Don’t Suffocate – Providing Your Organization with Air to Breathe
It begins with an encounter with individuals and teams struggling with individual and team capacity, and a cultural need to be busy. Expectations for individuals has been higher as illustrated by the recent cover of Harvard Business Review entitled “How to Succeed Quickly in a New Role”. Expectations for teams is even more intense, with frameworks offering promises of 3x or even exponential value opportunity by adopting teaming. Pushed by this challenge, I’ve seen it manifest into resistance by individuals and teams to the possibility that real gain can occur if they were to take a pause. We default to action, and that means get going now. Deliver something so we can iterate and get feedback. We’ll adjust as we go. We don’t have time for that, and finally the prevalent “too many meetings!”. Given the perspectives pulling on the system, individual or team, these are all very valid.
“Agile” has provided a promise of increased flow of customer value. We talk about process changes, introduce theory and practices and in support of client expectations, approach our craft with the traditional promises of consultant delivery. During conversation, I frequently find myself sharing this video on the Theory of Constraints to demonstrate flow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWh0cSsNmGY .
If you haven’t viewed it, it’s well worth a few minutes of your time! I am particularly fond of bottle C and the aspiration of a fast-moving organization with a calm environment. In this demonstration, air is blown through a straw, into the bottle to significantly improve flow. Many organizations are waiting for permission to breath! You may recognize this pattern:
Heads down, will power, push forward, don’t let my team down! Daily standups, collaboration, refinement, push-push-push! What did we do well, what did we do poorly, what are we going to do different? We must pick something to do different and quickly because it’s back to work! Come on team, why are you silent? You must be disconnected!
Within the frameworks, methodologies and practices supporting agility, there are multiple opportunities to purposefully and mindfully reflect and the current and identify what’s needed most right now. While they are sometimes easily defined, the complex nature of human systems introduces challenges on integrating the learning into skilled practice. Silence can be viewed as an indicator of our natural sense making process at work. It needs time and space. As you reflect on your organization and what might be needed most now, here are some questions to think about:
As my organization is searching for ways to optimize, does this illustration support an invitation to pause and take a breath and evaluate the current from multiple perspectives before deciding on the next course?
What is holding your organization back from taking the needed breath? What support is needed to create the air that your organization needs now?
In the moment of pause and breath, what would support a systems lens to be able to explore multiple perspectives?
How do leaders support safety and encourage possibility in the existing context?
If you’re interested in exploring the opportunities oxygen may provide, a coaching partnership can provide the structure for exploring and scaffolding for sustainable change, for both individuals and teams.