The challenges companies face today in the VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) world call for Agile throughout the company. There are two challenges: companies in general are trying to survive intense disruption and companies with successful software departments are trying to expand Agile methods to the whole company, including the board and the legal structure of the enterprise. Both the VUCA challenge and the pressure to implement Agile beyond IT, demand guidelines for implementing company-wide Agility.

We discovered these needed guidelines in Beyond Budgeting, Open Space, Sociocracy, and Agile. Design Thinking, Lean Startup, Human Systems Dynamics, and Cynefin provide additional insights.

However, in talking with various experts about how to address the challenges companies face , we got answers from within that expert’s framework. For example,

• A Beyond Budgeting expert said, “Stop fixing the budget annually, because otherwise you won't have the flexibility to react to frequent market changes.”
• An Open Space expert said, “You need to make space for what you don’t know and can’t control, for totally new things to emerge. If people can follow their passion, you will be able to implement company-wide Agility, otherwise people will just do what they are asked.”
• A Sociocracy expert said, “You first need to resolve the power structure, because as long as you have a hierarchy defined as top-down you will not become agile.”
• An Agile expert said, “You need to start inspecting and adapting by using regular retrospectives in order to react flexibly, otherwise you will neither be able to learn from the market nor from within your company.”

All of these perspectives are true, but each perspective was always from within the discipline. We synthesized the approach into a wider perspective dubbed BOSSA nova: B = Beyond Budgeting, OS = Open Space, S = Sociocracy, A = Agile.

The synthesis leads to a new organigram that reflects all the sources of guidance to a value center. The new organigram focuses board/CEO, inspiration, and resource and legal considerations on the value center. The value center is thereby free to focus on the customer.

We discuss how to use Cynefin-type probes that enable everyone to apply this new strategy for implementing company-wide Agility in their own organization.

Business Agility is not just the new thing, or a way to increase efficiency. It is a very good response to the challenge of complexity and dynamics (or VUCA, if you like). But while Agile is mostly about transforming the operating system of an organisation, there is little about the changes of individual understanding and competence, apart from "learning how to operate the operating system". No wonder is there an ongoing complaint about people doing Agile, not being Agile, or about the lack of the Agile mindset.

In this talk, Bernhard presents the Complexity Compass, an effective starting point for anyone who wants to navigate complexity. This brand new approach includes a mental framework, a set of principles, activities and tools that encompass the essential basics that help you rise up competently to the challenge of complexity, both within an Agile operating system, and without.

Running a small business is no small task. Financial management, sales, hiring, managing people, and supporting existing clients are just a handful of activities a small business might address in a single day. So what happens when you use the Kanban Method to manage your business?

I’ll share my experiences while training, coaching, and evolving a small business using the Kanban Method. You’ll see how the Method quickly surfaced issues, revealed hidden opportunities for innovation, and how the business is using the Method to mature the services they offer.

Business agility is more than the sum of different organizational units that each implement their own chosen agile method on their own little island, constrained by 20^th century management. Nor is it a one-size-fits all model that is imposed from the top down. Business agility requires the engagement of the entire organization in a fundamentally new type of thinking. Especially when the (deep) divide between organizational silos risks being reinforced by the islands of agility formed by the, sometimes dogmatic, implementation of different agile methods in different parts of the organization. It also requires creativity and insight to overcome the relics of a 20^th century management system. Especially when the thinking that underlies division of labour, capacity utilization, and predictive control still runs very deep. Finally, it requires a new type of change that is resilient to setback.

This presentation reports on our experience with teaching and coaching business agility to a wide range of audiences without digressing into specific agile methods. On a tactical level, we discuss how we developed and use business simulations that engage and mobilize all levels of the organization (including higher level management) across all functions (not just IT, but also HR, Marketing and communications, Finance, Legal, Product management, …). We discuss simulations that allow participants to experience the basic concepts of flow, self-organization and active learning; not just simulations at the team level but also at a cross-team level and across the entire value stream (upstream and downstream). Simulations that are generic enough in order to speak to different parts of the organization, but specific enough as to realistically represent real-life work situations.

On a more strategic level, we discuss how to challenge the traditional linear, reductionist, local optimization thinking (“either-or” thinking) about agile and how to teach integrative, applied systems thinking (“and” thinking) as a new foundation for agile business. Using integrative thinking we will explain how the foundational concepts of flow, self-organization and active learning can be shown to build on each other in order to create a whole that is bigger than the sum of the parts. By setting aside any dogmatic discussions, it builds a common, deeper, understanding between practitioners of the different strands of agility. By using simulation, it allows to overcome the habitual 20^th century thinking and prepare for 21^st century business agility.

This will be a live example of how to use life events and analogies that are relatable to the fundamentals of Scrum. I will walk through my own personal backlog of living on the water and tie the trials and tribulations of such back to a Scrum Model. The details I share will be described in parallel to concepts that resemble a host of Agile themes. The intent is to have the audience consider some of their own personal experiences and how they can use those in future conversations to overcome challenges or resistance around transforming their model.

One short activity is facilitated during the presentation that engages the audience. This is intended to emphasize the importance of getting to know your audience and highlight the repercussions of relying on assumptions.

People are their most creative when they feel safe to bring their whole self forward. In our agile environments, we are looking for that level of investment so that individuals can flourish and our customers can benefit from what comes forth. How do we make space for courageous creativity in our workplaces? What does it take to really be a place that values individuals and interactions over processes and tools?

This session will cover how we move to a mindset that fully embraces people and gives them room to explore their full potential. We’ll discuss the fears and mental models that are holding companies back from this. Using the Relationship Bill of Rights we’ll investigate a possibility of what our day to day lives could be like.

Lean and Agile practices are fundamentally changing the way we lead organisations. More and more business leaders are realising that old methods of management are being replaced by newer and better ones. That means business metrics are also evolving.

Business agility sounds great but as an executive what do I measure for success? If I focus on just one thing to track business agility as opposed to Agile adoption, what should it be?

In this presentation, Steven Mitchell, will discuss two examples of how he helped turn programs around with focus on the number one metric for business agility, and explore related themes to aid your company’s quest for greatness.

Steven Mitchell is an independent Lean & Agile Consultant based in Melbourne, Australia providing training, coaching, and consulting services.

This session is focused around leading your teammates toward success over managing them off a cliff.

Most of us who have had the pleasure of coaching a scrum team have adopted the mindset of servant leadership. But what about directors and middle management?!

Do you have teammates reporting to you who work on Scrum teams that you’re not part of?

Do you report to a manager that might as well be on another planet?

If you answered YES to either of these questions, this session is for you. We’ll talk through the shift of leading over managing and how we can use the framework of the retrospective as a tool to bridge gaps, manage performance and promote transparency. Whether you’re in a position of leadership or individual contribution, the values and mechanisms we review can be brought back to your organization.