We were sharing stories in a recent CAL class. One of the students talked about the dynamics of release engineering related to gaining customer feedback. I shared a recent post from Jason Fried where he mentioned the importance of releasing a product to get feedback. Making the point that customers are the only arbiter whether you were on track or not in your MVP development path.
Here’s the link -
https://uxplanet.org/10-things-i-learned-from-jason-fried-about-building-products-5b6694ff02aa
The young man brought up his frustration with the phenomenon of organizations often listening more to outsiders rather then listening to their own teams or internal experts. Either in person or as names being dropped in conversation.
I sometimes liken this to bandwagon syndrome and I shared on that here –
http://rgalen.com/agile-training-news/2014/4/13/bandwagons-the-good-and-the-bad
I fully resonated with his comment. Being an outside consultant, I often hear “insiders” say something like:
I’ve been giving my leadership team that feedback for several (days, months, even years) and they’ve never really listened to me. You (consultant Bob) come in and say it once and suddenly everyone takes it seriously.
Do you know how frustrating that is?
Actually, I do. And I’m incredibly empathetic to the point.
I remember when I was at iContact as their agile transformation coach, I had everyone’s ear for the first year or so. And my recommendations were easier to make and have them stick. But as time passed and everyone got used to my voice, stories, and style, they started to tune me out a bit.
So, this phenomenon happens to us all.
I started to bring in other thought leaders, either hired or invited, to mix the ideas (and voices) up a bit. And this seemed to work beautifully to break through the ice and renew some of my influence.
Wrapping up
While this can be a bit frustrating to folks on the inside, I think this is a natural occurrence in all organizations. Folks get accustomed to our voices and we need to augment them with book / article references, outside perspectives, and other ideas.
I think it’s simply the way it is. And you know…
It doesn’t matter where or who the idea comes from as long as the organization gains a flow of ideas, tries and experiments with new things, and continues to learn & evolve.
It’s all good.
Stay agile my friends,
Bob.