October, 2009 | New Technology Solutions

October 28, 2009

October 28, 2009 Meeting: Pollyanna Pixton and Sue McKinney on Agile Leadership (Meeting Venue: MICROSOFT WALTHAM, 6:30PM)

MEETING VENUE: MICROSOFT offices in WALTHAM. REGISTER NOW for this meeting

DIRECTIONS TO MICROSOFT WALTHAM.

Sept 23, 2009 630PM to 830PM

POLLYANNA PIXTON on: COLLABORATIVE LEADERSHIP, with…

SUE McKINNEY on: BACKING INTO AGILE LEADERSHIP

Seating is limited. You must RSVP !!

Pollyanna Pixton: “Collaborative Leadership: Just What Agile Needs”

When members of a development project are asked to become a self-directed agile team, some claim that leadership and leaders are obsolete. Or, is a different type of leadership exactly what agile teams need to truly flourish? Pollyanna Pixton describes collaborative leadership tools that gives ownership and does not micro-manage. It’s one that asks the right questions at the right time to generate new ideas and develop creative products that customers need and want.

Sue McKinney: “Backing into Agile Leadership”

Converting 25,000 developers to agile methods had its challenges. The agile teams struggled and needed support and understanding from the IBM Leadership at many levels. In the midst of this, as the global recession set in, Sue looked for tools for corporate leaders that would increase the productivity after cost cutting and unleash talent and keep fostering the innovation needed to deliver results.

In this talk, she talks about the approach and challenges to identifying what kind of leadership was needed and what tools would be effective in leading distributed teams as they adopt and deliver using agile.
Speaker Bios

Pollyanna Pixton
Co-Founder Accelinnova, President of Evolutionary Systems, Director of Institute for Collaborative Leadership, Co-Founder APLN

An international collaborative leadership expert, Pollyanna Pixton developed the models for collaboration and collaborative leadership through her thirty-five years of working in and consulting with corporations and organizations. She helps companies create workplaces where talent and innovation are unleashed—making them more productive, efficient, and profitable. Pollyanna is a founding partner of Accelinnova, president of Evolutionary Systems, director of the Institute for Collaborative Leadership, and co-author of the forthcoming book, Stand Back and Deliver: Accelerating Business Agility (Addison Wesley, 2009). She co-founded the Agile Project Leadership Network (APLN) and chaired APLN Leadership Summits in London, Minneapolis, Las Vegas, and Orlando. Contact her at ppixton@accelinnova.com.

Sue McKinney
VP Development Transformation and Integration, IBM

Currently responsible for development transformational activities with IBM’s software development group, her major emphasis is driving adoption of Agile and Lean principles into the mainstream of software development. Previously, Sue was a Vice President of Development for the Lotus Division where she led world wide development for Lotus Domino, IBM Sametime and WebSphere Portal. In addition to driving transformational activities within IBM, Sue works with large clients to share IBM’s experience and help them scope opportunities for their own transformational activities.

MEETING AGENDA:

6:30 PM: AGILE ORIENTATION: Scrum as described by Dan Mezick of New Technology Solutions

7:00 PM: Food and networking time. WITH LIVE MUSIC, from: Dan Hermes

7:15 PM: MAIN EVENT: POLLYANNA PIXTON and SUE McKINNEY

8:25 PM: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION OF MEETING

MEETING VENUE: MICROSOFT WALTHAM. REGISTER HERE for this meeting

NOTE: Please do not register casually. If you register, make a commitment to attend.

DO NOT register casually for this meeting, as you do us a big disservice to us by distorting the actual count for the seating and food. Registration is an explicit commitment to attend.

If you register and then, for some reason cannot attend, notify us by email. We need this info to execute on a good meeting. You help ALOT by a) registering with a real intent to attend and b) informing us if and when you cannot make it for some reason.

Please help us deliver a great meeting by complying with these simple ground rules.

DIRECTIONS TO MICROSOFT WALTHAM.

October 25, 2009

BART Checkup for Teams

This note provides a set of diagnostic questions with respect to observed BART (boundary, authority, role and task) properties on an agile team. I believe if enough agile/Scrum community leaders and members pay attention to BART analysis, the agile/Scrum work is advanced.

Specifically, BART analysis can help discover:

1. Important differences between stated and actual ground rules used by the team;

2. informal roles;

3. Informally authorized roles and tasks;

4. How people on the team are “taking up” formal and informal roles and associated tasks.

Canonical Scrum per the Schwaber-Beedle book and actual working Scrum implementations are great places to start with BART analysis.

Original date of note: 10/25/2009 by Dan Mezick

BART Checkup

BART properties populate typical “working agreements” that are created on agile teams over time. The following diagnostic questions help to quantify what is going on within a team.

Note that BART properties in Scrum are well defined as compared to typical organizational context; that is, typical company culture.

Teams deal in the BART properties of the organizational culture, the BART properties of Scrum and the emergent BART properties they add to form cohesive team culture in the absence of clear ground rules for a given role or task.

Teams for example may choose (via “working agreements”) to institute a working agreement about daily start time, perhaps allowing a flex-time scenario on the team. In terms of BART, this means team members are formally authorized by the team to choose their start time within agreed-upon boundaries.

ROLES

o Are all formally defined roles in Scrum taken up by specific individuals? Are all formal roles taken up appropriately? That is, well within role boundaries, but also taken up completely?

o Do any informal roles exist? If so what are they? Does the existence of any these informal roles impede the work of the team? If so how? Who is occupying any informal roles detected?

o Is any one person taking up more than one formally defined role in the Scrum implementation?

o If the team is an intermediate-to-advanced user of Scrum and for some reason has added additional roles, are these roles completely described?

TASKS
o Do all the team members exhibit great clarity and a shared mental model of the stated task of the team?

o Is there a person or persons available to the team who can distinguish all the different tasks?

o Does the team collectively believe that even repetitive tasks are unique as of the moment they are executed?

§ This means the team believes that every moment is unique, regardless of the seemingly familiar task at hand now.

AUTHORITY

o Is authority formally defined for each defined role?

§ If so, is formal authority:
· Clearly specified?
· Understood by all?
· Adhered to?

o Do team members:

§ Take up formal authority appropriately?

§ Do they work within the defined boundaries of the formal authority granted?

§ For defined tasks with unclear authority boundaries, how do team members define authority boundaries in the absence of formal definitions?

o What authority if any is observed associated with any informal roles that exist?

BOUNDARIES

o Are boundaries on roles, tasks and related authority:

§ Clearly specified?

§ Agreed upon?

§ Adhered to?

Fuzzy, ambiguous BART property definitions tend to encourage unconscious behavior at the group level.

Clear, well-defined BART property definitions tends to encourage the conscious attention of the team toward the stated task; i.e. producing “working software”.

Well-formed BART combined with Scrum’s ‘cadence’ via time-bounded Sprints (iterations) tends to entrain team-level production at the expense of team-level waste.

Advanced users of Scrum may choose to alter certain BART properties of Scrum. For example some may choose to add a ceremony, an artifact or a role to canonical Scrum.

That can be tricky. BART analysis can be useful for noticing how any tailoring of Scrum is affecting your effort at the Team level.

***

About the Author

Dan Mezick: An expert on teams and a trusted adviser to CxO-level executives worldwide, Dan consults on enterprise-wide culture change, implementing Scrum, and the often difficult adoption of authentic Lean principles.

He creates and teaches specific, useful tools and techniques for facilitating successful enterprise-wide adoption of agile and Scrum. Dan’s articles on teams and organizational dynamics appear on InfoQ.com, ScrumAlliance.org, and AgileJournal.com. Learn more about Dan Mezick’s agile writing here.

He’s the organizer of the Agile Boston user group and a 3-time presenter at Agile2007, 2008 and 2009, an invited speaker to the Scrum Gathering (Orlando) in 2010 and a news reporter for InfoQ.com

Reach Dan at:

dan.mezick [at] newtechusa [dotcom]

You can learn much more detail about Dan via his Agile Coaching page here.

October 25, 2009

Scrum, BART and Group Relations

This is a note explaining the connections by and between Scrum, BART and Group Relations. Scrum’s contains clear BART (boundary, authority, role and task) definitions. BART analysis comes from the Group Relations community of practice. Group Relations is concerned with psychology of some depth, at the level of “group”.

I believe if enough agile/Scrum community leaders and members get to know BART, the agile/Scrum work can advance. Specifically the community-level Scrum knowledge level advances as the study of Scrum’s BART properties increases overall insight into Scrum itself.

Original date of note: 10/25/2009 by Dan Mezick

Scrum

We all know something about Scrum. It’s a framework consisting of 3 roles, 3 ceremonies and 3 artifacts in its canonical form. The full description of canonical Scrum is listed in the reference links below.

BART

BART is short for Boundary, Authority, Role and Task. The full story on this is found via the BART reference link below.

Figure 1. Scrum is related to Group Relations (GR) theory through BART (Boundary, Authority Role and Task) analysis

Scrum is a great study in BART analysis. Upon examination of the roles in Scrum, per the Schwaber Beedle book on canonical Scrum, what is clear is that Scrum has well-defined BART properties. This greatly reduces the waste normally associated with any need to define roles and discover boundaries. The BART properties of Scrum are well documented in the aforementioned book.

Even so, Scrum does have some ambiguity in terms of BART properties. For example, during the Sprint, does the Product Owner stand up? If the PO is a fully committed PO, complete with daily co-location, does that PO recite during the Team’s daily stand-up?

Even with this, as ground rules go, Scrum shines in terms of BART, when compared to typical ways of organizing work, especially software development work, in a typical organization.

Group Relations (GR)

GR is concerned with the emergent behavior of groups, and group-level psychology of some depth. BART comes directly from GR work. GR conferences are concerned with the conscious and unconscious behavior of people who have membership in groups and organizations. Briefly, GR theory says that the unstated primary task of a group is to survive as a group. This under-the-surface task often motivates the group to seek leadership that can help the group with the unstated group-survival task. (see the links below for more info)

This unconscious and irrational leadership-seeking aspect is completely unrelated to the stated task, such as producing “working software”. It is usually in fact at odds with the stated task of the team.

Example: Consider the software project that has no end in sight.

As such, irrational GR effects have the potential to generate tremendous amounts of waste. GR and BART theory says that Scrum has well-formed BART which focuses attention on the stated task, leaving little or no opportunity for irrational team behavior.

Knowledge of GR effects can come in handy when participating in or observing group (team) life. Group Relations conferences are uniquely experiential and the learning can be unusual in form and content. The conferences explore boundary, authority, role and task in groups.

Links:

Book: Schwaber and Beedle on (canonical) Scrum

Scrum Guide from Scrum Alliance. Author: Ken Schwaber

The BART System of Organizational and Group Analysis

Group Relations FAQ

***

About the Author

He’s the organizer of the Agile Boston user group and a 3-time presenter at Agile2007, 2008 and 2009, an invited speaker to the Scrum Gathering (Orlando) in 2010 and a news reporter for InfoQ.com

Reach Dan at:

dan [at] newtechusa [net]

You can learn much more detail about Dan via his Agile Coaching page here.

October 24, 2009

Group Relations Theory and Practice

This is a note regarding my strong interest in focusing the attention of the Agile/Scrum community towards Group Relations theory, practice and conferences.

I believe if enough agile/Scrum leaders simply do some preparation and actually attend a Group Relations conference, we can advance the agile/Scrum work. This is achieveable by raising awareness of how we act and react in often completely unconscious ways as we participate in group life.

Original date of note: 10/24/2009 by Dan Mezick

Application

Group relations work is mostly focused on issues of boundary, authority, role and task. My experience is that GR work in a GR conference setting is immediately applicable after you do it. GR work is concerned with depth psychology at the level of ‘group’ or ‘system’. GR work is not therapy but rather “here and now” experiential learning.

For example, I learn at a GR conference that people have an ‘orientation’ or ‘valence’ regarding authority. Some seek it …while others seek to assist the current authority. Still others have a ‘adversarial valence’ towards current authority.

At Agile2009, I meet Tobias Meyer and we discuss this. He reflects out loud and admits freely that he has a adversarial orientation towards authority. For him, questioning authority is comfortable and very natural.

Today I examine the blog post by Jean Tabaka entitled Escalation is Killing Agile. I notice Tobias Mayer makes a comment on this blog post. I notice also that previous to this, Tobias develops into a de facto authority, over time, in the Scrum community. Now the tables are turned– his noted authority in the Scrum community is now attractive as a big target for other individuals to shoot at.

Other examples abound, such as ….

“…What is it about discourse in the agile community? This year, I’ve encountered three examples of pushing back against incivility, blaming, and scornful, abusive language. -Diana Larsen, Agile Alliance newsletter, 10/19/2009

We can argue what precise factors or forces are at work. One thing is certain: we are at or near a defining moment. Old ways of thinking and doing as a community no longer apply.

Everyone Loses

We are rapidly reaching a state where a “lose-lose” outcome is a very real reality within our community. We are at a defining moment. We can choose to devolve into an unstable state where we spin out of control and implode. End of cohesive community: Everyone loses. This very real possibility is the result of a collectively held “zero-sum game” mental model that says “for me to win you must lose”. Do we all want to lose?? OK, let’s all keep doing that !!

A better result is to TRANSFORM into a new thing. That is what this community is trying to do, now.

To get there, we need a collectively held “win-win” mental model that says “I am invested in this community and if it self-destructs, I lose in a huge way. Therefore, for me to NOT lose, we ALL must win– by stabilizing this downward spiral right NOW.”

My current belief is that we all collectively do not YET realize that we need to slog though this defining moment to emerge on the other side as a new and different thing….a TRANSFORMED thing ….or self destruct at the level of “group”.

We can slog through this. There is a way.

I know this is Jean’s intention, as she says directly:

1. When everyone is trying to win, the system suffers. Anyone’s “win” is nobody’s win; and anyone’s “loss” is everyone’s loss.

2. I’m done with all the distractions that don’t feed my growth. I’ve lost the ability to abide behaviors that don’t give evidence of what was written with conviction in the Agile Manifesto.

3. My personal commitment is to seek those interested in creating more and more insights about how we can grow and learn.

Jean is a leader.

Enter Group Relations theory and practice

In the absence of clear ground rules, people in a situation must create or re-create ground rules. This occurs by testing the fuzzy and ill-defined Boundary, Authority, Role and Task definitions in a messy system. That is part of what is going on here and now and it is full of waste and more importantly, it is destabilizing.

For an example of how this works, think about Scrum. Scrum has clear BART definitions. This dramatically reduces ambiguity for all involved, and frees up precious team energy– energy that might be wasted by the testing and discovery of boundaries, authority, roies and tasks.

Scrum is a boundary-centric container for work– by virtue of clear ground rules. Energy and focus can now be focused on the work, rather than wasteful boundary-discovery tasks. The clarity of Scrum’s BART definitions are designed to honor production at the expense of waste.

We are at a defining moment. Most of what is going on– with any acrimony in our community now– is completely unconscious, and is operating at the level of ‘system’. We are ALL participating, now.

Group relations work brings this reality into very sharp focus. As such, knowledge of GR theory and practice can help– alot.

My Intentions

My intention is to bring GR work to the attention of the Agile and Scrum community, such that the agile and Scrum work can advance.

Below is an email with links that I send, earlier, to agile and Scrum leaders this week. Please consider studying the Tavistock primer listed below, and attending a GR conference– such that you can gain valuable new insight and experience in groups.

I am in contact with Group Relations community leaders, see below. My current belief is that raising the ambient level of mastery of GR concepts has the potential to help us reverse this very unstable state we are now developing as a community. Please consider learning more about Group Relations theory and practice. Links appear below.

Sincerely,

Dan Mezick (bio/profile)

(email sent to agile/Scrum community leaders 10/22/2009…)

Hello,

I am writing you to bring Group Relations (GR) and the GR community to your attention. I send it because you are a leader in the agile community and I am eager to bring this topic to the attention of the community-at-large.

As you may know, GR events are ‘conferences’ where the psychology of groups is explored.

Each conference and 100% experiential and unique. There are many dotted lines to agile thinking, including: empiricism, group collaborative process, systems thinking, retrospectives.

GR work is interesting if you are looking for answers to how and why groups behave as they do. GR conferences and present-moment, “here and now” focused. The Tavistock primer listed below is useful for understanding the conference format.

I am providing links to key documents and web pages to help familiarize you with GR work. I hope you might consider attending a GR conference. These conferences span 3-4 days, and usually residential and held at a retreat location. I hope you might consider attending a GR conference. My own experience of GR work is as follows: GR conference attendance is some of the best leadership/follow-ship training ever.

At Agile2008 and 2009 I speak on Group Relations and related work from the GR community called BART (Boundary, Authority, Role and Task).

My 2008 and 2009 sessions on these topics are here:

http://submissions.agile2008.org/node/3483

http://agile2009.agilealliance.org/node/2154

http://www.agile2009.org/node/2153

In 2009, I help out with the [Manifesting Agility] stage, incorporating‘ Psychology and Cognition’. Going forward, I am eager to see group-level psychology and cognition play a MUCH more central role in the development of agile practice and knowledge. I hope sincerely that the Agile2010 conference has a Stage for [Group psychology and Cognition].

Here are some links to familiarize you with Group Relations work:

BART: Boundary, Authority, Role and Task

http://akri.affiniscape.com/associations/8689/files/BART_Green_Molenkamp.pdf

Group Relations FAQ

http://akriceinstitute.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=34

Tavistock Primer

http://www.nycgrouprelations.org/pdf/TaviPrimer.pdf

For my part, I am busy evangelizing Boundary, Authority, Role and Task (BART) concepts inside our community. I am speaking on BART at local PMI meetings and also the GIVE THANKS FOR SCRUM event on 11/25 in Boston:

BART at the SNEC-PMI event

BART presentation link at SNEC-PMI

The GIVE THANKS FOR SCRUM event 11/25/2009 Boston

http://www.newtechusa.com/agileboston/gtfs

My session on BART and Scrum:

http://www.newtechusa.com/agileboston/gtfs#Dan

I hope you might consider learning about GR and attending a GR conference. I am eager to see group-level cognition and psychology get more attention from our community. In particular, I am eager to see these topics get a formally authorized Stage at next year’s conference.

If we want to create a conference event dedicated to agile community members, this is possible. I have experience speaking to leaders in the GR community about this. Leigh Estabrook is the President of the AK Rice Institute and she is willing to set this up for us, if we can get 25 or more to attend. It can be in any USA city. Other leaders in the GR community are willing to create private conferences and otherwise accommodate similar requests we may make.

Let me know if this is of interest to you. I am very interested in attending such an agile-only GR conference.

I am eager to answer your questions, and I hope you enjoy the provided GR links and subject matter. GR conference calendar links to conferences appears below. Shoot me a call or email if I may be of assistance to you as you explore the Group Relations domain. See the links listed below.

Please forward this email to colleagues and friends, as I am sure I miss many people who likely have an interest in this subject matter.

Please note the GR conference coming up in Chicago area in April listed below. I have experience attending events under the authority of this conference director, Kathleen Cain, and I attest to the quality of the conferences she runs. Chicago in April is a good choice if it fits your schedule.

I welcome your questions on GR work as applied to Agile.

Best Regards,
Dan Mezick
Cell 203 915 7248

Group relations conferences (near term)

NYC- 11/13

http://akri.affiniscape.com/cde.cfm?event=249887

India- 12/14

http://akri.affiniscape.com/cde.cfm?event=274178

Boston- 1/22

http://akri.affiniscape.com/cde.cfm?event=279880

Chicago- April 22-25

A Group Relations Conference
*Leading in an Environment of Complexity, Transparency and Conflict/
Kathleen Cain, LCSW, Director
Mark Kiel, Psych.D., Associate Director

Where: The Cenacle – A Retreat Center, Chicago, Illinois

When: April 22 – 25, 2010

Sponsored by the Chicago Center for the Study of Groups and
Organizations and The Midwest Group Relations Center of the A.K. Rice
Institute

Contact Diane Denes, dianedenes1@gmail.com <mailto:dianedenes1@gmail.com>

Baltimore- June 29 (Annual International Conference)

http://akri.affiniscape.com/cde.cfm?event=279911

Overall Group relations community calendar

http://akri.affiniscape.com/calendar.cfm

List of AK Rice affiliate organizations USA and worldwide:

http://www.nycgrouprelations.org/affiliates.html

***

About the Author

He’s the organizer of the Agile Boston user group and a 3-time presenter at Agile2007, 2008 and 2009, an invited speaker to the Scrum Gathering (Orlando) in 2010 and a news reporter for InfoQ.com

Reach Dan at:

dan.mezick [at] newtechusa [dotcom]

You can learn much more detail about Dan via his Agile Coaching page here.