Over the past few months I’ve been working with a few Scrum teams to adopt a more Kanban-like approach to getting work done. Their goal is to move closer to an operating model that emphasizes continuous intake and delivery of work. Enthusiasm is high, leadership and management (yes, they’re different) are into it. The groundwork has been laid for a impactful transformation.
Earlier in my career, I would leverage this enthusiasm by aggressively pursuing topic-specific trainings and detailing playbooks for future implementations. I’d be keen to let the teams go at in on their own after just a few weeks – “they have this locked up!” – and I’d work with Scrum Masters only, encouraging them to look at the data and facilitate their discussions about improvement from there. I’d be in and out – job well done.
But today, I am taking a far more methodical approach, one founded on language, taxonomy, soft skills, and culture. I’m using the groundwork laid by leadership as a springboard for cultural change, not just process change. Today, I care less about the actions we’re taking, and more about the language we’re using to express intent and desirable outcomes. Why? Well…
Years back I worked with an Agile Coach who was Very Into Taxonomy. It was his talking point in nearly every brainstorming or planning session:
“How does this Portfolio define ‘in progress’?”
“Do we all know what ‘program means’?”
The questions often hit a nerve, and felt like a huge distraction from the Real Questions (whatever they were at the time.) But in a world where leadership and teams weren’t clear on definitions of things, those questions above were critical to answer. Misalignment and confusion compound over time, and it’s worth putting in some effort up front to make sure we’re all speaking the same language, and hearing the same thing. You learn that fairly quickly when you sidestep defining how you talk about stuff within your team.
OK, Back to the present:
In shifting from Scrum to Kanban, my teams are letting go a couple of comfort zones: Story Points and Sprint boundaries. All of sudden, velocity and burndown charts are not the stars of the show (indeed, they’re gone completely!) And Sprint start and end dates no longer matter, because Sprints are gone too! While the work hasn’t changed at all (same priority, same User Stories), the way we measure and talk about the work has changed. And that takes a bit of level-setting and getting used to before everyone feels comfortable again.
The team of coaches planning this transition (of which I am one) spoke a lot about tools, processes, documentation, and other very practical things the organization needed to ensure our efforts were compliant with regulatory and operational requirements. There was a lot of conversation about which teams we’d work with, what product lines we’d focus on. We talked a lot about the frameworks we’d be implementing and trainings we’d create to support it. And while doing all of this, something happened: We began to realize that what we’re really talking about is changing how we talk about doing work. We’re changing process, yes, but the real impact here is how we communicate progress through that process. All of a sudden spending time getting taxonomy right felt very relevant and very worthwhile.
Transformation can be tackled aggressively, quickly. I’ve done that before, and in many ways it’s thrilling. But the speed of a transformation is governed by how quickly we adopt the new language. And so when implementing something new, it’s critical to measure success, but also consider how you will listen for language as it changes. At the end of the day, you may find that a far more reliable indicator of how your transformation is going.
Goscin.ski 