Goodbye 2023...Hello 2024

I’m seeing lots of end-of-year posts about how great a year 2023 was for folks and how much they accomplished. In my agile community, seeing posts about—

• How many classes I run or how many students I taught;

• How many events/groups I’ve spoken at/to;

• How many articles or books I’ve written, or podcasts and videos I’ve recorded;

• How much money I made;

• How this was the best year…ever!

and I’m happy these folks had a good year.

But I have a different sort of end-of-year wrap-up to share. Some good and some not-so-good news. In 2023— 

• My wife Diane was diagnosed with Stage 3 Parkinson’s Disease. She’s bravely navigating PD, and I’m navigating what it means to be a caregiver.

• For the first time in more than two decades, I attended very few in-person agile events; depending on how I count them, it was three, and I missed my tribe. Thank goodness I made it to Agile 2023 in Orlando!

• I had a very challenging business year and I experienced an 82% YoY revenue drop.

• My frequent flyer status on Delta dropped from Diamond to Silver; I know, but 😉

• On a positive note, I did more pro-bono work than ever before—to help others and to keep myself sharp.

• The 2023 Badass Agile Coaching Day event contributed $11,000 to Africa Agility and Ukraine charities.

• My DEI discounts to classes amounted to more than $20,000.

2023 was perhaps the most challenging year for me, professionally and personally. It’s tested my energy, resilience, mental health, and faith.

I can’t tell you how grateful I am for my friends, colleagues, and acquaintances in the Agile community. The heart and spirit of this community have been an anchor for me during the year. There are some, you know who you are, who have played a special role in checking in with me and supporting me. To all of you, I humbly say—Thank you.

I’m writing to share a “not so beautiful” view of the year with others who may have been challenged in 2023 like I have been. And share my hopes for a better 2024.

My sincere wish to all of you is for a far better 2024. One where you find whatever you need to realize how special and unique you are. Where you find your “community of support,” as I have, and you lean into it.

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Stay agile, my friends,

Bob.

Who Wants to Become a Badass Agile Coach?

A Masterclass 

When I first conceived the Extraordinarily Badass Agile Coaching book, I was reacting to my perceived lack of professionalism and craft with many agile coaches in our community. Among other things, I felt that—

• There were many coaches in name only with a few certifications under their belts but not enough experience or skill. Chasing the money, if you will.

• There was an imbalance towards Professional Coaching over more powerful stances such as Mentoring, Advising, Leading, and Transformation (see ACGW reference below).

• As a community, we had failed to do an excellent job of communicating what agile coaching was, was not, and the value or impact it could have on the individual, team, and organization we are coaching.

So, initially, I envisioned creating a masterclass for agile coaching. It is not necessarily aligned with existing certifications but a place where agile coaches could immerse in all aspects of coaching skill and practice—significantly raising their skill bar to benefit themselves and their clients.

But then my work on the book and contributing to the Comparative Agility—Agile Coaching PI assessment and Agile Coaching Growth Wheel got in the way. So, a few years passed.

Masterclass

But now, my attention, focus, and hope for our profession fall back toward a class. But not just any class, a Masterclass rooted in—

• Developing your inner coach (self) first.

• Becoming more well-wounded in your skills & competencies.

• Understand the place for a professional coaching stance, yet do not let it dominate your agile coaching.

• More than teaching. A place where a group of like-minded coaches can collaborate—learning together, practicing together, and growing together.

• Nurturing collaborative learning in small groups.

• Becoming, dare I say it, a Badass Agile Coach.

And, of course, grounding the class in—

• My EBAC book

• The Agile Coaching Growth Wheel

• The Comparative Agility – Agile Coaching (PI) assessment

The class will be an immersive experience. We’ll meet for 2-hours each week to dive deeply into a specific topic or area. That will go on for ~12 sessions or ~3 months. Beyond the 2-hours per week, there will be an additional 2-3 hours of study and small-group learning. So, overall, a ~5-hour commitment per week of your time.

The class will also be constructed so that you get personalized coaching to help you in your learning journey and professional development. We’ll use the Comparative Agility PI as our base platform and include 2, 1-hour, 1:1 coaching sessions.

What It Is not?

It is not for beginners or novice agilists.

It is not for someone who is only seeking a certification.

It is not for someone who struggles to prioritize their learning.

It is not for someone who thinks Agile Coaching is a destination rather than a journey.

Who’s interested?

This post aims to test community interest in joining my first masterclass cohort.

Without giving additional detail, my questions are—

• How do you feel about the idea?

• Would you be interested in participating in a cohort? Why?

• What would you be willing to pay for the experience?

• What would be the Top 5 areas you’d like to work on to improve your Agile Coaching skillset?

Here’s a link to a short survey to answer those questions.

I hope to begin the first one in early March 2024, but we’ll see how the market (Y'all) responds. And please share this with interested colleagues across your networks.

Stay agile, my friends,

Bob.

Everyone is Right, but only Partially

When you start to look at the group of people as a system, which you can imagine as looking down on the team from a very high distance, the particular issues and problems are not so important from that point of view. You are focusing on the linkage among the people instead of individual persons or their problems.

From such a viewpoint, this System Rule – Everyone is right but only partially – is extremely helpful. It helps you to coach the system and not allow yourself to take sides. Moreover, every system is intelligent by itself. It will tell you if there is something wrong. And your entire job as a System Coach is to listen for those signals and reveal them back to the system so that the system can react and possibly solve the issue or improve itself. You are not here to solve it for them, you are there to help them straighten and strengthen their relationship so they can work towards the resolution.

From the website page: The Synergies between ORSC™ and Agile Coaching.

Everyone is Right, but only Partially

I learned this principle or idea when I took my CRR Global ORSC coaching series a few years ago. I use it in several ways—

• First, I use it on myself when I’m feeling particularly “know-it-all-y” as a coach. I remind myself that even if I’m right about something, I’m only partially right. It helps to keep me grounded, humble, and in service to my clients.

• It also helps remind me to take a systems view when coaching. You see, I believe all coaching is about the system. Yes, individuals matter, but we are all parts of various systems. So, I continuously try to keep the system in view when coaching individuals.

• I find it most useful when the system is the hottest. That is, in emotionally charged positional exchanges. It helps to remind everyone that we are all right AND wrong. So, let’s lean into empathy to understand each other better and fly higher to look at the overall system.

Another Example, November 2023

I often write posts in advance, and this one has been in the queue waiting for months. I guess the universe had a hand in this because I saw the following interaction on LinkedIn just yesterday—

Huy Nguyen said—

I came across a post today from a supposed "expert" that didn't list Impediment Removal as a key Scrum Master responsibility today. What are we people doing here?
As Agilists, we're all part of impediment removal - even Agile Coaches. If you want to show your value, you should be able to list all the impediments you were able to surface as well as those you helped to eliminate.
Coaching skills and whatnot are only in support of this - the creation and expansion of flow.

and Alan Dayley followed up with this—

It is easy to experience something that works for us, decide on the one or two things that made it work, tell people that it worked and then tell people they are wrong if they disagree.

These hot takes or blanket statements about what Agile is or is not, what a role does or does not tend to be like this. We argue as if we are right and the other is wrong. In reality, the other is also right, from their experience and thinking, while we are also partly wrong.

Maybe this brief post will explain better: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/alandd_we-create-rules-within-our-context-if-successful-activity-7130360724794540034-XfcX

and it struck me as an excellent example of everyone being right, but only partially. The exchange goes on for a bit with a variety of comments. But the point is both Huy and Alan are right, and they are wrong. And there is something powerful for them, me, and all of us to realize by adopting that perspective in everything we do.

Wrapping Up

Another rule I learned from ORSC is the 2% Truth Rule, which states that we should seek to find the 2% Truth in all feedback we receive. It’s another view that helps me to cut thru my triggers and defensiveness to digest feedback effectively.

I find both of these to be useful in my growth journey, and I thought I’d share them with you.

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.

What would I tell my younger self?

1985 - 2006 - 2023

I began exploring agile ways of working in 1995-96, inspired by the Scrum paper shared at OOPSLA 1995. 

Someone asked me—

I want to capture advice from experienced agilists as to if they were just starting out now in agile, based on their experience, what would they tell their younger selves?

And in no particular order, here is my answer—

1. The journey is a marathon, not a sprint.

2. Build and activate your trusted partner (friend, colleague, mentor, and cheerleader) network.

3. Remember, agile is an inside-out job.

4. Mindset is a thing, an important thing!

5. Certifications largely suck; experience wins.

6. When in doubt, trust your teams.

7. Reflect on your privilege.

8. Leave something positive behind, a legacy.

9. Agile is bigger than software; change the world!

10. Respect people…including leaders and managers.

11. Continuously build your personal brand.

12. Take better care of yourself (self-care)!

13. Take the time to build better relationships.

14. Stay humble.

15. And…always remember, you ROCK! Trust yourself and your gut.

I found this to be a great reflective question.

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.