Solving Problems: An Agile Organization Approach

Solving Problems: An Agile Approach

Toria

My influences … Growing and selling a successful software

company in my 20’s;

Spending several days with Christopher Alexander (Pattern Language “founding father”)

Working with Matt, Hong, Walt and Daryl figuring out “organizational agility”

Turning around a failing Colorado health care broadband network without knowing much about healthcare or networks.

Holacracy

… led me to this burning question:

If you take 5 people and an idea and another 5 people and a different idea what makes one group successful and the other not?

It’s not the people and not the idea.

What is it?

PlanningPoker

Daily Stand-ups

On Site Customer

KANBAN board for detailing

work

Business Driven DevelopmentRetrospectives

Backlog of User Stories

Time boxed Iterations

Value Stream Mapping

Cross-functional work teams

Burn Down Charts

It’s the Practices

Backlog of User StoriesDaily Stand-ups

Business Driven Development

Time boxed Iterations

Value Stream Mapping

Burn Down Charts

Retrospectives

Cross-functional work teams

PlanningPoker On Site

Customer

KANBAN board for detailing

work

So long as they are grounded in Agile principles

Value Driven

Work

Team Based

Decisions

Big and

Visible

Iterative &

Incremental

Value Driven

Distributed Decisions

Big and Visible

Dynamic Steering

Value Driven

Work

Team Based

Decisions

Big and

Visible

Iterative &

Incremental

It takes a team…..

…to see the whole picture

Hose for watering

Spear for hunting

Leaf for shade

Wall to keep us

safe

Rope for binding

“Most businesses die from indigestion rather than starvation.”

-- Tom Thomisonco-Founder

HolacracyOne

So what do we do?

We outvote or ignore the contradictory data.

We pay our leaders to be filters butunwittingly setup a single point of failure.

We make team decisions which often lead to “bloated” actions

where we solve more than is needed.

So what’s the alternative?

It’s all about processing tensions…

Tension: The felt-sense of a specific gap between current reality and a sensed potential.

Chronic Tension: the response to emotional pressure suffered for a prolonged period over which an individual perceives they have no control.

Who can make this decision?

What are we even talking about?

We’re going in the wrong direction!

Processing Tensions:

Establish/clarify

Roles &

Accountability

Establish Point of

Awareness

Establish/Clarify

Purpose

Scaling the Agile Delivery Lead Role at Pillar:

Purpose: Create the Best Agile Delivery

Leads in the Industry

Metrics:1. 2. 3. Projects:1. 2. 3.

Next Actions

Organizational Patterns human scale – evolutionary – value driven

Toria Thompson303-746-3161

toria@organizationalpatterns.com

Thank you!