Aug Wrap Up

I hope you have been doing great this month, mine has been a mish mash. While work has gotten me busier and happier with more challenging stuff everyday; my personal life has become more and more difficult to manage. My son started day care and he falls sick more often than before.


I have been trying meditation and some quiet time (if I am lucky to manage some), trying to keep sane. I think often to connect with my mentors, honestly, there’s barely anytime to even write emails. However, I have signed up for more learning (via Coursera-Standfords- Organizations Analysis), reading more books and even as a joke and dare I recorded my first YouTube (its so awful that I won’t even link it here). However I know there’s more learning coming up as I dabble in editing and understanding how to make a YouTube video and very proud to put myself out there when I know it isn’t going to be perfect.

To wrap up this month for you, here are some of the highlights, I hope you enjoy.

Good Reads (Blogs)

 New Books:


Finally, a book that changed me: When Breath Becomes Air

(PicCourtesy: Soma Bhattacharya)

Relearning: The Gadget Habits (5 simple tips)

If you spend all your time slouching in the couch and complaining life isn’t taking you anywhere, well you already know nothing will happen.

An average person will usually complaint 15-30 times day. The chronic complainer falls into a perpetual cycle of finding fault, feeling negative, and then being unable to face the next situation with an open mind.  

Instead of picking ourselves and working on our list, we are busy with the Gadget Browsing. We use it every day- new fancy phones, laptops, tablets... hundreds of apps crammed in it. We wake up with the mindless chatter of browsing and we wrap up our day by telling the world we are ready for bed. Does information overload or mindless browsing help your creativity- perhaps not. We are way too occupied with our gadgets (that's where the free times heads to) till we need a mental day off .

Here are 5 ways to re-think about your habits:

  1. Stop all the notifications- this includes your emails, social media and news channels. When you need something (info/news) you can open the app and it’s always better to have a fixed time to do it. Don’t use it as a cure for boredom instead pick a book or go for a walk or meet a real friend.
  2. Delete apps- you don’t need so many apps, delete them. Free yourself from the urge to constantly monitor your behavior, deleting helps. Once done you can decide to login to your Facebook or Instagram once a week or month and check for updates (in case you forgot they also have a website), you really don’t need to prove anything to anyone here. 
  3. Use apps to develop the growth mindset -don’t stop learning because you are out of college, keep that fire in you alive. Use your gadgets instead to learn a new domain, or pick up a interest or a certification. Download the content and you can even use it while you commute even with a shaky wifi. this includes paid and free stuff- read a blog, take up a course and get a certification that will actually help you to move to your new role.
  4. Shake up your timeline- make the time spent meaningful, there’s no point in giving up your time and feeling worthless. If you think browsing through social media is giving you all the negative vibes then just get out of it. Use apps to create real connections, meet your mentor once a month over Skype or use Google hangout to teach... the possibilities are endless as long as you use them correctly.
  5. Positive vibes only- use gadgets to create the life you want, not the life your social timeline dictates you to live by and crib about. Use apps to meditate or write or create amazing headspace that takes you through the day. 

Stop the mindless browsing and create the positive road-map you have always wanted and see how it feels to stop complaining for once.

(Pic courtesy: Google images)

Being Human in Agile

Agile is one of the most-discussed subjects in any process domain.

With commercialization and certification now so easily available to many, the approach has become easier to learn and implement, and with that has come the liability of seeing it as only a set of rules and practices. The "individual" who was the center of the process has now taken a back seat among the fancy tools and apps. Among many, Agile has become only a term.

As an Agile coach working with multiple teams and organizations, I have always felt that miracles are expected just because you gather together for 15 minutes. We look for data and stats and obsessively check tools. We have made the tool bigger than the process. Rarely does anyone talk about the human factor in Agile. No one wants to take the time to make the connections; we only want the productivity increased.

Have you ever noticed how you work your best? Let’s take a blind guess — maybe you like the freedom in the way you work, the human connection with your peers, and an understanding manager or mentor. No matter which process you are part of, doing your best work shouldn’t change.

If you are still old school like me and prefer the human connection, here are three ways to bring it back.

Storytelling

Don’t approach an Agile transformation with hard-set rules and terminologies. Instead, take the time to explain why, as a team or organization, you are going for it, what benefits you are hoping for, and the challenges that will be encountered. Tell the story of failures, recall the successes you have seen, how you have mentored or coached other teams, and the fact that every transformation is unique and should be treated as such.

Hear their stories, too; try to create a story card. Divide a paper in four quadrants and create your guided storytelling pattern. I have seen that when given a structure to tell a story — based on a question or an activity — people respond better, and it opens up a real conversation rather than just encouraging free-flowing conversation.

You can choose any of the following to create your story card for the teams and then talk one-on-one to understand them:

  • Myers-Briggs Type Indicator score (personality type): Try the free online assessment. This is just for fun and provides some insight into the person. Even if people disagree with the results, they will talk about why it doesn’t match up.
  • Moving Motivators: I find it interesting to see the most- and least-favorite motivators; it's usually an eye-opener. Asking the right question along with this assessment helps form some perspective you will need as a coach or manager to work with each individual. You can find the game at the Management 3.0 website.
  • Who you are: That 30-second elevator speech is rather difficult when you take out of the equation their job title or technical domain expertise. People really must think about who they are, and that’s what you want.
  • The improvement you would like to see in your team/process: Depending on their comfort level, people will talk. Trust me on this; you will get more information here than from looking at the trends in your team's velocity.


Mind Mapping
Sometimes we think better when articulating clearly, and the train of thought is easier to chase when we can come back to it. Mind mapping is a wonderful tool that can be used in various scenarios to get to know a person and to explain the process, and it can even be used in retrospectives. The transformation doesn’t need to be done in the same way everywhere. Learn about others and who you are working with, and bring new techniques to work that bring out the personal point of view and perspective.

Visualization
Reactions will always change more when people see something than when they are told something over and over again. Instead of telling teams that they are full of flaws and that productivity and velocity have to increase, try value stream mapping with the team. Let the team draw with colored pens and crayons and have some fun. Then let them see where they have been lagging. When realizations come from within, changes are easier.

The bottom line from all of the above is that we are trying to keep the uniqueness of an individual and not trying to assume that everyone is the same. Data matters; however, you won’t know the authenticity of the data if the team is always gaming it up to protect themselves from you.

Yes, we are busy — always busy moving from one meeting to another. But not even for a second do we think that the human connection is replaceable with a process or data. When we showcase the human within us and try to understand the other person, it makes the transformation and the assumed role much more fulfilling for all.

This article was originally published in Scrum Alliance

(Pic courtesy: Google Images)