What is leadership Agility?

This workshop will introduce a promising framework for leaders to increase Self-awareness in them and help them connect the "Why" and "How" part. Over the years,

I have learned that the future is already here and that your organization’s survival is based on several critical factors—including its ability to be agile — one of the essential drivers to achieve this through leadership agility.

Learning objective:

-Introduce four areas that a Leader should all focus on.

-Use Ken Wilber’s integral model as an anchor point.

-Use “I\Its” quadrants

-Relate I/its Quadrant as the Future Focus of Leadership

- Increase self-awareness on what quadrant we are residing.

Discussion:

-Agile Leaders need to keep the balance to focus on all four areas

-Too much focus on the right two quadrants (and none on the left) leads to disengagement and mechanical agile implementations

-Too much emphasis on the left two-quadrant (and none on the right) leads to a lack of results and ambiguity

What's Unique?

I would extend this Wilber Model with a few practices that would help leaders to move from Impasse to Insights

This workshop is 100% activity-oriented and will enhance awareness level in Leaders.

A powerful tool help leaders to balance "I" vs "We" quadrant. Connect the "Vision" and "People" in an Enterprise.

Agility requires experimenting continuously in order to Inspect & Adapt continuously and to Learn continuously. So, it's not just failing fast, but learning fast. In this workshop, which is based on the concept of 'Probes' from BOSSA nova, we will learn what learning fast means for every individual and the organization as a whole.

By definition, Probes are small, safe-to-fail experiments based on hypotheses derived from reflection via per-learning on the current situation as well as on theory. This is such a great tool not just for Agility enablers but for anyone who wants to bring in change. They can design their own safe-to-fail experiments considering all aspects, and not just but also get validation from peers, users and approvers of the experiment.

We will learn to define experiments that you can use in your company for bringing agility. This will allow you to create an environment for continuous innovations, an environment where everyone is enrolled which will further create a win-win for everyone.

As coaches, our focus on any Agile transformation is limited to measuring IT Output (e.g. Velocity, Defects, Lead Time, Cycle Time etc.)

However the real value from Agility an organization can reap benefits are whether Agile has really harvested Business Outcomes or not. In my talk, I will talk about how to move from a focus on IT Output to Business Outcomes

In my talk, I will talk about how to move focus from IT Output to Business Outcomes.

Few important areas, I cover include :

• What is a Business Outcome?
• How Business Outcome contributes to Value Realization?
• Who formulates Business Outcomes?
• How an Agile Coach facilitate the achievement of Business Outcome
• Traceability between IT Output- Business Outcome - Value Realization
• Business Outcomes with examples (NPS, Release frequency etc.)

Micro Abstract: A single demo is worth a 100 meetings

Abstract:
Dojo Delivery Agility is an abstract (non prescriptive ) Agile product development framework built to augment the Dojo way of working across teams. Built on the concept of hyper sprints, Dojo Delivery Agility enables teams to build “E-shaped” skills to unlock the next level of productivity and predictability. Dojo Delivery Agility as a process framework is crafted on the fundamentals of SCRUM, XP, and Agile Dojo.

Agile Dojo is well known coaching strategy but this talk is about our experiences with respect to our experiments with Dojo as a product development framework across different domains. Our experiences include mostly learning from failures and successes and hence the session would be driven by case studies. We will also be discussing our studies on teams that adopted Dojo as a way of working which showcased substantial improvement in predictability, productivity, and technical agility. We will also touch upon how Dojo acted as a constructive constrain to triggers change for good. Last but not the least we will also discuss our SENSI program which helped us scale our Dojo Delivery Agility capability of practitioners

Psychological safety has become an integral part of an organization these days. Amy Edmondson, professor at Harvard Business School, first identified the concept of psychological safety in work teams in 1999. Since then, she has observed how companies with a trusting workplace perform better.

Through the workshop, we will be promoting the same culture that Amy has promoted.

It is going to be a hands-on exercise with the help of Lego and it will give participants

- A perspective to have innovative thinking

- A thought process to overcome conflicts

- A way to build self-motivated teams and

- An aim to encourage experimentation

This style is also known as kinesthetic learning that helps teams to be fearless. It not only encourages active listening but also promotes a Speak Up culture to create a safe environment.

A common understanding about different Agile methodology is that those are implacable only in software project. But I want to share my experience, how a failed IT infrastructure project became a successful one after following Agile way where internal & external stakeholders and team members are not aware of Agile properly.

Transformation has become the buzz word of the times with it spreading over various manifestations like agile, devops, business agility, organizations transformation etc. At the same time most transformation initiatives are driven in a global organizational and team environment.

In a global environment, we look at scaling and standardization quite frequently. Organizations train everyone alike with same content, same philosophy, same tools, and standards yet we struggle in producing exceptional/uniform results that are sustainable. We see teams falling back to their old ways of working leaving a question on the transformation itself.

Transformation is often seen as a series of changes in the way we work, the process rules, the way we are structured and several other things. However none of the changes mentioned above guarantees a transformation that is sustainable in delivering business value.

In this talk, we explore

• The possible areas to look at why often we fail in sustainable transformation
• Even after a transformation exercise, why do organizations have to still deal with areas of accountability, commitment and ownership and delivery at cadence.
• What really matters in a transformation exercise, are we focusing on the right things?
• Essential ingredients for a sustainable transformation

In an Agile world,we are being asked to move faster—reducing the length of time to delivery while still continuing to improve the quality. At the same time, we are faced with increased pressure to reduce testing costs. The main aim of Shifting left is ‘Early Defect Detection to Defect Prevention’.

Bugs are cheaper when caught young. Being a testing professional during start of my career where i have seen the agile transformation from ground zero. I have experienced all what a tester can face usually in start of a agile way of working.

Most difficult phase is shift from defect identification or detection mode towards a more collaborative approach of defect prevention.

Why a tester was no more quality police and he/she is not the sole responsible person for quality but it was whole team. Development teams need to focus on quality from the beginning, instead of waiting for errors & bugs to be discovered late in the game.

These learning and many more in my early career helped me when I started coaching agile teams for delivering better quality product. In recent time where I am leading a transformation , one of the major ask was to break the boundaries and silos between development and system testing teams. This topic is close to my heart because i have practiced , performed and tried to perfect time and again.

I want to share How “Shift-Left” Testing Can Help Your Product Quality? What it means to testing community, with vastly different skill sets, are getting involved in the testing process. More specifically, it means that development teams are being incorporated into the testing cycle earlier than ever before.

According to neuroscience - human Mind Power system consists of easily learned techniques that help you focus and direct your thoughts, and the first technique you’ll learn is visualization.

‘Visualization is any technique for creating images, diagrams, or animations to communicate a message. Visualization through visual imagery has been an effective way to communicate both abstract and concrete ideas since the dawn of humanity.’ Using visualization techniques in any gathering help to inspire creativity, focus and shared vision.

During our day to day working environment - especially in Agile WoW (irrespective of the frameworks we use) we have lot of opportunities to plan, strategize, brainstorm, innovate and generate ideas. These will always be incomplete without the application of Visualization techniques. Visualization techniques can be successfully applied to identify common goals, understand customer expectations, collaborate with individuals (multiple teams), and identify areas for continuous improvement.

Many a times, key events in our workplace are conducted in vaccum where people feel they are not engaged or disconnected or feel there is no value out of these. We can turn the table around completely by giving the dimension of Visualization using Visual Metaphors.

Agile methods have provided a framework for improving innovation, but there has been a missing piece - Visual metaphors (influenced by Innovation Games ideas) offer ideas, tools & practices to aid the innovation process at its most critical point - product management, particularly visioning & roadmaps identification. Key to innovation is creating collaborative, interactive, visually-oriented, fun, business-driven-environment for people.

In this interactive workshop participants would be experiencing some of the popular & widely used Visual Metaphors that can assist in their Agile journey through which they can experience the power of these tools to generate better visibility, collaboration opportunities, sense making and continuous improvement opportunities.

Where can it be applied?
• Business Review Meetings
• As a tool for prioritization
• Planning, Backlog refinement and Retrospective meetings
It is time for some ‘hands-on’ and ‘minds-on’ to know more about innovation through visualization.

If you are interested in increasing utilisation of the team, this talk may not be for you.

However if you are interested in increasing the effectiveness of the team, make Scrum events very engaging and fun, want to move towards cross-skilling and remove dependencies on any team-member, or - improve knowledge sharing or minimise time taken to perform for a new team member, this talk is for you.

During this talk we'll try to find the answer to the following questions:

* Why should multiple people work on one task? Isn't it unreasonable?

* Why should we even care for collaborative way of working?

* What are the problems in solo programming and how does collaborative programming techniques fix them?

In our workplace - at some point of time, we have all experienced the elephant in the room—a situation probably no one wants to discuss/admit openly or obvious truths that are unaddressed.

When these issues are not addressed, it can create uneasiness, not trustworthy environment there by leading psychologically not safe workplace. More importantly a toxic work culture settles in that can wreak havoc throughout the organization thus limiting the ability as a team to grow and create a learning and innovative organisation.

In this session (more of engaged workshop) , we will be using Liberating structures for people to share their experiences and learn from others, while also providing them a safe environment to discuss the elephant in the room (their version) they might have experienced in their workplace.

By the end of session participants may probably come up with some ideas to address and tame their elephant.

Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland founders of Scrum mentions that Scrum is a framework for developing, delivering, and sustaining complex products through (as mentioned in Scrum guide).

In my experience when people who are newly introduced to Scrum they always had challenges in having better understanding of Scrum which is most of the time due to in-adequate training, support or guidance received during their transition path.

Most of the times I found that people are engaged and carry better understanding when new concepts are taught/explained/experienced through 'fun' & interactive learning.

Through this simulation activity we will cover below aspects through interactive,fun, engaged & collaboration based exercise

• Sprint
• Timebox
• Business value in product delivery
• Sprint Goal
• Definition of Done
• Product Vision
• Scrum Events
• Scrum Values (Openness, Courage, Respect, Focus, Commitment)
• Sprint Backlog
• Empiricism

The activity consists of 3-4 rounds (all of equal duration) where team would be going through the journey of product development & execution in Sprint fashion.

Agile Architecture

94% of Agile Transformations fail to generate the capability to adapt to changing market conditions according to the 2018 State Of Agile survey. 97% said their organisations practice Agile delivery methods ... but if what you deliver doesn't fit your markets, that's a trainwreck.

In a business environment, any potential startup may be your potential competitor and customers are served with varied choices, ability to respond to these changes quickly and with ease (agility) is the need of the hour for many organisations. Many such orgs spend millions and sometimes billions of dollars for such Agile transformation initiatives. What if all such spend doesn't change a bit in your bottomline and you're at the square one after couple of years of effort?

This is what happening to many orgs. I have been associated with half a dozen of Agile transformations since 2011. And I see a pattern in why such initiatives keep failing.

This session helps you to understand the repeated issues and provide options in handling them.

Do you remember the famous dialog from the movie Spiderman – “With great powers comes great responsibility”? Today’s world is driven by Software and as a Software Professional we have great powers and so have a great responsibility towards this world and the human kind. We can use our powers to make this world a better place to live or can destroy it with our bad practices.

The talk is about Ethics and Professionalism. As an ethical professional, its our responsibility to make sure that the work done by us and the practices being followed by us are benefiting the society.

The Wikipedia definition of Corruption is a form of dishonesty or criminal offense undertaken by a person or organization entrusted with a position of authority, to acquire illicit benefit or abuse power for one's private gain.

Knowingly or unknowingly, software profession is being infected with corruption resulting in bad behavior, bad practices and bad products. The talk will be covering some case studies and asking every Software Professional, are we doing the right thing for the society?

We have to do an introspection and ask ourselves –

1. Are we abusing the power to our's or organization’s gain?
2. Are we dishonest towards our profession?
3. Are we getting involved into a criminal activity without being aware of it?

We all live in a VUCA world. Organisations have realised that to thrive and navigate through this VUCA world, they have to create a culture of learning and innovation.

As per research a mere 1 per cent, feel “extremely confident” voicing their concerns in the workplace in crucial instances. In another study, 93% of people say their organization is at risk of an accident waiting to happen because people are either unwilling or unable to speak up.

As much as we talk of creating a speak up culture, it is equally imperative we have a culture of listen up for people to feel psychologically safe.

Leaders in an organisation play a very important and critical role in creating this environment where people feel free to innovate, think out of box, share ideas, experiments without any fear of repercussions. Leaders need to agile, be the catalyst and exhibit the core competency of being empathetic, being curious and more importantly being self-aware and have the right intent.

In this interactive session we will explore on how leaders/to be leaders can become the catalyst in creating the culture of innovation and learning and provide a safe environment.

Microstructures of liberating structures are easy to learn and it enhances relational coordination and trust. These are the best approaches to group interaction and facilitation. Its collection of 33 microstructures and their purpose is to involve and unleash everyone, which is essential in complex environments.

Every microstructure has a different meaning and usage, We need to select these microstructures wisely which suit properly in our eco-cycle.

This talk will give participants to :

• Select the proper microstructure in a specific scenario
• An understanding of the division of microstructures in different parts
• Case studies to use these microstructures.

Once we will facilitate these microstructures well with proper flow, it becomes smooth and effortless while sparking the important conversation as we go.

Let us all understand the 5 love languages which will help us to better collaborate at scale. Have you ever heard about the 5 love languages Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Receiving Gifts, Quality Time, and Physical Touch. Want to know more about this come on Let’s discuss in detail!

Did you ever understand the which is the prime of 5 languages of others so that your actions can be in alignment to their languages which will bring a better collaboration at scale. which will be of great help in your coaching conversations.

we will be discussing how at work, people express and receive appreciation in different ways. If you try to express appreciation in ways that aren’t meaningful to your co-workers, they may not feel valued at all. This is because you and your co-workers are speaking different languages. These insights are from The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace, by Dr. Chapman and Dr. White which will help you identify the five languages of appreciation in order to: 1.Express genuine appreciation to co-workers and staff — even on a tight budget. 2. Increase loyalty with the employees and volunteers in your organization. 3. Reduce cynicism and create a more positive work environment. 4. Improve your ability to show appreciation for difficult colleagues. 5. Convey the language of physical touch in appropriate ways.

Based on the #1 New York Times bestseller, The 5 Love Languages, Dr. Chapman and Dr. White which gives you practical steps to make any workplace environment more encouraging and productive, This talk will be an enlightened one for sure for the target audience.