Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Is your CIO an Agile Leader or a Conservative Manager?
Being Agile is the antithesis to being conservative. Agility while focusing on short-term delivery does not mean that you cannot take a long range approach. Having a clear vision for the team to rally around and the need for managementleadership to think ahead to ensure that we're not just moving forward, but moving in the right direction is of utmost importance...
If Agile is the antithesis to being conservative, would it be a far stretch for us to acknowledge that annual planning is the antithesis to innovation? Agilists are out there, every single day, responding to change, creating things no one has before. Agile leaders are open to new ideas, willing to take risks and comfortable with agile's level of change. If your CIO believes he needs a PMO organization to govern planning cycles then is he responding to change or more focused on creating documentation that can impede yet undefined forms of innovation.
Agile teams are about trust and couldn't function nor deliver without it. Leaders encourage trust by enlisting team member's strengths to achieve results and giving the team autonomy to make their own judgments about the best way to meet objectives. Managers on the other hand are savagely focused on taking care of HR review processes where the focus resides solely on one's competencies.
Agile leaders are passionate in ways that make the masses feel good about themselves, their employers and society at large. Managers may also exhibit passion but the feeling of warmth is only felt by the priveleged few. One way to spread passion is by also spreading empathy and caring for others. The best amongst the Agile community care about the human condition and will enquire first about your health and well-being while managers will only care whether you got your timesheet completed on-time...
| | View blog reactionsIf Agile is the antithesis to being conservative, would it be a far stretch for us to acknowledge that annual planning is the antithesis to innovation? Agilists are out there, every single day, responding to change, creating things no one has before. Agile leaders are open to new ideas, willing to take risks and comfortable with agile's level of change. If your CIO believes he needs a PMO organization to govern planning cycles then is he responding to change or more focused on creating documentation that can impede yet undefined forms of innovation.
Agile teams are about trust and couldn't function nor deliver without it. Leaders encourage trust by enlisting team member's strengths to achieve results and giving the team autonomy to make their own judgments about the best way to meet objectives. Managers on the other hand are savagely focused on taking care of HR review processes where the focus resides solely on one's competencies.
Agile leaders are passionate in ways that make the masses feel good about themselves, their employers and society at large. Managers may also exhibit passion but the feeling of warmth is only felt by the priveleged few. One way to spread passion is by also spreading empathy and caring for others. The best amongst the Agile community care about the human condition and will enquire first about your health and well-being while managers will only care whether you got your timesheet completed on-time...
