[OSList] Open Agile Adoption experience report

[Harrison Owen]

Wonderful story, and marvelous lesson: It is never about "how many" - but
always about "Who cares, and how much." Those who care ALWAYS make the
difference. I think. Have fun!

 

Harrison

 

Winter Address

7808 River Falls Drive

Potomac, MD 20854

301-365-2093

 

Summer Address

189 Beaucaire Ave.

Camden, ME 04843

207-763-3261

 

Websites

www.openspaceworld.com

www.ho-image.com

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From: OSList [mailto:oslist-bounces at lists.openspacetech.org] On Behalf Of
Daniel Mezick
Sent: Monday, August 04, 2014 4:50 PM
To: oslist at lists.openspacetech.org
Subject: [OSList] Open Agile Adoption experience report

 

As some of you may know, ASCAP (The American Society of Composers Authors
and Publishers) recently won the coveted CIO100 award from CIO MAGAZINE. 


You can learn more about that here:

 

http://www.ascap.com/press/2014/0610-ascap-to-receive-cio-100-award.aspx

 

ASCAP is an organization that uses Open Agile Adoption with Open Space. They
are one of the 1st to stick their necks out, and avoid mandates, and try the
self-organized approach to figuring out what Agile adoption might actually
mean to their organization. 

 

When we did the 2nd Open Space ("OST2") at ASCAP, the event was not as well
attended, and had a smaller closing circle than the 1st OAA Open Space or
"OST1". 


At the time, I felt like we failed. However, a couple of interesting
patterns emerged:

 

.      The people who participated all the way to the closing circle were
full of passion and responsibility

.      Those same people were the people who took the whole Agile adoption
forward from there !

 

Imagine my astonishment as ASCAP completed their mission-critical task of
delivering a new business operating system- the system that pays royalties
to hundreds of thousands of members. AND they got this done at a time when
the business was under tremendous pressure to perform. Furthermore they got
this done using agile ideas inside a 100-year-old-culture that was highly
resistant to change. 

 

What looked like a total failure in the closing Open Space was actually the
beginning of very significant culture change inside the company. 





 

The next client to use OAA was a progressive, FORTUNE Top-20 employer, a
software company. You would think they would NOT have a 2nd Open Space that
was less attended than the 1st, but they did. I recognized the pattern
again-the really passionate and responsible people were there, in the
closing circle. Furthermore, while the numbers of people were down, the
level of intensity was way UP-one participant remarking in the closing
circle said "I don't understand why the whole company isn't here right now.
We are making tremendous improvements!"

 

Moral of Story: If you use Open Agile Adoption, expect the 2nd Open Space
(about 3 to 4 months later) to have lower attendance. This is a normal
pattern. The people who are present in the closing circle are your new
leaders- the people who are going to carry the culture change forward. 

 

I welcome your questions as you ponder the futility of mandates (and the
power of invitation) in your own work with organizations that are working
hard to improve their culture-- and their results. 

 

-- 



Daniel Mezick, President

New Technology Solutions Inc.

(203) 915 7248 (cell)

Bio <http://newtechusa.net/dan-mezick/> .  <http://newtechusa.net/blog/>
Blog.  <http://twitter.com/#%21/danmezick/> Twitter. 

Examine my new book:   <http://newtechusa.net/about/the-culture-game-book/>
The Culture Game : Tools for the Agile Manager.

Explore Agile Team  <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-training/>
Training and  <http://newtechusa.net/services/agile-scrum-coaching/>
Coaching.

Explore the  <http://newtechusa.net/user-groups/ma/> Agile Boston Community.


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