All delivery systems create value for customers. In a Predictable & Agile Delivery system, 'value' flows:
Managers who know how to achieve this optimise delivery systems continually. Improvement is done efficiently, by collaborating with delivery teams and removing obstacles to performance.
The crucial challenge for knowledge work is quality. A new software feature may pass QA and HR may hire the best candidate for a role, but these are subjective. In reality, these processes are rarely documented and often badly flawed. Of course, people do their best under these conditions. Yet the result is inconsistent outputs and problems that have to be corrected later. The costs saved today are wiped out in re-work and apologising to customers, later.
Lean techniques are particularly good for increasing efficiency and Agile for improving adaptability. They need to balance though, because one is good for production at scale, the other for exploring new designs and solutions.
Both are tried and tested approaches that maximise operational effectiveness.
The journey to achieving predictable and agile delivery is shorter and faster than you think.
Prioritisation resolves tensions and diverse demands by clarifying what matters most, right now:
Prioritisation helps people make decisions, at all levels.
Managers were written-out of the Agile movement yet they are crucial for improving Business Agility, by:
Technology managers support developers, who are "uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it."
Improving organisation-wide agility depends on managers at every level. Their curiosity and willingness to explore is crucial. Improvement emerges in its way, not from projects or plans.
The guiding principle is 'inspect and adapt'. Change the smallest thing you do now that could be done better. I guarantee you will look back and notice the transformation.
Slothful Behaviour is Good If ever an animal captured the principle of "maximising work not done", it must surely be the sloth. A curiously slothful practitioner of business agility. Strangely endearing and charmingly enigmatic, sloths are surprisingly inspiring. There exists a Sloth-Club which was formed "to promote slothful behaviours" such as ecology, economy and vegetarianism […]
Marilise de Villiers, host and author of Your Bullyproof Life, interviewed fellow coach, Andrea Darabos, and myself about Agilty. Specifically, what it mean in the workplace as one of 10 skills organisations need to develop to thrive.
This is an invitation to meet your organisation's objectives and help develop the Tensions Management approach. I need to test and share it so organisations that are struggling can benefit, level-up, thrive and prosper. Collaborators will apply Tensions Management techniques to solve real issues in their organisations as part of a global action learning research […]
