Self-Directed Work Teams

An overview of some of the ideas Kimball Fisher discusses in his book 'Leading Self-Directed Work Teams', and how they apply to the Agile world.

Transcript

1. SELF-DIRECTED WORK TEAMS According to “Leading Self-Directed Work Teams” by Kimball Fisher
2. WHY?
3. WHY SDWT’S? Self-directed work teams tend to outperform traditional operations in terms of: • Time to market • Cost reductions • Quality of output
4. WHAT’S THE RELEVANCE TO AGILE? • Scrum teams are a special case of SDWTs, so the literature is instructive • SDWT models can be helpful in assessing and understanding team performance • SDWTs can be introduced by advocates at a team level (not just executives), and understanding the end goal can help drive such changes
5. WHAT IS A SDWT?
6. THE FORMAL DEFINITION “A group of employees who have day-to-day responsibility for managing themselves and the work they do with a minimum of direct supervision. [Team members] typically handle job assignments, plan and schedule work, make production- and service-related decisions, and take action on problems.”
7. IS THIS UNUSUAL? • There’s nothing very radical about this: most tech companies give their employees a certain degree of autonomy • But plenty of companies fail to create true SDWTs, so fail to realize the potential of their employees
8. WHAT DO SDWT’S LOOK LIKE?
9. SDWT’S ARE EMPOWERED “Self-directed work teams are the most advanced form of empowerment [in an organization]”
10. SDWT’S ARE EMPOWERED According to Fisher, empowered teams require: • Authority • Resources • Information • Accountability This gives us the helpful mnemonic ARIA.
11. SDWT’S ARE EMPOWERED In more detail, the model suggests empowered teams require: • Authority to make decisions about their own work • Resources, i.e. the people and skills to do the work • Information to make informed decisions • Accountability for work done and decisions made Note that if any one of these is missing, any sense of empowerment is probably illusory.
12. AN ASIDE ON ACCOUNTABILITY Accountability is often confused with a command-and-control hierarchy, elaborate sign-off processes, or simply a way to assign blame when mistakes are made. In practice, a far more effective way to improve accountability is to: • clarify responsibilities; • create transparency. In Agile teams, transparency is achieved through iteration and regular communication (including stand-ups, demos and retrospectives).
13. SDWT’S ARE CROSS-FUNCTIONAL “Whereas a traditional organisation might be divided into groups of functional specialists, SDWTs are usually responsible for delivery of an entire service or product”
14. SDWT’S ARE CROSS-FUNCTIONAL • This reduces dependencies so the team can be more responsive • It allows for broader perspectives, improving decision making • It reduces the time for feedback from downstream processes, improving output quality
15. MANAGEMENT STYLES • Management of SDWTs is based around trust and delegation (rather than hierarchy and control)
16. MANAGEMENT STYLES • Douglas McGregor’s theories of human motivation (regarding management perceptions, not reality): Theory X (autocratic) Theory Y (democratic) People are lazy People like to work People need to be controlled People have self-control People need to be motivated People motivate themselves Most people are not very smart People are smart People need encouragement to do good work People want to do a good job
17. MANAGEMENT STYLES Theory X assumptions can become self-fulfilling: • they “injure self-esteem” • and “[cause] unhealthy dependency on management”
18. AN ASIDE: TRUST IN PEOPLE • It’s not just managers that don’t always trust people. It’s particularly easy to fall into this trap when working with remote teams, or when communication breaks down. • Of course, not everyone has the best of intentions. • But assuming they do until proven otherwise will make it easier to engage in constructive dialog, and foster a more collaborative atmosphere.
19. MANAGEMENT STYLES • Theory X managers develop a controlling management style. Theory Y managers engender commitment instead. Control Paradigm Commitment Paradigm Elicits compliance Engenders commitment Believes supervision is necessary Believes education is necessary Focuses on hierarchy Focuses on customers Biased towards functional organisation Biased towards cross-functional org Emphasis on means Emphasis on ends Believes bosses should make decisions Believes team members should make decisions
20. MANAGEMENT STYLES Adherents to a “control paradigm” frequently mistake being “results oriented” for “control oriented”. To realise the benefits of a SDWT it’s important for management to choose the commitment paradigm, in order to: • allow team members to contribute to the fullest of their abilities • engender commitment and motivate the team • give everyone a chance to learn, develop and apply their skills
21. HIERARCHY SUBSTITUTES • SDWTs avoid traditional hierarchies and bureaucracy, and replace them with hierarchy substitutes.
22. HIERARCHY SUBSTITUTES Scrum comes with several out of the box: • Product Backlog, to facilitate prioritization and planning • Daily stand-up, to provide information and accountability • Product Owner, to identify customer needs and priorities • Scrum Master role, to facilitate, coach and design team practices
23. TEAM LEAD RESPONSIBILITIES • In a SDWT, the Team Lead should focus not on decision making, but on boundary management • That is, the external limits of the team (whether physical or internal capabilities) with a view to improving and extending these boundaries
24. TEAM LEAD RESPONSIBILITIES Example boundary management responsibilities: • Issues with other teams • Customer/vendor interactions • Other corporate groups • Building communication bridges • Training and development
25. TO RECAP • SDWTs are empowered and cross-functional • Management is based around trust and delegation, rather than hierarchy and control • SDWTs replace traditional hierarchies and bureaucracy with “hierarchy substitutes” • Instead of decision making, Team Leads focus on boundary management
26. QUESTIONS?