Agile Consistency vs Flexibility: Creating a Culture of Change
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The document discusses the challenges of achieving agile transformations, highlighting the risk of creating a culture of conformity rather than flexibility. It contrasts mechanistic and organic organizational models, emphasizing that true consistency should support adaptability rather than impose rigid structures. The summary advocates for a balanced approach that fosters a diverse ecosystem within organizations, promoting collaboration and experimentation among teams.
Agile Consistency vs Flexibility: Creating a Culture of Change
- 1. Agile Consistency vs Flexibility Creating a Culture of Change We need everyone to “speak the same language” if they’re going to work together.
- 3. What this is all about: • One goal of many “agile transformations” is to create consistency so teams can work together smoothly. • Transformations often fall short of their objectives and can have the unintended consequence of creating a culture of conformance rather than a a culture of change. • We will compare a mechanistic model and organic model of organization to explain why this can happen. • We will provide a 2+1 model for systematically creating consistency and a culture of change 3
- 4. AN AGILE TRANSFORMATION SAGA 4
- 5. The start of a typical consulting engagement: Islands of Agility 5
- 6. Problems with ”Islands of Agility”: • Barrier to teams working together – Inability to re-use and share knowledge • Challenging to manage – Lacks repeatable processes – Difficult to collect meaningful metrics • Difficult to improve – Improvement is ad hoc rather than systematic – Knowledge is associated with individuals rather than corporate knowledge base – Individuals become constraint to scale 6
- 7. Management seeks a solution to the “Islands of Agility” We need everyone to “speak the same language” if they’re going to work together 7
- 8. An Agile Centre of Excellence (CoE) maybe created to drive the change… This in addition to my day job? We’re doing an agile transformation and you will lead that change. One goal is creating a consistent structure so our teams are on the same page and can work together. 8
- 9. A methodology and maybe a coach are adopted... I think the Comprehensive Agile Methodology will help get all your teams on the same page. 9
- 10. The teams are trained in the methodology (and possibly new tools)... Let me tell you how the comprehensive agile methodology defines all your new roles, practices, and work products… 10
- 11. Now we finally have a consistent structure! Finally… 11
- 12. Yes and from what we were hearing we all thought we were on the same page. Unfortunately we weren’t. However can structure on its own create alignment? “People trump process” – Alistair Cockburn How could you miss those dependencies? Our methodology has all sorts of coordination meetings? Aren’t you holding them? 12
- 13. Yes but some of these practices aren’t working for my team Does structure facilitate flexibility and the ability to adapt? If we don’t have consistency we will have chaos 13 You are just saying that because you are find the changes inconvenient
- 14. What happens to the culture of change if an over enthusiastic desire for consistency suppresses change? That’s not how we do agile! Where did that character come from? But we just wanted to try something! 14
- 15. The result? But we’re agile?!! I thought things were suppose to get better with a consistent structure 15
- 16. “Corporate transformations have a miserable success rate…studies consistently report that about ¾ of change efforts flop” - HBR Nov-Dec 2017 Another great career lost to a “transformation” We did everything right, so how did it go so wrong? 16
- 17. Poll Here: Any of this familiar? 1. Yes: this is my life right now. 2. Sort of: we’re in the midst of a transformation and while we’re seeing issues, its moving in the right direction. 3. No: we’re in the midst of a transformation and things are really going well. 4. Don’t know: we’re still exploring our options 17
- 18. Thesis: Seeking “consistency” by standardizing practices and tools in knowledge based work processes (like software development) risks creating unhealthy processes – an unhealthy “eco-system” – because such processes cannot adapt. 18
- 19. TWO MODELS OF CONSISTENCY 19
- 20. We need consistency to work together. ? ? ? ? ? ? 20
- 21. But what do we mean by “consistency”? Is consistency, conformity? 21
- 22. How we define “consistency” depends on how we see our organization. • Organization as a machine • Organization as an organism 22
- 23. The organization as a machine – Frederick Taylor Emphasis on “efficient” operation: – Bureaucratic organization – Well defined job descriptions – Management by objectives – Responsibility for planning lies with management 23
- 24. Machine Model Consistency: The Software Factory 24
- 25. …but is the ”Software Factory” the solution? Mechanistic models work well where there is little need to adapt: •Straightforward tasks •Stable environment •No variation – produce the same thing every time •Precision is at a premium •Compliant workers But does this sound like the traits of knowledge work? 25
- 26. We just want to try something different to see if it will work better If we don’t have consistency we will have chaos Some of these practices aren’t working for my team Knowledge work requires flexibility. 26
- 27. The organization as an organism. Emphasis is on adapting an organization to the environment* • Organizations are “open systems” • Different “species” of organization need different types of environments. • The is no one “best way” of organizing • Management seeks to achieve alignment and good fits * - Images of Organization pg.42 27
- 28. The organization from a biological point of view: a diverse eco system of organisms exchanging resources 28
- 29. A biological model of consistency? Consistency is the capability of the organization to create a healthy environment that facilitates the interaction between all the different organisms (Islands of Agility) in the organizational eco-system 29
- 30. The machine model approach to consistency: Pave over the Eco-system! Create a “mono culture” 30
- 31. Consequences of a mono culture: Lack of Resilience. 31
- 32. The IT Mono Culture? How well will a mono culture organization tolerate disruption? 32
- 33. Invasive Species – take over “empty spots” in the eco-system” 33
- 34. Invasive Species: Rogue Excel sheets and web tools 34
- 35. The Organizational Mono Culture: An Unhealthy Organizational Eco-system: • Lacks resilience, cannot change in face of environmental change. • Invasive species fill the gaps where methodologies and tools fall short impeding communications. Makes systematic improvement challenging. 35
- 36. Embrace a diverse multi methodological world Teams and programs create their methodologies and select their tools depending on their context, and even personal preferences. 36
- 37. “Every project deserves its own methodology” - Alistair Cockburn, Doctoral dissertation 37
- 38. But this sounds like a recipe for chaos! 38
- 39. The “Liberating Form” - Neil Harrison Creating balance between structure and flexibility. 39
- 40. Methodology and tools as “guard rails” Minimize mandated practices to what is necessary to liberate the creativity of our people. ”...barely sufficient process” – Jim Highsmith 40
- 41. A SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO TRANSFORMING THE ECO-SYSTEM 41
- 42. A 2+1 part solution in the form of a software engineering fable as told by Philippe Kruchten…. NSERC Chair in Design Engineering Former Director of Process Engineering at Rational ….and the Newt! 42
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- 47. The Frog says “all projects are the same” Represents the common attributes of software development 47
- 48. The Octopus says “all projects are different” Represents the contextual attributes of a project. 48
- 49. And of course we cannot forget the people – How people work together is the single largest determinant of success, possibly swamping all other factors 49
- 50. Introducing the “Newt” who says “people create software” Who can cultivate the social process we need to keep everyone aligned? 50
- 51. Two Models of Change Machine Model: Paves over the diversity of the eco-system by installing standard practices and expects the context and social systems to adapt. Organic Model: Embraces the diversity of the eco-system. Practices, context, and social system change holistically. COE as Enforcers of Change COE as Facilitators of Change 51
- 52. Poll Here: What Model of Change Have You Experienced in Your Organization? 1. Mechanistic: We adopted a specific methodology and then we were all expected to adapt to it. 2. Organic: While we did adopt a specific methodology, we are working hard to integrate it holistically into our context and social systems. 3. Chaos and Magic: Pretty much everyone does what they want. Somehow magically it all comes together. 4. Don’t know: I haven’t been through a “transformation” yet or thought much about it. 52
- 53. THE AGILE TRANSFORMATION SAGA - REDUX 53
- 54. A Cautionary Tale • It is tremendously easy to delude ourselves that we are building an organic organization because we are adopting an ”agile” methodology, when in fact we are creating a mechanistic mono-culture. • It is the difference between doing agile and being agile. But we’re agile!! 54
- 55. Management seeks a solution to the “Islands of Agility” We need everyone to “speak the same language” if they’re going to work together 55
- 56. We still need an Agile COE AND… We’re doing an agile transformation and you will lead that change. One goal is creating an eco-system that enables our teams to work together. This in addition to my day job? 56
- 57. And probably still adopt a methodology (or two). I think the Comprehensive Agile Methodology will help as a guiding framework. 57
- 58. And the need for training does not go away, AND… Let me tell you about the comprehensive agile framework, but first lets make sure we understand the economics that drive this. 58
- 59. Facilitating the eco-system- but what about tooling? 59
- 60. Enable diversity by inter-connecting the tool 60
- 61. Tooling facilitates the exchange of resources between teams rather than enforcing how the team gets their job done. 61
- 62. Some of these practices aren’t working for my team How does this conversation change?... Is that because its hard to change, or what is it about your context that we have to adapt to? 62
- 63. …and what about this conversation? That’s not how we do agile! But we just wanted to try something! 63
- 64. Facilitate the opportunity to learn… You guys seem to be doing something different! we just wanted to try to reduce our story writing effort Lets see what we can learn then. As long as you stay aligned with our principles, and run this as an experiment. 64
- 65. Yes and from what we were hearing we all thought we were on the same page. Unfortunately we weren’t. While some structure is necessary, its not sufficient… How could you miss those dependencies? Our methodology has all sorts of coordination meetings? Aren’t you holding them? 65
- 66. People really do trump process. Learn to unleash people’s talents. What if Lydia facilitated the meetings? Great idea, she knows how to make sure everyone really is on the same page and no one would dare miss the meetings.! 66
- 67. Wow, we really are finally on the same page A better result? 67
- 68. A Tale of Two Approaches Mechanistic (Frog only) • Methodology used as a tool for conformance • CoE mandate is to roll out the methodology • People are animators of the system • Experimenting is often seen as non conformance • Mandated tool suite is imposed Organic (Frog, Octopus, Newt) • Methodology used as a tool for encouraging change • CoE mandate is to create a healthy eco-system • People are an intrinsic part of the system • Experimentation (and hence learning from failure) is encouraged • Diverse tooling is integrated 68
- 69. The downside of the organic model Everyone participate in process improvement. This is NOT solely the responsibility of the CoE 69
- 70. Why is this important? “….Personnel attributes and human relations activities provide by far the largest source of opportunity for improving software productivity” - Barry Boehm, 1981, Software Engineering Economics 70
- 71. FINAL WORDS 71
- 72. “Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth” – John F. Kennedy 72
- 73. Organizations that fossilize mechanistic processes – even agile processes - are destined to become fossils themselves 73
- 74. Summary: Our Biological Definition of Consistency Consistency is the capability of the organization to create a healthy environment that facilitates the interaction between all the different organisms (Islands of Agility) in the organizational eco-system 74
- 75. Summary • Consistency is not conformity. • Enforcement of standard practices and standard tools may create a mono culture by paving over a vibrant eco-system • The Frog, Octopus, and Newt represent three perspectives of knowledge work, practice, context, and people. • An effective consistency programs focuses on all the creatures in the eco-system– the Frog, Octopus, and the Newt and changes them holistically • Inter-connect tools rather than using a single tool to create conformity 75
- 76. Bibliography • Morgan, G. (2006), Images of Organization, Sage Publications • Taylor, F.W, 1911, The Principles of Scientific Management, Courier • Burns, T., Stalker G. M., (1961), The Management of Innovation, Tavistok • Kruchten, P. (2012), The Frog and the Octopus: A Conceptual Model of Software Development • Adolph, S., Kruchten, P. Hall, W. (2012) Reconciling Perspectives: How People Manage the Process of Software Development – Journal of Systems and Software 76
- 77. Thank You! Feel free to reach out… We’d love to hear from you. • Steve@developmentknowledge.com • info@tasktop.com • marketing@cprime.com 77
Editor's Notes
- #2: Agile consistency versus flexibility Seems a bit like an oxymoron….one of the reasons we adopt agile is to become flexible, create a culture of change, yet how is we could ourselves into a situation where we are tradeing flexibility.
- #6: I have been involved in numerous “agile transformations” A primary business drive is to get everyone on the same page, consistency. For people to work together we need consistency, we need consistency on how we get our requirements, what we making…..yada yada.... This is a serious problem if the team must collaborate to deliver a product or service. Simple examples, does the term Epic mean the same thing to everyone, Who is responsible for coordinating the teams, what are the mechanisms? What are the practices
- #8: I have been involved in numerous “agile transformations” A primary business drive is to get everyone on the same page, consistency. For people to work together we need consistency, we need consistency on how we get our requirements, what we making…..yada yada.... This is a serious problem if the team must collaborate to deliver a product or service. Simple examples, does the term Epic mean the same thing to everyone, Who is responsible for coordinating the teams, what are the mechanisms? What are the practices
- #9: Agile COE is usually a team dedicated to driving change in the organization, Camilla telling Miyagi and Paul, make this happen, we got to get everyone on the same page.
- #10: Me selling the comprehensive agile methdoloy
- #14: But then the cracks appear – need tSahil is a firmware engineer, and maybe
- #15: Kinda like the joke, I’m from the government, I’m here to help….I’m from the COE, I’m here to help
- #16: I have been a lot of clients where I have heard “this is the 4th time we’ve been to this rodeo….
- #17: Lets first state this up front, this is hard stuff change is really hard…. Maybe we didn’t do everything right. While this articiale is focused on corporate wide transformation initiative and not IT specifically, it supports what I have anecdotally observed, that many transformation efforts fall short of their goals. I have marquee clients that have remarked ”…this is their fourth time to this rodeo....”
- #18: As an agile coach, my perspective may be biased, after all if an organization is happy they are likely not going to call in a coach.
- #19: Could it be that our efforts to create consistency impede our ability to create a culture of change?
- #21: If the biblical story of the tower of Babel taught us anything is that we need consistency to work together. Negotiate commitments, coordination, managing dependencies, reporting….
- #22: That goal depends very much on how we imagine or model our organization
- #23: Depends on how you view your organization If you’ve done an MBA or studied business you may have run across this book…if you haven’t its worth a read... Book presents different models for reasoning about organizaitons, eg. The organizaiton as a machine, as a biological organism, as a brain....
- #24: Many agilist make a significant effort to vilify Taylor and yet despite protest to the contrary, the organization as a machine appears to be the dominant model for organizing people and designing their processes….even in knowledge based organizations. Everyone likes to beat up on Taylor but in the 1800s he was a pretty progressive person, his theories at that time were intended to increase the economic benefit of the worker. How to achieve more for the same work We are all likely familiar with Fredrick Winslow Taylor and as a good agile community we have dumped all that is wrong with organizations on his shoulders. Machine…strive for efficiency.....terms of lowest cost for the greatest value Works well where a machine would work well….no need for adaptation Straightforward tasks Stable environment No variation – produce the same thing everytime Precision is at a premium Compliant workers Think McDonalds….very efficient…now think how well they are doing as they need to adapt
- #25: Through the machine model lens a consistent structure to create alignment is a good course of action
- #26: In the software factory, people are mere animators of a defined process… Mechanical models are associated with mass production, and a focus on costs But Mechanical models of organization do not innovate and adapt well , and we live in a world where only the adaptable survive
- #27: It’s a cliché, but its true, the only certainty is change.
- #28: Sometimes called contingency theory Open system – need careful management to balance internal needs (e.g. consistency) and adapt to the environmental circumstances – change Management seeks good fits, not perfection ( the perfect is the enemy of the good) a perfectionist never gets anything done Different projects need different environments. This implies that our roles move from enforcement of standards and practices
- #29: Managements role becomes creating the healthy eco-system that enables these “organisms” to easily exchange resources, adapt. ( may need a slide for this what is the role of management….)
- #30: Changes the focus from seeking conformity to facilitating Few agile organizations would admit they see consistency through the machine model lens, but unfortunately the way some transformations are pursued
- #31: So now using the biological model of organization we can explain why an agile transformation can fail to create alignment and impede creating a culture of change
- #32: Because there is no variation, there is no resiliency to change the organization becomes fragile, a single blight wipes out the entire crop. Catastrophic failure for organizations may be in the form of missed opportunities….the organization is incapable of responding quickly enough to new opportunities because they have created an IT mono-culture. , that other variants or species could have survived. If we look at this approach from a biological point of view we can understand why it really didn’t work, created fragile organizations that we unable to adapt to changes in their environment…..mono cultures lack reslience…. Decision making is slow when confronted by change Cavendish bannana and blight, all bananas are a clone…. Lets carry the metaphor a bit further, what happens when we create a mono culture? Its fragile, cannot resist disease and cannot adapt Photo of a diseased grove abandon field in Florida – victim of greening disease Lacks resilience to disease Invasive species
- #33: This structure looks like it would have change anti-bodies, in fact would resist change This week, Sears completed liquidation in Canada, and Jeff Bezos was declared the richest man in history….it had the opportunity to be Amazon How quickly can this organization adapt to change? How quickly could this organization respond to faster moving rivals Could it survive disruption? Size and regulation are no longer determinants of survivability….even highly conservative industries such as finance, insurance and even utilities are realizing this. Simply, will Google eat your lunch? What will block chain do to your business....mono culture creates rigidity....resistst change...
- #34: How many invasive, “rogue” excel spreadsheets are floating around within your organization?? Worse, by suppressing diversity we create gaps in the eco-system that are filled by invasive species….. In this case the invasive species are the local ad hoc or situation methodologies people create because the organization methodology is not relevant to the needs of the group Steve’s Law, the more rigid SDLC enforcement the more invasive local ad hoc methodologies will appear
- #35: People being innovative in getting their jobs done There are some really painful tools out there, and people will find a way to get their job done despite the tooling
- #36: Hilight how lacks of resilience and invasive species defeat Could it be that our efforts to create consistency impede our ability to create a culture of change?
- #37: This is not anti methodology, or even anti consistency, it means choosing the appropriate model Just like embrace change… Alistair Cockburn – every project requires its own methodology Remember the invasive species?? Mission of the COE becomes providing the plumbing that makes this all work
- #39: Zombie apocolypse…
- #40: After all the original agile manifesto was not a rejection of software melthodolgy, rather it was an effort in jim highsmiths words to restore balance. As organizations seek to transform, we need to know how to discover balance.
- #41: Liberating form….Rather than suppression our people’s creativity innovation, what do we really need to channel and structure the skills and talents of our staff? What can we do to unleash them? Focusing on the whole means minimizing mandated and prescribed practices: Consistency as a “guard rail” that encourages the exchange of resources between organisms and not as an operational prescription for how to behave
- #43: A fable by Philippe Kruchten may help us better understand the reasoning we are pursuing
- #49: Scrum team for a website will be different from a scrum team for a defense contractor, from a medical devices team, to an IT team.
- #50: What we tend to forget…..They are highly diverse And swamp is suppose to be a valid pun here. They are not mere “animators” of the software process.
- #51: The newt represents the social process for keeping alignment and the roles people play within this process. Mis-alignment is when people have different mental models or perspectives of an event or artifact. A key element of this process is recognizing the mis-match and reaching out to begin reconciling that mismatch. Methodologies usually mandate a variety of coordination meetings to flush these out, but as the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink. Methodologies can create the opportunity to talk, but it is the personality of people that make this process work. The Newt is particularly susceptible to being crushed in consistency programs because This is the dynamic that keeps everyone aligned and avoids chaos As engineers we seem to be by nature uncomfortable with managing social systems beyond machine models, but they are the key driver to success. We need to truly understand what drives a healthy social system for software development.
- #52: The machine model is simple and straight forward for an agile COE because our measure of success is conformance to the methodology. The biological model requires the COE to facilitate the design of an appropriate methodology for each organism. Consistency programs frequently just focus on the Frog, seeking compliance with standard methodologies and practices in the hope of creating alignment. We ignore the Octopus (context) and the Newt (social system).
- #53: As an agile coach, my perspective may be biased, after all if an organization is happy they are likely not going to call in a coach.
- #54: With this new knowledge, how may our transformation saga now unfold.
- #56: We still have the islands of agility problem ….
- #57: The mandate is more focused on creating an eco-system, rather than focus on a specific structure…
- #58: Me selling the comprehensive agile methdoloy Lets get the teams to work together on the same page.
- #59: Being “agile” versus “doing” agile. Learning agile economics and principles such that we can make better decisions.
- #60: We still have the islands of agility problem ….
- #61: Everyone wants their own tool of course, lot of developers are of the “from my cold dead hands” mindset Beyond enforcing a standard practice, why do we want a single tool? License cost? Reporting?
- #62: Of course there is a need for conformity, but what do we absolutely have to do? In other worlds who really has to work with whom and what do they need to exchange? Reality is many teams will simply refuse to use the tool, or use it improperly GIGO...
- #63: But then the cracks appear – need tSahil is a firmware engineer, and maybe
- #64: Kinda like the joke, I’m from the government, I’m here to help….I’m from the COE, I’m here to help
- #65: Our principles become our “guard rails”
- #66: But then the cracks appear – need tSahil is a firmware engineer, and maybe
- #70: Means everyone must believe that process improvement can substantially improve their lives. That process Everyone needs to learn to experiment. Many do not appreciate the economic i
- #71: Most of us do not appreciate the economic impact of
- #73: The failure of the machine model is that a machine does not improve itself- cross pollination between different methodologies…. If everyone used the same methodology, what happens to competitive advantage? We talk so much of embracing change and yet we seem to focus on compliance with agile practices….
- #75: This means the COE is steering the process to seek constant improvement….not conformity to a specific methodology