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You are not a born leader. You haven't been prepared to be one but you were chosen to be. And then everything changed. Now you should be a good communicator, negotiator, mediator, facilitator, motivator. You have heard that you should be a servant leader, should prefer collaboration over contract negotiation, people over processes but … you think: „What the heck should I exactly do?“ Most of the leadership hints are general, fuzzy and unstructured. If it sounds familiar to you, this is a talk for you. We will talk about fundamental soft skills in a structured way. You will see a lot of schemas, diagrams, algorithms, dependencies you weren't aware of before. This way misty soft world will become familiar and easier to understand for left-brainers (people loving to think in an analytical way). What we will talk about? How to resolve tough (conflict) situations. How to find a problem solution. How to conduct effective meetings in a way nobody told you about earlier. Who will benefit from this? Technical leaders, team leaders, any other kind of leaders working dealing with software development. Leaders and all technical folks interested in developing their soft skills. Technical guys (developers, testers, ux designers) at least having clue that soft skills might be really important in their work.
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Mariusz Sieraczkiewicz @ms_bnsit_pl
http://msieraczkiewicz.blogspot.com http://bnsit.pl
Structured Soft Skills (not only) for Technical Leaders
Typical career path in IT
Junior developer Developer Senior developer Tech/team leader
Stereotypes about tech guys
Non communicative
Binary way of thinking
or at least strictly logical
Structures, models, algorithms
Afraid of people – non-assertive or aggressive
Challenging mismatch
A tech guy organizing work of a team
Not ready for the role
Non-technical guides about soft skills
Soft skills
Personallity traits
optimism, common sense, responsibility, sense of humour, integrity
And abilities
empathy, teamwork, leadership, communication, negitiation, sociability, ability to teach
… a lot of emotional stuff
Experiment
Structure of emotions
Structures, models and algorithms
Easier to understand (especially for tech guys)
It is always a simplification
It is like a pattern you have to adopt
You need a lot of practice and flexibility
Using soft skills structures
is like using stair railing.
It might dangerous to go
without it.
Conflict resolving Hello World
Somewhere in one company…
PMs and Devs
Many small conflicts
less documentation vs. more documentation
more time for refactoring vs. more time for features
PMs having more understanding of technical aspects vs. we don’t have time for that
If you try to convince each other
You will mostly argue
Usually only one side wins (if any)
At best you may compromise
You can’t resolve
conflicts on a level
they arose
Conflict resolving Hello World
I want a blue color
I don’t want to live in
hospital (NOT WHITE)
Grrrr… I want white!
I want a very bright
color
Pink
Why is it important? Why is it important?
Him Her
No, I don’t like pink as
much as white
Maybe another bright
color
Bright violet
Statement
(I want a blue color)
Need
(NOT WHITE)
Statement
(I want a white color)
Need
BRIGHT COLOR
Possible Solution
(PINK)
Why is it important? Why is it important?
Her Him
Need
(NOT WHITE, NOT PINK) Need
BRIGHT COLOR
Possible Solution
(BRIGHT VIOLET)
Conflict resolving basic structure
Statement
Need
Statement
Need
Possible Solution
Why is it important? Why is it important?
Main questions you may ask to level
up the discussion Why is it important?
What do you need in this situation?
What would you like to achieve this way?
If we do it this way what will change?
Conflict resolution algoritgm
1. Assure all participants want to find solution satisfying both sides
2. Get an agreement for this using this structure
3. Begin from the statements
4. For each statement look for a need asking why-like questions
5. Having both needs look for an alternative – new solution
6. If a new solution is not satysfying for at least one side ask why
1. Redefine the need and go back to 5
2. Formulate new statement and back to 3.
Another samples
You don’t have a
technical knowledge
Easier to talk about
requirements and their
consequences
Be able to talk about
choosing better
technical solutions
We are not paid for this
Time for supporting
project success
Project success
Devs do minimal
technical knowledge
training for PMs
Why is it important?
Why is it important?
Why is it important?
Why is it important?
Dev PM
Requirements are fuzzy
We don’t want to change
code all the time and still
conform the estimation
Safety and respect for
my work
You should figure out
the details
We want development
to move on before
knowing everything
When moving on we have
a better chance to meet a
deadline
Let’s work in
increments
Why is it important?
What do you need?
Why is it important?
What’s your need?
Dev PM
Safety
- I can reestimate after changes
Respect for my work
- Requirements changes don’t blow my code out.
I don’t want to be
invited unnecesarily to
meetings
I want to spend time
effectively
Your knowledge might
be cruciual
We can make better
decisions
• Partially participating in
meeting
• Be ready for consulting
• Let’s analyze last cases
Why is it important? Why is it important?
Dev PM
Problem solving
How do we usually try to
motivate?
People don’t like to be told
how to do their job
They feel incopetent
They feel like pupils at school
It diminishes his/her position
… but there are situations when you should tell sb what to do …
Ask questions
This breaks a pattern of casual thinking
There are some questions specially powerful
You are likely to know one of this question if you are using
…5WHYS
But questions are not enough
A – specifying current situation
Qustions for exploring A
What do you concretely mean?
Check if problem is specific
(How not to surrender to the customers’ pressure? - What kind of pressure do
you mean? Which customers? All of them?)
Check if problem is not too big (How to make team work efficiently? – What kind of team work aspect do you
want strenghten? Split it to smaller chunks.)
Is it really a problem?
(How many times it happened?)
A – specifying current situation
Questions for consequences and intent
What is possible in this situation?
What is not possible in this situation?
Why does it happen? What’s good in it?
B – specifying target situation
Questions for exploring B How would you like it to be?
How should it work?
What it would be like?
Check if it is specific and not too big
Questions for consequences and intent
What would be possible in this situation?
What would not be possible in this situation?
Delta – how to get there
How to simplify it?
How to simplify it?
Structuring meetings
How does it usually look
like?
Core anitpatterns
People not prepared
The hidden bottom
Drifting away
People not listening to each other
Lack of meaningful results
Lack of action plan
Lack of structure
Meeting agenda
1. Introduction
2. Issues:
• Too much documentation
• More time for refactoring
• PMs to have more understanding of technical aspects
3. Action plan
4. Summary
Let’s use conflict resolution structure
Statement
Need
Statement
Need
Possible Solution
Why is it important? Why is it important?
Or let’s use problem solving structure
Introduce the structure
Conflict resolution
Problem solving
Facing the change
Creating a plan
Retrospective
Set or remind the rules
„Only one person is talking” (especially when there are strong emotions, when you talk you don’t listen)
„One side talks and then another”
„A facilitator decides who talks next”
Frame potential problems
„It might be difficult to talk about problems and this is why we suppose a positive intention…”
„This form of meeting might seem strange for you but …”
Frame potential problems
„You might want to talk about issues that are not in the agenda but …”
„We might come across an impass while looking for a solution but this is usually the moment right before the success …”
Summary
Using soft skills structures is like using stair railing. It might dangerous to go without it.
You can’t resolve conflicts on a level they arose.
Instead of giving advices or forcing someone to do something, start asking questions.
Meeting agenda is not enough. Use deeper structure to make it effective.
Mariusz Sieraczkiewicz @ms_bnsit_pl
http://msieraczkiewicz.blogspot.com http://bnsit.pl
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