A better culture change approach for busy practitioners
You need organizational change tools that reflect agility: accessible by most everyone without in-depth learning, adaptable for your particular situation, and applicable, providing tangible results without months of fuzzy “prep” work. We think we have an answer for you. You will become acquainted with an organizational/cultural change framework and try your hand at applying it to a common problem. Our goal is to give you enough information so you can decide if further investigation is warranted.
This is a hybrid session between a talk (need some background to understand the model) and a tutorial with timeboxed exercises loosely set up around an agile/Scrum framework. It can also be done as just an experience report or some other variation that will be most useful to attendees or as needed to fit time constraints. Introducing a completely new (for most) model will be a tight fit into 90 minutes; however, we are aiming for a shorter than normal period to be considerate of the many good session ideas and allow more to be included in the overall conference time period.
5 minutes – kickoff and setting up session backlog
5 minutes – personalization of backlog via individual exercise: assessment of where participants’ current work teams are and where participants would like them to be if optimally agile (this exercise is best done without prior model knowledge)
20 minutes – Iteration 0: architecture orientation (culture model introduction + clarification Q&A)
5 minutes – session refinement of backlog via review of composite session assessment results and discussion of both individual and group implications, reflecting how an assessment can be used in attendees’ situations (we will gather and produce a visual if projection devices are available) and producing a session target culture for use in the following exercise iterations
5 minutes – team (8-12 attendees) self selections and movement to iteration areas
15 minutes – Iteration 1: produce a team agreement of how to handle a particular situation (provided by us) so the culture moves toward the target. This will help participants get an immediate feel for model application.
Background: the Competing Values Framework is based on four quadrants of behavior that are all in play at any given time, though in differing intensities/levels. Individuals and organizations from team level to corporation will exhibit behavior based on the combined intensities. Because it is easier to begin thinking in terms of a single quadrant in its extreme form, this exercise is designed to take a group of people, physically separate them into four quadrant subgroups (e.g. tape squares on the floor), and have them come up with solutions to the question/issue based on their adopted “extreme” views. Once these views are expressed, the second phase is for each quadrant subgroup to physically move in to the exercise “target” blend point and come up with how their original positions would be modified based on that movement. The four quadrant subgroups then come up with a composite view that represents how their group would handle the situation/issue. (much easier to demonstrate than explain … kind of like explaining how to tie shoes verbally!)5 minutes – Interation 1 team retrospective/debrief.
5 minutes – Iteration 2 planning: team determines topic for next interval and makes any changes needed.
15 minutes – Iteration 2: a second extreme/target culture exercise around an agile topic chosen by the team.
10 minutes – final Q&A + wrap-up.
Note: we are considering setting up a web site for follow-on discussions around this model and for mutual support of those thinking further/beginning implementation after the conference. We will also make an experience report available (conference/IEEE format) to attendees (paper at session; online at website) and submit it as part of the proceedings, but will not “present” it in the session to make more time available for participants to experience the approach directly.