EN Social Systems Agile
I want to contrast two perspectives on Agile:
- Agile as a machine: The Process Perspecive
- Agile as a living organism: The Social Systems Perspective
Agile as a machine: The Process Perspective
You view the team or organization as a value creation process. You view the world as predictable and controllable. The key to success is a proper implementation of a best-practice process (i.e. Scrum). Sure, the process may be adapted somewhat to the organisation, and it might take a few iterations to get things right - but a controlled, step-wise implementation of the best-practice process remains the backbone of your operation.
Key areas of focus:
- Roles
- Meetings
- Artifacts
- Process flowchart
Agile as a living organism: The Social System Perspective
You acknowledge the Volatile, Ambgious, Uncertain and Complex (VUCA) world we live in. You view the team or organization as a Complex Adapative System. In this system, humans are the elements, and their relationship are the interactions. As every action creates a complex reaction, skillful intervention requires continuous sensing and responding. Improvement is not a stepwise journey from A to B, but a dance in which you nudge the system towards a new equilibrium.
Key areas of focus:
- Team coaching
- Developing skill in problem solving, decision making and collaboration
- Cultivating empathic and generative listening
- Systems thinking
| Topic | Social system perspective | Process perspective |
|---|---|---|
| Mode of operation | Be Agile | Do Agile |
| Emphasis | Humans & Relationships | Processes & Results |
| Primary activity | Develop people | Implement process |
| Primary result metric | Employee satisfaction and performance | Frequent delivery |
| Ground | overview of employee skills and capacities | overview of the process |
| Primary reason for effective change | The quality of awareness, attention of consciousness | The wisdom accumulated in verified and proven methods. |
| Problem-solving | Teach problem-solving skills to people | Offer solutions from a proven method |
| Reflection | Teach reflection skills to people | Teach various formats for Retrospectives |
| Language | Lead change based on awareness | Lead change based on a method |
| Implementation | Observe, then implement | Implement, then observe |
| Problem diagnosis | Go and see for yourself | Compare current situation with prescribed solution |
| Cause of failure | Insufficient capacity/skill to diagnose root cause and solve problem | Did not fully implement the process fully (Scrum But) |
| Control (1) | Control through facilitating self-organization | Control through inspecting metrics |
| Control (2) | Facilitate decentralized self-organizing systems | Centralized overview to inspect metrics and adapt |
| Results | Transformative, Cultural, Qualitative, Multi-facated | Quantitative metrics, focused, delivery. |
| Frameworks | Theory U, Crystal, Heart of Agile | Scrum, SAFe, XP, DevOps |