How To Stop Faking It And Start Feeling It

A couple of months ago I wrote a piece called “You Can’t Fake #Agile”, - I was wrong.

To save you reading it, in the piece I was arguing that a lack of change at mindset level will eventually show. That covering up for not truly “getting it” isn’t possible long term and eventually everyone will need their own internal “come to Jesus” moment about change.

When I wrote it, PeopleNotTech and Catapult CX were in the throws of designing a revolutionary Bootcamp for leaders to comprehend and embrace the concept. In the weeks since we met quite a few of the organizations who claim they want in on #Agile to help bring them to where they need to go. 

These are people who don’t need to be sold to the speed and magic of Agile having arrived there themselves and they are in various stages of the journey. But are they doing it or efficiently faking it? 

Pre-Journey 

These are my favorite kind of organizations to meet, as they have the proverbial will and only need an effective way to make it happen. They are new to it, untainted by having to eternally carry the dead weight of the reluctant, and can be shown ways in which if they want Agile they need to arrive at it organically from a need for business wins.

Depending on a number of factors from size to the type of proposition and even age of the organization and its people, at times the first few steps are nothing to do with hanging up Kanban boards and everything to do with gathering knowledge and changing perspectives. The efforts of the smartest of these organizations see them transform into a giant reading club where everyone gets to come to Agile through their own journey and debate it, feel it up and eventually embrace it before anything else happens. They then focus on key human attributes such as increasing their empathy and their ability to “read others” that they will need for real collaboration and the ability to grow a clean culture of servant leadership. 

In-Journey 

The vast majority of everyone is on an Agile path or other when we meet them. Some have impatient change-makers, others have detached boards asking for everything to be translated into terms they are familiar with. Most are slightly disheartened and there’s renewed apprehension should they have already experienced some product or process-related set-back. 

They don’t want to end up having to fake it but they don’t know how to keep the morale of the Superheroes up and the journey moving along. 

We advise they make brutal honesty a priority, do spot-checks and evaluate with sincerity how it’s going not in terms of results but in terms of mentalities. 

We then help them translate those findings into focusing on pivotal changes to create the three sine qua non attributes that will help people let go of sequential thinking: flexibility, resilience and real teams. 

My favorite example of this comes from an emerging Agile Superhero, an Italian banker who has asked the exec team to move their meetings to a new room and - more importantly- leave all their scribblings and post-its on the walls when they are done free for all who use it after to see. Take a minute and consider the genius of such a seemingly simple change from the perspective of the vulnerable leader and of the included employee. 

Post-Journey 

The term is misleading already as there is never any “post”, not truly. In fact, the handful of organizations that claim they are “done” or “fully Agile” are a heartbreaking topic. 

On the one hand, all of us converts recognise the value of having success stories to point to so anyone who claims they got there, is a much-needed example but what happens when we “meet our heroes” and get to know them intimately enough to see it hasn’t actually happened and this achieved transformation is more of a PR fairy dust than a sustainable change?

When the most common examples that spring to mind that the big consultancies parade as exemplary turn out to have faked it all along. When their own internal Superheroes left or gave up in their heads halfway through and let them get on with the process without changed hearts and minds. When only a small proportion really get it and the rest of everyone is fervently translating anything Agile into non-flexible, sequential, waterfall-y ways in their heads. 

The ones where you’ll still overhear:

“This Agile thing”

“Have we looked at the other ones? What about Scrum?”

“What if we just have springboards instead?”

“Can someone translate the backlog into proper milestones?”

“Where do we keep the spreadsheets of the progress reports?”

“Of course we need to selective and decide where Agile fits, doesn’t work everywhere”

“I still think we should have invested more in Digital and Innovation not this”

“Is this still what they do in Silicon Valley?”

Agile CI/CD

Agile is not a one-and-done job. At least not before it becomes second nature and all “waterfalls run dry”. The easiest test is to ask people where they keep their lists. And not their work lists only. How they define to-do’s closely reflects how they think. And while the higher you go the more appallingly often you’ll hear they have none and rely on hazard, emails and being dragged to meetings, it’s not a problem confined to leadership. Everyone has to have it.

One of my favorite examples of how everyone in an organization truly needs to be on the same page from the bottom of their hearts and the expanse of their minds is the JFK vs. NASA janitor conversation when he asks him what he does at the space agency and the man answers “I help put a man on the moon”. 

I don’t think something as colossal as a mentality change away from sequential thinking can be done without the janitor so before you can be assured each and every one of the people in an organization irrespective of size are firmly on board Agile is eternally in flux and part of a mentality change pipe. 

So if you want to stop or avoid faking it here’s some cards for your transformation board:

• Get that reading club going and then make everyone into a real-life Counsellor Troy 
• Make brutal honesty a religion
• Get flexible and resilient real teams from top to bottom

Simples, right? No, it isn’t. But it’s worth it. I know you’d rather feel it than fake it. Good luck keeping it real out there.