Category: Interview Series

In this edition of interview, Daniel Gullo (author – Real World Agility) joins us for a discussion on exploring what he means by Real World Agility. This discussion passed through interesting topics like challenges faced by companies while implementing Agile, dealing with unavoidable cultural obstacles, mistakes that ensure failure, and advantage of continuous integration and test driven development.

Q1. What was the inspiration behind writing ‘Real World Agility – Practical Guidance for Agile Practitioners’?

Daniel: I wanted to write a different Agile book; different from those which were currently on the market back when I began in 2013. Then, Pearson Technical Group reached out to me and asked if I was interested in writing a book on Agile.  Pearson is continually seeking contributions from well-known practitioners in the field and I have a bit of a reputation because of the clients I have dealt with and my involvement in the Agile community over the years.

First and foremost, I wanted it to be a book that was easy to read, not something that required a huge time commitment. I also wanted to use a voice that was casual in tone, as if we are standing there together having a one on one conversation among friends. To that end, I attempted to inject some of my humor into it; but I caution everyone that I am prone to “dad jokes”. So, be advised.  

In my workshops, I conducted some research asking each participant what the biggest question was in their mind. I coded the questions, determined the most frequently asked questions, and took the top 65 to write a 4-5 page answer to each.

I also wanted to provide people with a nice sized glossary of Agile terms, since there wasn’t a nice comprehensive glossary at the time.

Lastly, I wanted to include real life stories from real world practitioners of Agile; people from all walks of life, all levels in the organization, their “My Agile Journey” story, including the good the bad and the ugly experiences.

Q2. Briefly describe to our readers what is Real World Agility?

Daniel: Real World Agility is practical. No amount of learning or training is useful unless it can be applied to real life scenarios. This is my philosophy about my current PhD journey in progress:  theory guides practice and practice informs theory. Much of it boils down to a research orientation toward mixed methods, simultaneously evaluating an organization and its individuals inductively and deductively.

Moreover, maintaining a systems view throughout by understanding people are themselves complex adaptive systems from the molecular level to compounds, tissues, organs, systems, and finally systems of systems and then seeing how people as a whole are part of other complex adaptive systems through family, church, school, work, the gym, etc.  Being able to see through various different lenses by understanding the ontology, epistemology, and axiology of culture AND individuals simultaneously is a key competency of practicing Real World Agility.

In essence, it’s like an iceberg, which seems to be a favorite model to describe many complex layers: The practices are what easily seen and understood above the surface, the commonplace and pedestrian. Examples are Scrum, Kanban, Extreme Programming, SAFe, LeSS, etc.  However, lurking just below the surface are the values and principles of the Manifesto. These paint the picture of the philosophy and mindset of what Agile means, how to become Agile, not just DO Agile. Below that, in the depths where the lower end of the iceberg lies are the cultural aspects that represent intersectionality of Agile and other disciplines; sociology, psychology, philosophy, et al. To understand how to make these values, principles, and practices real for people in their organizational context, it is vital to understand diversity and roots.

Thus, Real World Agility draws heavily upon the idea of emergence in cybernetics; the idea that the whole is different from the sum of the parts. Often times people confuse this concept by saying “greater”. However, to do so is to make a value judgement and statement. The parts are no less significant than what they represent together; just different.

Q3. Why companies face challenges while implementing Agile practices? Most of the times, the same pattern of challenges are observed.

Daniel: Etiology, one of the most neglected aspects of Agile adoption… and failure.  Why was the US weight loss market set to be worth an estimated $70 Billion in 2018?  Ultimately, the challenges can be attributed to unrealistic expectations. People want all the benefits with none of the trade-offs or sacrifices. It comes down to Economics 101: unlimited wants, limited means/resources.

For executives, this means not expecting workers to spend their time generating reports, metrics, documentation, and other deliverables which provide ZERO tangible customer value and instead, allowing them to focus on what does result in customer value. Giving up the illusion of control over work that can’t really be controlled; not in the same sense as manufacturing and production.

As Peter Senge has mentioned, the competitive edge in knowledge-work depends upon a company’s ability to innovate. Innovation doesn’t happen at 1-2σ; i.e. where 95% of the organization is obeying all the rules. Leaders need to trust the people in the organization to take risks and by doing so, will discover more efficient, innovative ways of doing things.

On the flipside, workers need to value their work as more than “just another job”. Engagement is key. Seeing their role as an opportunity to make a difference, to shine, to be a part of something bigger and more meaningful. As Daniel Pink and David Rock point out, having a greater sense of purpose is vital. The sad part is that quite often, it’s a Catch 22, stalemate situation with leadership telling people what to do because people won’t do things otherwise and people not taking the initiative or risk because they aren’t being told what to do and not wanting to “get in trouble”.

Another widely ignored critical success factor is the middle manager’s role in successful change initiatives. As Barry Oshry points out in his book In The Middle, the middle tier managers have greater potential to effect change across the organization than the upper tier or lower tier due to the fact that they can be more mobile throughout the organization and more connected with the upper, lower, and their peers who are also in the middle. Organizations fail to leverage the middle managers effectively in change initiatives.

Q4. Cultural obstacles are unavoidable in an organisation. Share three most effective ways to overcome such obstacles without hitting the motivation of people.

Daniel: First, we must understand what “culture” is and what it isn’t. Culture is an attempt to describe an organization by looking at how it behaves, what it thinks, its beliefs, etc. The most important thing to understand about culture when dealing with change initiatives like Agile adoption is the letter of the law and the spirit of the law, both formally and informally. These are the cultural norms.

Some of the norms are learned when people join an organization through their onboarding process. Much of it is discovered over time by observing how others act, what they say, etc.  Even when an organization’s norms say one thing or point in one direction, the individuals may act a different way. No one has a mission statement or set of company values that say “We strive to squeeze every ounce of profit from our sale of software that is barely passable in terms of quality. We do this by treating our employees like expendable assets which we mercilessly work ridiculous hours and issue impossible demands. When they burn out, we simply hire a replacement because all people are fungible.”

And yet, that’s the way the organization actually operates.

Culture is NOT something you can directly change. Culture is a reflection of the organization, remember. The goal is not to change the culture but rather, change the organizations outcomes for the better; i.e. increase value delivery. The net effect of successful organization improvement will be reflected long-term in a cultural shift, most likely.

Engaging ALL individuals throughout the organization and gaining buy-in is crucial to effecting sustainable, long-term change. If anyone feels that their participation is not opt-in, then they will most likely resist and subvert the changes. Thus, enlisting the help of the workers as well as upper management and the middle tier will help with identifying an organizational change backlog.

Q5. What are the three major mistakes of implementing Agile that ensures its failure?

Daniel: First and foremost is the reluctance to hire an external coach who brings experience, knowledge, and perspective to the table that is fresh and new. The best coach to lead an organizational change initiative is an independent consultant. I realize this may come across as self-serving, but hear me out and judge for yourself…

A consultant such as myself knows he will be out of a job the moment he starts an engagement as a coach; because it is a finite engagement. Thus, we have nothing to lose by being honest and forthright with everyone. The goal is not to “land and expand” and carry-on for multiple years. The goal is to quickly build trust, quickly enable the organization to deliver more effectively, and to identify internal coaching capabilities which can become the coaches who will keep the light on. I have a vast network of additional talent that I tap when there is a need; Agile developers, other Agile coaches and trainers, Agile business people, and so on.  

Second, leadership is unwilling to give-up the things that don’t result in value.  Everything from streamlining the meetings to metrics and reports to having teams spread all over the world (distributed). People often ask me “How does Agile solve the problem of having remote workers?” I ask them back “So, you have people working remotely and it isn’t really working out?  The solution is REALLY easy in Agile: Don’t have remote workers.” Organizations will resort to all manner of twists and turns that often resembles a cat falling as they attempt to avoid the plain truth that is right in front of them: remote teams and people who work from home are simply not as effective as those who work in the office together. The body of research has demonstrated this time and again going back to 1974 when the term “tele-work” was first coined.  

Lastly, this is not even an Agile thing really, but, having unrealistic expectations around employee pay, incentive programs, hiring of new talent, and so on. I know many organizations right now who are desperately trying to higher new ScrumMasters, Product Owners, etc. but they won’t pay what the market is demanding.  In addition, the job postings ask for the most ridiculous things sometimes. I am reminded of that video “A Job Interview In Real Life” where the guy is asking the employer if they REALLY are looking for a “ninja” because he has no martial arts training. It seems organizations want unicorn candidates with many years of experience to be Scrum Masters. I would put my trust in someone who just graduated my CSM course and became certified over someone who has been practicing Scrum for 7 years… the wrong way… all 7 years.

Q6. Your book covers how to take advantage of continuous integration and test driven development. How important is it in today’s world? Please share some insights.

Daniel: The truth is, most organizations start with Scrum, kanban, or a mixture of both.  Some are looking to SAFe to scale up to the program and portfolio level. However, none of these frameworks helps with the technical side of the house. If we are talking about how to improve the way the organization builds software, then most certainly, we must talk about engineering practices along with other practices.

In fact, it has always been my belief that while Scrum doesn’t explicitly spell-out the need for automation, that need is implicit, between the lines of what Scrum does say. For instance, if we have developers and QA doing manual testing at the unit level, functional, performance, etc. that MIGHT be ok for a Sprint or two. However, as time goes on and the codebase continues to grow, the time it takes to do manual testing will outrun the Sprint duration. This is especially the case when we consider that we MUST do full, manual regression testing each Sprint or we won’t have a SPI (shippable product increment) by the end of the Sprint.

Ignoring these practices, as well as DevOps practices and other engineering excellence, is the kiss of death when it comes to innovation. Teams must be continually learning, growing, evolving or any competitive advantage they have will eventually be lost as competitors adopt more efficient practices.

Q7. The concept of being Agile is quite applicable for entrepreneurs. Do you recommend adapting to Agile to entrepreneurs? How can it benefit them?

Daniel: I look at this question from a slightly different perspective. In order to BE Agile, you must think and BE like an entrepreneur, regardless of where you are in an organization. In fact, I gave a keynote talk on this very topic at the Scrum Gathering in Bangalore a few years ago called “Entrepreneurial Spirit”.  

Agile is very much about the idea that EVERYTHING is the job of EVERYONE; not that we don’t have any specialization. My point is more around accountability and a sense of ownership. In fact, after my talk, a fantastic book was released by Jocko Willink called Extreme Ownership. Reading through Jocko’s stories of being in the military as a Navy Seal officer one can clearly see that there is both a sense of extreme Agility, as well as, extreme Entrepreneurial Spirit due to the mindset of owning everything. There is literally no such thing as “It ain’t my job.” as I am fond of saying. When you are an entrepreneur, everything is your job, just as it is in Agile, or being a member of a soccer team or football team, or any kind of team or organization.

What Agile values, principles, and practices can do for an entrepreneur is help them understand that uncertainty is risk but also opportunity. Focusing on delivery of small increments of value mitigates risk and eventually results in large amounts of delivered value in the form of lessons learned and customer delight.

Q8. One question you think I should have asked you. Please answer that question as well.

Daniel: “What advice would you give to aspiring Agile coaches and trainers?”

Don’t focus on becoming an Agile coach or trainer. Focus on delivering REALLY well. Focus on sociology, psychology, and other soft skills, people skills, etc. Focus on learning; for yourself, for your team, for your organization. Focus on being and helping others to be…  If you give people the right opportunities, they will grow because they want to. As a REAL WORLD farmer (yes, I own a 10.5 acre farm) it really doesn’t take much for things to grow. If the conditions are right, nature takes over and magic happens. And, nature is rather forgiving… thankfully.  If you can focus on cultivating relationships and building a personal brand based on trust and dependability, you are already a coach / trainer. Getting certified will be the easy part.

Daniel is a well-known and highly regarded servant of the Agile community. His awards include The Most Valuable Agile Professional award for 2015, The Most Valuable Agile Professional award for 2016 and Most Popular Scrum Professional for 2016.  Daniel is founder/advisor to Agile Delaware. His experience includes numerous keynote addresses and workshop sessions. He was Conference Chair for the 2015 Scrum Gathering in Phoenix and 2013 Scrum Gathering in Las Vegas; where he reinvented the Gathering experience in the process. He has coached other conference chairs for Scrum Gatherings and Agile Alliance conferences. He is a well-known author and speaker.