A day in the life of an agile coach

I was fortunate to spend some time over lunch the other day with a couple of great Agile coaches. Over these meals, we can discuss a wide range of topics, from Agile to zoology - I love that you never know what interests people bring to the table that day. It satisfies something in my soul and makes me happy to have such people in my life.

One such topic was that the senior stakeholders in one of the coach's areas had finally twigged to the value of the collected data. Suddenly they could understand where they were, see opportunities to improve and tune their system and make informed choices about where to focus limited resources. It was a big day, to say the least.

It wasn't a single eureka moment; it was - as is often the case - months of painstaking work collating and curating data, creating ways to present the data, and sharing and re-sharing both the data and insights as they became apparent.

All so that the stakeholders could have an epiphany.

What praise did the coach who had meticulously and (not so) quietly set the stage for this revelation get? None.

And they were still happy.

Why?

Because our role is one of service, we do our work, not for recognition - and if you do, you'll be sorely disappointed - but because in doing so, we make it easier for others to achieve their goals.

All that time and effort had been well spent; the team had not only learned something new, but they owed that learning. The epiphany was hard-won and will be valued more by the workshop participants. A week from now, those stakeholders may not remember who set the stage, but they will remember the lesson.

Like housework, nobody notices what we do until we stop doing it.

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