I get asked big questions about agile leadership nearly every day. So I thought I’d grab three of the most commonly asked questions and share quick answers with you. (These answers come from my YouTube shorts, which I publish weekly.)
What Is an Agile Leader?
Three qualities define an agile leader.
First, agile leaders are comfortable with uncertainty. They’re willing to hear and say, “I don’t know.” They understand not everything can be stated with certainty. This means they can accept it when a team says they’ll be done in five or six months.
Second, agile leaders guide; they don’t command. An agile leader does not tell people the specific steps to take to achieve a goal. Instead, the agile leader creates a culture of teamwork, transparency, and continuous improvement. This environment empowers team members to achieve great things.
Third, agile leaders do less but accomplish more. Agile leaders are rarely a flurry of activity. Instead, they motivate and inspire others to do more of the right things.
Jazz great Thelonious Monk was known for leaving silence between the notes he played. He said, “What you don't play can be more important than what you do.”
Like Monk, an agile leader knows that what they don’t do–where they leave space–can be more important than what they do.
How Do Agile Leaders Make the Case for Change?
Agile leaders know that the best way to persuade others is to focus on one compelling reason for change. They don’t try to convince people with a list of benefits.
Let me explain why. If you tell me there are four reasons I should make a change I don’t want to make, I’m going to pick the weakest of your four points and argue about it. My argument may not convince you, but I’ll convince myself that I’ve parried that point. And with one less point in favor of the change you want to make, I’ll also convince myself I can continue resisting.
So, don’t try to persuade someone with a list of reasons agile is better than what you’re doing today. Instead, focus on one compelling reason.
Agile Leaders Create a Safe Environment for Learning
When team members are practicing a new skill, good agile leaders know they have one big job to do to make sure team members feel safe to learn. That job? Ensuring team members know that their efforts matter more than the results.
A teams’ efforts at learning new skills should be considered experiments or trials. More important than succeeding at the new skill is trying until they do succeed.
Set realistic goals. Manage expectations of how much a team can accomplish in their early sprints.
Want More Quick Answers to Big Questions?
Follow me on YouTube, where I create weekly short videos that answer the big questions you have about agile and Scrum. If you’ve got time for a deeper dive, I also create weekly long videos where I give you tips on how to solve common issues that bog down agile teams.
