Achieving Critical Safety

As a leader, you want to hear the truth from everyone.  

I can hear what many of you are saying. No, I don’t. I want to hear thoughts that align with mine. My plans, my strategies, my ideas, and my approaches. And I’m here to tell you…

NO! You Don’t! You want the Truth!

Getting critical feedback is a skill and habit exemplified by the best of leaders. They are adept at creating an organizational ecosystem where feedback, all types of feedback are welcome and encouraged. Even critical feedback. No. Most importantly, critical feedback.

The point being, we want to be told when the Emperor (the leader, we/us, Me) Has No Clothes.

But the challenge is creating that ecosystem. One where it’s safe to speak truth to power. And not just stipulated safety, but tried, true, real, and absolute safety. Where the most critical of feedback is welcome, embraced, and even celebrated. With no immediate or later ramifications to the giver. 

Kim Scott, the author of Radical Candor, wrote a post recently entitled 11 Ways to Get Feedback from Others. I’ve long been a proponent of Radical Candor and this complemented the ideas in it so nicely.

Here are four of her TIPS that resonated the most with me around the topic of safety. I’ll add a bit of my own color commentary to each, but please read her article first.

TIP 4: Reward Criticism to get More of It

I think this starts with thanking folks for the critical feedback. Honestly and genuinely thanking them.

Another aspect is rewarding it in your coaching conversations. Noticing it and sharing how much you value the courage it takes for individuals to “speak truth to power” when that power is you.

I’ve often given people that feedback in your reviews. Of how much I value their opinions and thoughts even when they contradict my own. Emphasizing that I’m not looking for “Yes, persons”, that tell me what they think I want to hear.

Another great way to reward feedback is to actually…do something with it. Consider it, tell people what conclusions you’ve come to around it, and take action based on it. You don’t have to take immediate action on all feedback, but you don’t want to be a receiver who never takes action.

TIP 5: Ask for Public Criticism

I love this idea. That is, ask for out in the open criticism. In hallways, meetings, conferences, wherever.

But the important thing here is not the ask. While that takes quite a bit of courage, it’s not that hard. No, what’s challenging is how you respond to public criticism.

• Do you embrace it or deflect it?

• Do you thoughtfully consider it or argue against it?

• Do you thank the person for it or attack them personally?

Remember to stay sharp in how you receive your feedback, knowing that if you don’t receive it well, it will certainly stop. 

TIP 6: Criticize Yourself in Public

One great way to support Tip #5, is to criticize yourself in public. No, not overtly or artificially, but in a self-deprecating way. I’ve found that one of my Super Powers is my self-deprecating humor. I found this definition of self-deprecation on Wikipedia –

Self-deprecation is the act of reprimanding oneself by belittling, undervaluing, or disparaging oneself, or being excessively modest. It can be used in humor and tension release.

Don’t be afraid to criticize yourself in public and look for frequent opportunities to do so. How you show up to others can work wonders in creating the space for the critical feedback you need to be a better leader.

TIP 8: Relish Being Wrong and TIP 11: Get Theatrical

I enjoy being wrong. I didn’t start out that way though.

Early in my leadership career, I was under the false assumption that I needed to always be right. In my thoughts, decision-making, approaches, literally everything. And when I wasn’t, I kicked myself. But over time I’ve learned that it’s normal to make mistakes and to be wrong. In fact, I’ve learned to relish those times, to celebrate them as the learning experience they are, and to sometimes go over the top in my storytelling of those events.

And there’s a point to be made here. There’s criticizing when the going is easy. For example—low risk, low impact, everything is going fine, no pressure or stress. Then there is criticizing when the going is tough. When the shit is literally hitting the fan. I want to appreciate the criticism and relish being wrong under both conditions, the latter being the most powerful.

Wrapping Up

I often use Steve Jobs as a leadership example. Sure, he had many failures and weaknesses as a leader. But there were things he was really good at.

Here are two videos that I would recommend you view as a way of closing this post. The first is an example of how Jobs handled VERY public and HARD criticism - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeqPrUmVz-o

I really think it’s an exemplar for this sort of thing and worth a look.

The second is short and sweet. It shows Jobs’ position on being wrong - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBlc4UX9vZI

I think it’s something we all need to grapple with around criticism. Around our ego, our intentions, our perceptions, our goals, and our intentions.

Stay agile, be safe, and be critical my friends,

Bob.

CoP and the LACE

SAFe LACE Alert

In my last post, I shared some ideas around the value of a Community of Practice and how to re-energize it if it’s lost a bit of momentum. Please read that one if you haven’t before reading on here.

Now I want to contrast things a bit between CoP’s and CoE’s. Specifically of the LACE kind… 

Contrasting between a CoP and a Center of Excellence?

There’s another notion you’ll often hear when discussing this area. It’s a Center of Excellence or CoE. My bias is going to shine through a bit here, but please bear with me.

A CoE is a more formal, top-down mechanism whose primary goal is the consistency of practice. That is, it’s focused on regulation and governance. Often metrics and agile performance metrics are tied to it as well. A good example of this idea is the Scaled Agile Framework’s – Lean-Agile Center of Excellence or LACE[1]. And you can also see the idea often marketed or aligned with the Agile PMO or PMI’s Disciplined Agile[2].

I’ve already alluded to the two problems I have with generic CoE’s. First is the prescriptive top-down nature—where the organization tries to mandate practices. I think that’s a non-starter in agile contexts and particularly not aligned with the agile mindset. So, implementing a CoE can actually do harm to your culture you’re trying to instill or support.

The second is that it disengages from the people doing the work. Which are the very people who are part of the “community” you’re trying to create. Typically, the teams and individuals only engage with the CoE because they’re told to. Not because they’re inspired to or are invited to participate.

In my opinion, you don’t create an agile culture by top-down mandate. It’s just doesn’t work. Instead, the organic nature of building a community of practitioners aligns so much better with our agile mindsets.

And the third challenge with creating a balanced and effective CoE relates to the agile maturity of the leadership team. If they’ve not evolved to an agile mindset, across leadership, then the CoE often becomes a mechanism for reinforcing controls and measurement.

All of these lead to problems if your goal is to truly develop and mature as an agile organization. So, approach LACE and all Centers of Excellence with caution and care.

 Stay agile my friends,

Bob.

[1] https://www.scaledagileframework.com/lace/

[2] https://www.pmi.org/disciplined-agile/people/centers-of-excellence

There is no testing in agile…only Discovery

Photo from - https://lisacrispin.com/2020/11/01/shifting-left-right-in-our-continuous-world/

• There are no testers or developers;

• There are no testing tasks or development tasks;

• There is no verification or validation;

• There is no test automation;

• There are no silo-based or functional behaviors;

• There are no shift-lefts or shift-rights or shift up/down for that matter.

Or there SHOULD be none of this!

There are only…

Explorers – who are responsible for exploring and delivering the needs of their customers

And they practice the art of Discovery in finding those needs.

And finally, they deliver on those needs. Sometimes making mistakes, but more often, delighting their customers.

Exploration is a team sport and everyone is an explorer in one fashion or another.

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.