

I know this all sounds like common sense, but think about your own organizations. I bet one or more of these steps here don’t have much–or even any–traction. Which is it for you?

Until next time.

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