Building Self-Organization Skills through the Touchstones Discussion Project
Self-organization is a key concept in agile software development, but teams are often more used to taking orders than making their own decisions. Touchstones Discussion Project prepares participants to take responsibility for their own future by applying structured discussion techniques that encourage them to examine and adapt their own behavior, their peer relationships, and their culture. Those who join us in this interactive Touchstones session will experience the power of group learning in a setting that emphasizes respectful participation, collaborative skill-building, active listening, and participative leadership.
This session provides a strong foundation for building participation in retrospectives, defining active research agendas, and fostering group learning in a supportive, critical, and honest environment. The conditions that nurture creativity and discipline in high-productivity organizations like Toyota are sometimes referred to as “ba”. Touchstones provides a mechanism for generating ba on a continuing basis. For more information about Touchstones, see http://touchstones.org.
Introductions (5 minutes)
Introduction to the Touchstones Discussion Project (10 minutes)
Small group discussion of what makes a good discussion (10 minutes)
Report back and discussion of the Touchstones rules for good discussions (10 minutes)
Reading of an excerpt from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein or A.R. Ammons’ Identity (10 minutes)
Discussion of the text (25 minutes)
Reflection on the discussion and definition of what areas might be be improved (10 minutes)
Wrap-up (10 minutes)