Find the Right People to Begin Your Agile Journey

I spent time away from work to be with family on the Alabama coast, and I am glad to be back.  Taking time away from projects is a healthy way to recharge and discover new perspectives mentally.  Unfortunately, it creates a backlog of work that you need to sift through when you return to the office.  While I was sorting through my e-mail to achieve the elusive inbox zero, it occurred to me agile is becoming more mainstream.   

When I joined the reformation, 2009, it was composed of misfits and developers who saw the old way of doing things as needing significant change.  Today, I talk with executives who ‘want’ agile.  The secret of agile being a better way to manage complicated projects like software development is now public knowledge.  As this information spreads, business leadership struggles to find people who can make it happen within their organizations.  Today, I will discuss the struggle to find good and great agile professionals. 

Speaking from my own experience, I had the zeal of a newly converted person and still look back at my embrace of agile as my “road to Damascus” moment. Early converts to agile and scrum were enthusiastic. We gained experience working as scrum masters, product owners, and developers.  Now, we are looking for the next steps in our career training and leading others to be agile.  

For business leaders new to agile, people in my cohort of agile practitioners are a large pool of labor, but the front-line scrum masters and product owners are scarce. The challenge is how do you find people to fill those roles. Often they have to train people internally or hire outsiders at a premium.  The challenge is how do you find good people to fill those roles.  

The first thing you must do is take an unflinching look at the organization’s culture.  Is conformity valued over results or delivery?  If it is, it will be hard finding internal scrum masters or software developers.  Agile professionals are iconoclastic and have an entrepreneurial streak.  Suppose the organization is crushing these traits out of the workforce. In that case, they will not spontaneously come to life because you rename a project manager or business analyst a scrum master after a two-day training course.  

Like people who resolve to lose weight or quit drinking, an organization needs to take small and concrete steps to transform.  The agile wannabe leaders must find scrum masters from outside the firm willing to buck the organizational status quo to get things done.  It also means abandoning micromanagement, rewarding people willing to question established ways of doing things, and creating psychological safety so people can try new things and make mistakes.  These are not easy things to do and could take years to complete successfully.  

Where leaders have an advantage is recruiting product owners.  There are plenty of people inside your organization with business knowledge and tenure.  They are the people who know all the secrets in the organization, and they make perfect material for craft product owners. Before you send them off to training, make sure they are empowered to set priorities and say 'no' to others in the organization.  Finally, make sure the new product owners are doing the job full-time. Product Ownership requires undivided attention to write stories, communicate with customers, and measure value delivered to the organization.  If you expect them to handle accounts receivable while acting as a product owner for the new accounting system, you deserve failure.  Pair these people up with an experienced scrum master or coach, and you have a recipe for success.  

Finally, look for people who are stoic and realistic.  The contemporary business world produces toxic people; either they are so optimistic it is alienating or so hostile they act like cancer on their work. Find people who are willing to look at a negative situation and say, “Wow, this is broken, might as well get started and fix it.”  If you find people like this and place them in positions of responsibility, your ability to become agile has a reasonable chance of success.  In the words of agile coach Michael de la Maza, “There are no solutions, just countermeasures.” Find people willing to implement those countermeasures.  

Finding good talent will be a significant challenge as we attempt to rebuild the global economy in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Agile is not something you can buy off the shelf and magically implement at your organization.  It will require organizational change, people willing to take risks, and finally, a commitment to being uncomfortable and hold oneself accountable.   

Agile is not easy, and your first step on your journey is acknowledging that you need the right people to help you make the trip successfully. 

Until next time. 

I would have fired him too!

Freedom of expression is not a license to be an asshole.

Plenty of pixels have been expended on the diversity memo from a Google engineer who argues that efforts to improve diversity were a waste of time.  I have been following the arguments and spoken with friends about the dust up.  It dawned on me that this is not a question about diversity versus political correctness.  The entire affair is really about teamwork and being a jerk to you colleagues.  The author of the memo is not free thinking but using pseudoscience to justify biased views.  As an agilest and leader, there is no room for these individuals in your organization.

Over the years, I have been critical of the “brogrammer” culture.  I have also been critical of engineers who think gender is a disqualifying factor to work in technology.  Last week, I further bemoaned the lack of women in the development profession.  I placed much of the blame on a feedback loop of men pursuing computer science careers and providing a leg up to other men in the industry.  It is also apparent to me that working in technology gives certain individuals the license to be an asshole to others.

One of my favorite business books is “The No Asshole Rule,” by Robert I. Sutton, Ph.D.  Sutton does a fantastic job providing a scholarly definition of what an asshole is and reasons why you do not want them in your business.  I think it should be required reading for any business person along with the “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team,” by Partick Lencioni.  

According to Sutton, an Asshole has two traits:

• Test One: After talking to the alleged asshole, does the “target” feel oppressed, humiliated, de-energized, or belittled by the person?  In particular, does the target feel worse about him- or herself?
• Test Two: Does the alleged asshole aim his or her venom at people who are less powerful rather those individuals who are more powerful.

Based on the above criteria, it is evident to me that the author of the Google memo is an asshole.  The author considers himself and those like him intellectually and morally superior.  Since they are superior, they should not have to debase themselves by having to educate, mentor, or collaborate with those people.  This"other" could be women, ethnic minorities, and people living different lives.

A modern office is not an environment for this kind of thinking.  Women make up a large percentage of the work force and are filling senior leadership positions.  There are also countless people of color working as professionals.  Finally, individuals who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender are collaborating with those who are not.  Anyone who considers themselves superior to others not like them is going to create tension and undermine collaboration in the office.  Eventually, behavior like this is going to trickle down to the bottom line.  From an agile perspective, individuals who feel this sense of superiority are going to be resistant to continuous improvement.  It is not a surprise the author of the diversity memo wrote this after attending a workshop on the bias.

As a manager and agilest I would have fired the author of the Google memo.  He was a distraction to the firm and advocating for a direction that the company had openly rejected.  Finally, his attitude to co-workers different than him would undermine any project he was assigned.  Better to remove a polyp than deal with cancer which could kill your organization.

Until next time.

I am taking next week off to attend the Gen-Con game fair. 

Life, Death and your Business

Do not wait for accidents or federal regulators
to find out if you meet safety regulations. 

People should not have to die in order to enjoy the comforts of a contemporary society.  We take for granted that each day we get on the road to commute to work we are also sharing the road with numerous trucks which are transporting the goods and services we need to keep that society moving.  The maintenance of those trucks and the conduct of those drivers could mean the difference between life and death on the open road.  This week I want to share some news you may have missed this week and how that relates to our company.  It could be a matter of life and death.

On April 2, the Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration or FMCSA shut down an Illinois trucking company calling them an “imminent hazard to public safety.”  The company in question was involved in a fatal accident on January 27th and less than ninety days later were shut down by the federal government.  The department of transportation took such swift action thanks to the attention of a United States Senator, Dick Durbin, and the death of an Illinois State Police trooper.

Investigators found all sorts of malfeasance; including doctored log books, poor safety records and drivers with numerous traffic violations.  Confronted with such a clear case of safety violations the federal government had no choice but to shut the operator down.  What does this mean to you the consumer?  It means that taking the word of your staff that they are following safety procedures and operating correctly is a recipe to garner the attention of federal regulators.  You can take your chances or scrupulously document your business in case of a federal investigation.

This is where we at E₃ systems can help.  We created a solution known as Tony to make it possible for you to document your maintenance for all your vehicles.  Not only do we document the work but we also make it possible to send reminders via e-mail so that when a vehicle is up for maintenance you can take action right away.  This means that when FMCSA starts investigating your business you have the documentation to prove that you have been correctly maintaining your fleet.  That is a form of peace of mind no amount of money can purchase.  Contact us today and we will show you how we can help.

The federal government acted swiftly when confronted with a trucking company which did not make safety its primary concern.  Confronted with an organization which did not maintain its vehicles and did not obey regulations regarding driver rest periods, the Department of Transportation had no choice but to shut that organization down.  You could be next if you do not keep correct logs of your safety and maintenance information.  It could be a matter of life and death.

Until next time.

Software and Your Local School Bus Company

Would you like to know how well maintained
your child's school bus is?

We see them every do and we really do not give much thought to them.  On our way to work we pass them by and do not give them much thought.  Rarely do I even think about them when I see them pick up young people on their way to school.  I am talking about school buses and each day communities blindly trust companies we know little about to safely transport our children to and from school.  It is a pretty serious business filled with insurance risks and major expenses. This week I want to discuss how our software Tony can help school bus companies stay on top of maintenance and insurance expenses.

When I began writing Tony a year ago, I was thinking about truck fleets but after speaking with a few bankers and other people I decided that I should expand the focus of my software to include farm equipment and other types of motor fleets.  I even met someone who worked for a porta-potty company who though my software could help him.  It took a few detours and corrections but now you can track the maintenance of how your items are maintained by either hours of operation, mileage or simple date.  This makes it perfect for just about any business which has hard assets which need maintenance.

This brings me to school districts and school bus companies.  I am sure as a parent you would like to know how often the breaks are fixed on each bus.  Oil needs to be changed and tire pressure maintained.  Our Tony system makes tracking that information as easy as a click of a mouse or the swipe on a smart phone.  I am very excited about it and if you are managing a bus barn then you should be too because now with the scan of a QR code on a bus you can see up to the moment when work was done on the vehicle.  This will give additional piece of mind to the school board and parents who are curious about the buses their children ride on.

More importantly, we can see how our systems can help with insurance adjusters and companies.  For example, if you are involved in an accident you now have proof that you did actual maintenance on the vehicle and that mechanical failure can be ruled out as the cause of the accident.  In addition, these detailed records can be used as a means to negotiate with an insurance company to make sure that you get the most economically efficient rates you can from your insurance firm.  So using Tony is a great means to track maintenance and reduce insurance costs and liability risks.

At E₃ we are constructing these systems because we want to have easy and affordable means of helping small businesses stay on top of their fleets.  Contact us today to learn more about how we can help.  An account executive will give you a call and together you can discuss how we can improve your maintenance records.

We do not pay much attention to school buses unless something bad happens.  With the help of E₃ systems Tony we can help you save time, money and help postpone the bad things from happening.

Until next time.