avoiding the dilbert syndrome - scrum · but agile makes managers irrelevant! leadership •...

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Avoiding the Dilbert SyndromeWhat Does the Agile Manager Actually Do?


compliance international B2B MBA English IPO

agile husband start-up technologynewly-minted Canadian

executive leanstartup outsourcing father enterprise transitions

B2C data analysis kanban seismology PhD

scrumorganizational excellence

[email protected]: @davesharrockCertified Enterprise Coach (CEC)Certified Scrum Trainer™ (CST)

Dave Sharrock


Introducing Catbert,...

the pointy-haired boss…

and Dilbert.


How do managers spend their time?Accenture survey of 1,770 frontline, mid-level and

executive-level managers from 14 countries

https://hbr.org/2016/11/how-artificia l-intelligence-will-redefine-management

53% 30%

10%

7% Administrative coordination and control

Solving problems and collaborating

Strategy and innovation

Developing people and engaging with stakeholders


EXERCISE: what do managers do?

•Form groups of 2-4; Think about what managers did before agile…•Make a list of 5-10 core responsibilities of a manager in your organization

6 min


What is management?

Leadership

• Providing strategic direction

• Cross-training employees

• Engaging with other managers

Line Management

• Recruitment

• Resource management

• Coaching and performance feedback

• Reporting on performance indicators

Functional Management

• Training and support to new hires

• Provide necessary tools and education

• Establish standards and best practices

• Monitoring performance vs targets

Project Management

• Tracking project progress

• Managing tasks and priorities

• Identify and address inefficiencies


But Agile makes managers irrelevant!

Leadership

• Providing strategic direction

• Cross-training employees

• Engaging with other managers

Line Management

• Recruitment

• Resource management

• Coaching and performance feedback

• Reporting on performance indicators

Functional Management

• Training and support to new hires

• Provide necessary tools and education

• Establish standards and best practices


Project Management

• Tracking project progress

• Managing tasks and priorities

• Identify and address inefficiencies

SM

POTeam

SM

Team

Team

Team

CoP/Guild

CoP/Guild

Team/PO


And it gets worse!

All that’s left…

Leadership

• Providing strategic direction• Engaging with other managers

Line Management

• Reporting on performance indicators Functional Management


53% 30%

10% 7% Administrative

coordination and control

Solving problems and collaborating

Strategy and innovation

Developing people and engaging with stakeholders


EXERCISE: Case Study

•The goal is to come up with 1-2 options (Option Catbert, Option PHB)

•Write each option on a 4x6 card or post-it note

•If you have time place your 2-3 options on the Dilbert Scale

15 min


Maintaining Visibility

expecting iterative and incremental change

https://c1.staticflickr.com/8/7573/15708839377_1cfef5571c_b.jpg


Maintaining Visibility

expect iterative and incremental change

focus on flow and value delivery

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Kowloon_Waterfront%2C_Hong_Kong%2C_2013-08-09%2C_DD_05.jpg


Importance of Safety

provide guidance and visible progress


Importance of Safety

provide guidance and visible progress

shield the team (to allow risk-taking)


Encourage Learning

https://d.justpo.st/media/images/2014/03/1c4a756623a5a9527c3899191ef49685.jpg

enable problem solving, not solving problems


Encourage Learning

enable problem solving, not solving problems

share your knowledge

https://d.justpo.st/media/images/2014/03/1c4a756623a5a9527c3899191ef49685.jpg


EXERCISE: Case Study

•Now come up with a final Dilbert Option, based on:• Maintain visibility• The importance of safety• Encourage learning

•Write it on a 4x6 card or post-it note and add it to Dilbert Scale

6 min


1. Poor Performing Teams

We are about a third of the way through the project timeline, with only 20% of the expected scope complete.

Your stakeholder committee is getting nervous, and would like an update in next week’s Steering Committee meeting.

What would you suggest?

The major web relaunch project has been started using Scrum. The project has a fixed deadline with executive bonuses tied to successful delivery on or before the hard deadline.

The web team have agreed the expected scope for the project. However, the delivery of the teams is significantly below that needed to meet the deadline.

While the productivity of the teams has grown, it has not yet doubled as required to meet the project deadline.


2. The Super-Developer as Bottleneck

Several sprints later, things had got worse. Even though the retrospectives kept focussing on how to share work across the team, the developer refused to change his behaviour. Something had to change.

Eventually the Scrum Master comes to you asking for help.


The team formation and chartering exercise went well. Right from the outset, one of the senior developers was far outperforming the rest of the team. He finished most of the stories, and always took on a lot more work than others.

However, none of the rest of the team knew what he was doing. Sometimes stories finished as planned, sometimes they were carried over into the next sprint.


3. Code Ownership and Quality

Without the regular one-on-ones with his testers he was unsure what the team was doing, or how product quality had changed.

He was still meeting with his functional team regularly, but wasn’t sure how to make sure quality was where it needed to be.


After several months of working as small, dedicated Scrum teams, I asked the Quality Manager how things were going – was the team increasing the quality of their work? Was test automation progressing as planned? How comfortable was he with the work the team was doing?

He said he had no idea what the team was doing, let alone how good the quality of the product was.


Drucker’s Manager of Tomorrow

• manage by objectives

• take risks and allow risk-taking decisions to take place at lower levels in the organisation

• be able to make strategic decisions

• be able to build an integrated team with team members capable of managing and measuring their own performance and results in relation to overall objectives

• be able to communicate information quickly and clearly, and motivate employees to gain commitment and participation

• be able to see the business as a whole and to integrate their function within it

• be able to relate the product and industry to the total environment, to find out what is important and what needs to be taken into account

https://mbsportal.bl.uk/taster/subja reas/busmanhist/mgmtthinkers/drucker.aspx


Managing Agile Teams

• Maintain visibility

• Expect iterative and incremental change

• Focus on flow and value delivery

• Importance of safety

• Provide guidance and visible progress

• Shield the team (allow risk-taking)

• Encourage learning

• Enable problem solving, rather than solving problems

• Share your knowledge


Thank you@davesharrock

[email protected]

avoiding the dilbert syndrome - scrum · but agile makes managers irrelevant! leadership •...

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