The Agility Narratives: Recent Episodes

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As senior leaders we want to focus on the key conversations to have with ourselves, our leadership team, teams and our organizations around change and AI.

What are the essential three conversations to have? We will explore this topic.

Martin discusses the role of a leader as a change champion during a time of change, such as the introduction of AI. He emphasizes the importance of retrospection and self-examination in understanding how leaders and organizations respond to new technologies. He suggests that leaders should reevaluate their belief systems around new tech, especially AI, as it may not follow the normal hype cycles of older technologies. He also encourages leaders to create a culture of engagement and safe spaces for open, growth-based conversations.

In response to a question about whether it's correct to approach AI with a system geared towards yesterday's enterprise, Martin asserts that yesterday's enterprises need to update themselves to stay competitive and take advantage of new opportunities.

Martin then discusses the importance of an organization's culture in challenging leaders. He emphasizes the need for an environment open to challenging and being challenged, and for leaders to model being challenged. He also highlights the importance of having a diverse set of perspectives and developing narratives through storytelling and reflective listening.

Martin also talks about the role of leaders in guiding decisions based on context, understanding, and responsibilities for outcomes. He stresses the importance of supporting people through the losses that come with change and offering opportunities for relearning to those who show the capacity to adapt.

In the third conversation, Martin talks about the importance of continuous learning and adaptation in the face of AI's potential to change current and future paradigms. He suggests promoting experimentation and scaling successful insights to deliver more significant, holistic solutions.

Finally, Martin discusses how to get started with these conversations and the leader's role as the champion of adaptive change. He offers various tools, workshops, and techniques to support leaders in this role.

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About this event - LinkedIn Audio Event

As a leader, what are some of the complex challenges you face? Is there a mindset or practice change that would make a fundamental shift in the value your team delivers? Do you want to evolve the quality of the holding space with your team? Would you benefit together from more meaningful and challenging conversations?

In an era marked by rapid change and growing complexity, the role of teams is more pivotal than ever. But what does it mean for a team to be adaptive and conscious? How can leaders guide their teams to evolve in a way that not only meets the demands of today but fosters resilience, creativity, and innovation for the future?

Join Martin West, a guide to evolving adaptive conscious teams, in this live audio event, as we explore the essence of adaptive conscious teams and what we can learn as part of this journey.

What You'll Discover:

Understanding Adaptive Conscious Teams: Delve into what it means for teams to be adaptive and conscious and why such a shift could benefit your team

The Evolutionary Process: Explore the steps that leaders and teams must take to evolve consciously, adapt to changes, and co-create solutions.

Practical Insights: Learn actionable strategies to foster a culture that emphasizes empathy, collaboration, continuous learning, and innovation.

Real-world Examples: Benefit from case studies and insights from research and Martin’s experience with various organizations, highlighting successes, challenges, and lessons learned.

The structure of Martin’s 20 minute talk:
- The Need for Adaptive Conscious Teams (ACTs)
- The Principles of Adaptive Conscious Teams
- The Role of Leadership in culture change
- Cultivating Quality Holding Spaces for Adaptability

Who Should Attend?

Leaders and Managers: Those who are steering teams and looking for innovative ways to enhance collaboration, creativity, and adaptability.

HR Professionals: Individuals involved in people development and looking to create a supportive environment for growth and transformation.

Team Members: Anyone who is part of a team and wants to understand how to contribute to an adaptive and conscious working environment.

Entrepreneurs and Business Owners: Those leading their organizations and keen to implement strategies that foster agile, resilient, and engaged teams.

Why Attend?

Join this discussion to deepen meaningful conversations within your team, share your insights, and explore the benefits of co-evolving together. You'll gain valuable insights and practical tools to evolve your team's dynamics. Whether you're a seasoned leader or an emerging talent, this session will inspire you to think differently about team collaboration and leadership, equipping you to start your journey towards adaptive conscious teams.

Registration: Secure your spot today. Be part of the movement towards adaptive conscious leadership, and start your learning journey today. See you there!

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We are pleased to welcome Charly Cox of Climate Change Coaches to the Agility Narratives, where she joins us to talk about her personal journey as an advocate of climate coaching, and her book - a first on Climate Coaching in the world - “Climate Change Coaching: The Power of Connection to Create Climate Action”.

Charly is impassioned by storytelling and the desire to help others reposition their narratives. Today, she leads by holding space for coaching conversations on climate grounded in social justice, which is now building a global movement. Those involved help people see a different story about Climate Change, a human problem with a human solution, and not just something to do with trees, polar bears, deserts, and other beings in the natural environment that we care for.

Charly’s narrative started with working for a global organization. This led to seven years of work in West Africa, where she started the first Photography business. In this podcast, we learn that Scarcity was a key element in her awakening to climate issues, as it was the core issue in the conflict at hand. In her work, she learnt that Scarcity has a cousin, Overwhelm; both are, and always have been, clearly present in individual and team conversations on climate.

We found this conversation heartfelt and very timely in light of the natural disasters that are increasingly being experienced around the world. It sparks curiosity about being in the present moment, opening oneself up to love about the planet, and being given the opportunity to reflect on what we might begin to feel as the climate crisis is deepening. This makes for an hour of awe. Enjoy!

Find out more about Charly and Climate Change Coaches at About Us - Climate Change Coaches. Want to learn more about the co-hosts - Martin's LinkedIn Profile and Janet's LinkedIn profile

See full notes at https://theagilitynarratives.buzzsprout.com/ 1:38 - Charly's journey to Sierra Leone, retraining as a photographer, story-telling and becoming a social entrepreneur

9:31 - Scarcity has a cousin, overwhelm. Together they create inertia.

12:34 - The challenge with people feeling disempowered, and therefore not taking action.

13:44 - How does individual action contribute to systems change?

14:42 - We need to have a good relationship with the problem.

15:32 - Not sounding guilty or angry, but rather owning how worried we are

15:48 - We can move like a shoal of fish; we can shift systems.

18:30 - If you don't listen to voices of dissent, people break things in the change process.

21:49 - Being with uncertainty.

23:44 - One of the challenges for organizations is not slowing down enough.

25:13 - Feeling safe.

26:14 - Listening brings magic.

28:17 - Spirit of the magic of collaboration, rather than control.

32:46 - We have no idea of the impact of our actions.

35:16 - Culture Shift - an imaginative leap is involved.

36:36 - There is an arc that teams go through… and then the ideas come...

41:39 - Bridge building

42:07 - The role of love

44:05 - Sitting in the grief

46:53 - It is very easy to be angry.

47:40 - It's not a niche thing over there.

53:06 - Villianising is not the solution.

54:17 - Humanity is at risk.

59:43 - Charly’s call to action.

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Thanks Liz. In this podcast, you helped us embrace a world that is changing. You've introduced us to a tool, the Enneagram, a very ancient tool that helps us develop personal insight to our defenses and our essential selves. It is a slow burn which takes time, as people doing personal work create deeper connections and relationships with themselves as well as others.

You led us into a secret, which is yes, we can also learn about and empathize with others' natural patterns. While it is discouraged to type others, people learning the enneagram sometimes see things about another, great things not known before, and some of the things that have been bugging them for a while. And when they understand the natural defense mechanism behind those behaviours, they are more able to understand and empathize.

Liz describes the journey of discovering that the Enneagram is a portal to learning more about oneself, to learn about one’s internal self. In this journey, there are all kinds of ways to approach that. It's a circle, with a nine point perspective on the world. And there are all kinds of lines that connect us all together. As we dive deeper into it, we can each reach our full potential, which is important for individual and organizational agility.

Dive into the Enneagram - seek out the Enneagram Narrative - Learn more about Liz West at https://enneagramtraining.co.uk/who-we-are/. If you are looking for a book, search for Beatrice Chestnut. Check out her channel and the type panels on youtube.com.

Want to learn more about the co-hosts? Visit Martin's LinkedIn Profile and Janet's LinkedIn profile to know more about them, and what they do.

**00 - Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast
0:42 - Liz's personal journey - was introduced to the Enneagram during a personal tragedy and it provides an anchor for navigation
02:59 - Earlier leadership work

05:47 - What is the Enneagram?
08:15 - What is it about the Enneagram that links us into learning about our inner part of ourselves?
09:45 - What is it that aligns the Enneagram to be an agent of change?

13:10 - So in your application of the Enneagram, as you work with organizations and change, who is the protagonist?
16:23 - You've chosen the narrative tradition of the Enneagram. Why that choice?
19:10 - Liz's journey with personal growth with the Enneagram

22:11 - A description of a client situation with the earlier stages of a journey
24:26 - The challenge with adopting the Enneagram in organizations
26:27 - The inner work - the journey to become your true self - to live from your essential self - understanding the head, the heart, and the gut

37:45 - What does it take to move beyond where we are today?
38:42 - Excited to see how this knowledge can help them with relationships
39:37 - Some types find it difficult to take it on

41:34 - The Enneagram is a three-fold journey - the psychological, the somatic, and the spiritual. Liz outlines working with these three elements
44:00 - Building awareness and commitment to overcoming traits and behaviours that hurt others and themselves. They work on their relationships... and see its impacts
44:40 - What is lost if this challenge is not taken up? Emotional intelligence - why not invest in personal development?

47:03 - Liz's call to action - get involved with Enneagram, see how it benefits you.
50:25 - Developing relationships, and a community - of trust, understanding, sharing each other's joys and struggles
52:55 - About the learning journey of the enneagram and thank you**

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Kai Mosebach of Integral Works' personal journey starts with shadow work. He introduces:

• 03:44 the modules of Integral life practice: Shadow (unconscious), Mind (cognitive & trust), Body (emotions, life happens in your body), Spirit (mediation, observing your own system, states)
• 06:42 Integral theory - Ken Wilber initial story - All quadrants All lines (AQAL) of development

08:48 The Journey from shadow work to integral theory helped develop practices that changed his world view. He gained empathy to understand different types of people. 11:00 The Enneagram helped with a vertical shift in understanding. 12:32 Showing up. A good willed but probably a somewhat painful missionary. 14:17 understanding vertical versus horizontal development.

15:38 Kai started to lead - own shadow groups and experiments in leadership. 19:11 reflecting on his first experience of scrum/agile in terms of integral colors and structures. 23:35 vertical or mindset shifts can't be taught, you have to experience it. 26:46 What is the right methodology for the team? Get dragged v hold spacing.

31:06 Bring people into understanding - working with the heart, body and spirit. 35:21 Breakthrough moments - trust & opening and the team wanting it. 37:55 Who is the protagonist? Person who sees the pain and realizes the opportunity of development and is prepared to take that step - "It hurts more but it bothers you less" (Wilber)

39:51 The world is not the best world we can have. 41:49 You realize your theme over time - purpose - integral assessments and making development visible. 45:49 Measuring vertical development is an important step in building more effective happy teams. 46:58 Villains identified include i) Integral scene is cognitive and theoretical - it is meant to be lived ii) limited focus on shadow practice iii) perceptive on what is better...

49:17 Change and immunity - Robert Keagan - shadow work for business

50:46 Teal - bringing wholeness - structure and unconscious. 51:42 Is the framework holding space for itself or for the people? Gives ideas and structure Yet people are outside. 53:07 - Deliberately development organization DBO focuses on i) creating space, ii) shadow work and iii) it is centered on people

54:48 What is at stake here for your clients and for the industry to not take action? 56:21 Cultures and mindsets get built and our role in that. 59:13 What would be your call to action to a leadership team that feels stuck? 1:02:23 Integration of the five elements and Kai’s hope for the future, an unfolding universal v fights of conscious levels. Kai hopes that we realize the next steps. 1:04:23 The reality is each person, team, organizations and the world has to go through all development stages. All stages are good. 1:05:42 Three things to consider about vertical development. 1) explore it and out of this take action ii) Shadow - taking care of these is important (understand projection); iii) express emotion - such as understanding anger as a need for better system

1:08:22 Reflection on vertical development, what it means for agile implementation and this podcast. 1:11:22 - Substance & form - to see what has not been seen - placing people at the centre of development

1:12:08 Authenticity, a key message. 1:12:55 Structure has limited space for people. 1:15:00 Agility master (coach) & scrum master roles. 1:16:10 Wrap up & thanks

Kai - https://www.integralworks.ch/en/about-us/meet-the-team
https://www.integralworks.ch/en/the-modulator (view of methods across integral colours)
Theory of Everything Integral Business Spirituality - Ken Wilber
Immunity for change - Robert Kegan

Want to learn more about the co-hosts - Martin's LinkedIn Profile and Janet's LinkedIn profile

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Klaus Nielson talks about his personal journey as a product manager, his passion for writing based on his need to understand. How scaling of Agile, and hybrid models of portfolio management is challenging. He sees this challenge as the next frontier for methodologies to conquer, the missing element that will be solved in the next 5 plus years.

As hosts, we engaged in a more spirited way in discussing Klaus's narrative. This may be a pattern that will evolve for future podcasts.

Enjoy - Klaus has great knowledge of this topic whether working at team, portfolio or organization. I wonder whether it is the commercial engines of these methodologies that will solve the scaling challenge or will it be the customer?

0:00 Welcome
0:48 Early part of Klaus journey
3:11 Klaus's experience with predictive product management
4:18 Introduction to Agile methods as part of predictive projects
5:16 Approach to Agile - Mindset, Lean, Foundational writing, tools, artifacts... trace it back to Agile Manifesto, Lean...
7:08 Initially it was Agile at team level, now it is about many teams, portfolios & transformation
8:03 Is it the structure or the mindset? Challenging of mindset change
9:22 Best practice, adoption of methods including portfolio management and going full hearted
11:02 What in SAFe is not having Agile portfolio management
11:56 Who is the protagonist in your agility narrative? Leaders as part of a top down implementation
13:21 Having the type of conversations prior to buying and adopting a methodology
14:24 Does Agile allow for experimentation at team levels? Or is it the structure?
15:54 Do you see Xscale as descaling or as another form of scaling?
16:33 Adopting pattern as an approach to adopting a methodology. Xscale and Disciplined Agile
18:30 Working with people and type of dialogues or the type of conversation that support the scale processes
19:50 Does the type of dialogue impact the end goal?
20:33 Acceptance of constraints outside a team's control
22:08 What needs to happen in the team to leadership conversations for that relationship to be more effective?
23:18 Klaus's theme of agility narrative
24:46 What is your calling in the agile world? A new one every day
25:50 What are the constraints to being able to respond effectively in your responsive adaptive approach?
26:47 What are the constraints that people in the value management office are facing?
28:06 How to manage leads us to key capabilities? And Attention to how we listen?
30:06 Professional judgement - tailoring of frameworks
31:22 What is at stake here? Life and death for an organization.
33:30 What is Klaus's call to action to our group of leaders?
35:12 Summary of Klaus's approach. From where you stand, what are the threats and opportunities you see?
37:53 How do you see us progressing over the next five years?
39:19 End and the Thank You's
39:35 Chatting about various topics

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For more about Christopher Avery. Click here for the responsibility process
A good place to connect with us is LinkedIn with Janet, and Martin
Thanks
Please see chapter headings;
00:01:27 Driving question, why so many smart people are unhappy at work?
00:01:57 A personal sales a 25 year career in insurance sales
00:04:25 Back to studying, then working in consulting firm - creativity, entrepreneurship, culture building and worked working with IBM to build a team building program
00:06:17 The search for integrity
00:07:44 Christopher settled on shared responsibility as the space where individuals make this organic shift and come together as a team
00:09:38 The search for personal responsibility started... found research project with Christopher's mentor, Bill McCauley, and his mentor, Marshall Thurber.
00:10:37 Listening to narratives on why they were stuck and why they couldn't have what they wanted - They created the responsibility process
00:11:04 Team work is an individual skill
00:12:18 Many responsibility definitions - Capital R - Responsibility and its meaning - is owning your ability and power to create, choose and attract.
00:13:50 Agility's definition from responsibility is the "ability to change (adapt) without changing" (your identity)
00:15:33 The protagonist is the 3 or 5 year Christopher who wants to feel good and to be loved
00:16:29 Aspects of of the protagonist - a proposal of living life in reverse
00:18:25 Teaching on how fast can you get past good, bad, right, wrong as learned position abilities
00:20:15 Practical responsibility or extreme responsibility - levels of owning your ability and power to create, choose and attract
00:21:21 Profound role of the Law of Attraction and attraction patterns
00:23:06 Various thoughts have different vibrational frequencies, meta physical (beyond the physical) and biocentric design
00:24:59 The villain of ego, the upper and lower mind, Being anxiety driven versus freedom driven
00:26:54 The three keys to responsibility are intention, awareness and confront, which are all big aspects of consciousness
00:27:49 Letting go - identify the fear, blockage, even the pain, the symptom, and you can work to release it
00:29:05 The Sedona method - Can you welcome it? The frustration, the pain.... Could you let it go? Would you let it go? When
00:30:36 The responsibility process
https://responsibility.com/the-responsibility-process-poster/
00:33:52 What is at stake for people to not take any action - For people to live at cause rather than at affect in their lives
00:34:18 Coping is overrated - I'd rather grow than cope
00:34:51 We learned to reward intellectualism and haven't learned how to put the human psyche and consciousness first
00:35:10 COVID 19 experience - free mentoring with people who had high anxiety - the reason I can't have what I want is because of this pandemic
00:37:20 Covid had me in fear for 36 hours
00:39:09 People are stuck, what would be your call to action
00:39:42 Dealing with the real problem is rare, we generally solve to treat our anxiety
00:40:27 I love best practices are great as ideas, I don't love them as solutions. The challenge of advice.
00:41:39 The angst cause by should, good, right or wrong... It is your responsibility on whether you want to adopt this advice or not.
00:42:42 Solve problems by sitting in our anxiety and use curiosity to look at how we got here, at our thinking, at our assumptions, at our beliefs
00:45:47 Thank you, Socrates, practical program, at effect in our life and are stuck or are in charge of our life and we're moving forwar

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**0:44 The early part of Ken's journey with conflict, parents relationship, a shared heritage, and being close to Latino and Anglo communities.
1:42 Going to Berkeley, becoming an activist initially in the civil rights non-violent movement and working in the south
2:29 Part of the antiwar movement trying to stop the war in Vietnam and represented GIs
2:48 Legal approaches could not complete the journey
4:00 Legal path - civil rights, law professor, judge led to a point of personal crisis
4:33 A lecture on mediation changed Ken's life. The solution he saw conflict resolution to be.
5:59 Reflecting on last 42 years as a conflict resolver
7:11 The first few steps post that neighborhood meeting...
8:35 Understanding protest as a law making process and evolving towards collaborative problem solving
9:53 The law is inherently adversarial - a zero sum game
10:33 What mediating dangerously is about - as said by Gerta "the dangers is in life are infinite, and among them is safety"
11:50 Connecting mediation and systems design
13:18 Organizational conflicts as indicators of what is not working
14:42 Inside us, between us and around us. Conflict is required for paradigm shift
16:28 Conflict is a dance of opposites - inviting the other to a new dance with new music
18:02 Respect and disrespect - Will Smith and Chris Rock
19:59 Mechanisms of conflict operate at all scales
21:30 We can solve problems collaboratively with one another
21:58 Key tenets of Ken's Agility Narrative - An agile response - be present, deeply listen, and help the other person reach their point of vulnerability
24:15 What tools do you bring to the mediation? The tools of inner awareness, mindfulness
25:13 Empathy - A platform to find out what is true for the other. Relational empathy - experience energy flow between people
26:22 Approaching systemic conflicts is multifaceted needing a different set of skills
28:27 Three generations of systems design
29:31 2nd Gen - Design leadership systems (that reduce conflict resolution)
31:15 3rd Gen - higher order conflicts once we learn to resolve existing conflicts
33:27 In your agility narrative, who/what is the protagonist? Each of us.
34:37 What is your theme for your agility narrative?
35:25 The artful power of questions
37:12 The magic in mediation
38:17 Asking pivot questions as part of an organization
40:38 In your agility narrative, who or what are the villains? Your own worst self
41:18 The reality of being a protagonist and a villain - The dance of Opposites in Narrative structure of conflict stories
42:39 Destabilizing the conflict story (victim, perpetrator and rescuer)
43:48 Another two looks at conflict stories
45:39 What is at stake if people don't learn these techniques.
Jean-Paul Sartre "Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you"
46:38 Call to action to a group of key organizational stakeholders who feel stuck - Multiple Truths
48:01 The power of a planning process... may be constrained
49:49 Discussion of different forms of conversation
51:24 The value of dialogue rather than monologue AND Making Bread
53:02 The facilitator of dialogue plays a number of roles - including teasing out diversity
53:51 Threat, opportunities and mediation without borders
54:47 Ukraine and Russian war - the large scale organization of small scale hatreds - the power of the methodology that leads to war
56:19 What do you lose in your capacity to prevent war by making that assumption?
57:50 Our task as conflict resolvers is really simple. And we need a political system capable of mediation.
58:25 My brief wrap up and thank you to Ken for his agility narrative

Learn more about Ken Cloke
https://www.kencloke.com/
https://www.kencloke.com/books
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ken+cloke+and+vikram+mediator**

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We are really pleased to welcome Peter Pula to the Agility Narratives to talk about his personal journey as an advocate of generative dialogue and journalism that supports the art of collective conversations as a transformation tool.

Peter leads by holding space for and challenging changemakers, organizations and individuals with generative dialogue and connection found in relational presencing in the hosting of mini or community conversations.

Practicing dialogue with a generative approach, using appreciative inquiry, asset based community development and the power of asking launches the possibility of an experience of aliveness, delight and creativity and being welcomed and received in community.

Peter's story started with a start-up venture in generative journalism, the Grassroots Review, based in Peterborough, Ontario, with the belief that everything one needs is already present in our communities: all that is needed to be done is ask the right questions and tell the stories that result.

This belief in the power of community presence led to 18 months of Peterborough Dialogues, the launch of diverse Community Conversations globally, both teaching and hosting, including Cultivating Community Conversation that has reached its two year anniversary.

We found the talk illuminating, sparking levels of curiosity about the power of listening v.s. the power of distractions, being in the present moment, origins of inquiry one has, definition of community, my role as host in holding podcast space, and the benefits on changemakers and organizations that are navigating complexity with agility. This makes for an hour of awe. Enjoy!

0:00 Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast
1:06 Early part of your journey towards the work that you do - Desktop Publishing Revolution
2:14 The journey from publishing to dialogue
4:43 How do you harvest from a large group dialogue? Peter's exploring new approaches like Found poems
7:08 Are found poems meaningful for people who weren't at the meeting that day?
8:26 What shifted for you that rose from your curiosity in these practices?
9:47 The flow of meaning - Peter's passion and curiosity about the root of dialogue
14:10 Tenets of my agility narrative - Peter aims starts with the realization of every person's potentiality and act of mutuality - in relation
15:59 Exploring the practice of relational presencing
18:43 The community member is the protagonist
19:55 Emergence in community dialogue and the idea of being open to surprise
23:45 The power of being present
27:39 notion of living wholeness, a journey or generative wholeness? (the theme)
29:08 notion of living wholeness, a journey or generative wholeness?
30:34 Applying these techniques to organizations - To discover and explore a next step in social evolution or the way we are organized
36:40 Villains - abstraction, dissociation, co-dependency, consumption, homogeneity, deference to experts and maybe consensus, collectivism,
38:58 Moving beyond these villains
40:28 The theme behind your villians - how do we see separation and alienation in conversations
42:27 What's at stake here? Living Life
44:41 Advice to stakeholders that feel stuck - What's Peter's call to action?
47:49 Defining the meaning of democracy as a way of life - conditions for each person's potentiality
50:52 I ask 4 questions. If if you, Martin, want to step in and move, create, initiate something
52:28 Threats - Despair, hollowness... powerlessness, loneliness...
54:58 Opportunities - A live life - An encounter with life in all its forms is the possibility
56:07 What other languages would you like to introduce?
56:50 Thank you Peter for flow of meaning you have engaged us in- lots to get to know
Janet is Founder of Taproot.jem.Systems is an integral coach
Martin is Founder of Neutral Advocate.

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We are really pleased to welcome Kerry Woodcock to the Agility narratives to talk about her personal journey as an advocate of change and the challenges she sees for organizations in being responsive to opportunity and change.

Kerry leads by holding and challenging leaders, organizations and social systems to amplify the power of relationship

Weaving together innovations from change leadership, adult development and systems coaching, she coaches leaders and teams to develop collective leadership capacity.

Kerry is a great story teller - how curiosity, connectedness and separation was a core experience growing up in a market town in Northern part of UK. How it was built upon living in a village in the Eastern Arc mountains, Tanzania for four years in forestry reservation.

How change makers are people embracing introspection, and reflection. How she feels the villains are the things that get in the way of introspection and reflection and awareness...

I found the talk challenging, thoughtful with deep gut level concepts like a time for pause, space in between, fascination, curiosity, connectiveness, being separate, introspection and reflection, relational systems... ". Enjoy!

0:00 - Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast and first question
1:42 - Kerry's personal story - early reflections on influences that developed her curiousity
4:09 - Being a lightsprite! Being fascinated by ourselves and the space in between. That is where the possibilities come from.
5:33 - Living in one village in the Eastern Arc mountains, Tanzania for four and a half years (Forest Reservation)
8:19 - Being alone, separate and connected - Travels between Tanzania, UK and then to Canada and coaching
11:23 - Exploring and finding the right match for coaching approach "the space in between"
12:38 - Context for the Agility Narratives on Social intelligence and the third relationship systems intelligence - this is about tapping into what is trying to happen
14:15 - Tools to make the invisible visible and developing those skills within leaders
15:29 - The Agility Narratives - the protoganist is The HR & OD leader / change maker
18:23 - The relational dynamics of conflict with people coming from different positions and responding to change
20:20 - Change leaders are those that are willing to look inside themselves, their systems and teams... and are working with others in the organization
21:55 - The Agility Narrative Theme - The dance of Separate and connected at the same time AND being introspective and reflective at the same time
22:55 - The dance - your impact as a leader. - systems depend on people playing internal & external roles and understanding their power
24:55 - Role confusion - Competitive roles .v. collaborative roles
25:14 - Experience with environments that have different levels of separateness and connectiveness
27:20 - The villains are the things that get in the way of introspection, reflection and awareness of yourself and the systems
28:23 - Fear and exploring the low dream
30:00 - What is the antidote to fear? Stepping into purpose and meaning
31:18 - If clients can't get past fear, what is at stake for clients and the industry?
33:11 - role of ecosystems in moving towards a stronger relational systems approach?
35:01 - Advice to leaders who feel stuck - Starting with their fears - allowing them to get curious about them
37:09 - The call to action is to do the introspective and reflective work
38:46 - A time for pause - From the pandemic, people are considering how do they want to connect with the world, social justice and climate...
40:40 - Introspective - can't just stay with us as individuals but needs to expand to us as a collective
42:12 - Thank you Kerry for getting to think about some themes of the conversation - pause, fascination, curiosity, relational systems and ecosystems.

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Larry's shares his agility narrative, tells us a story of many aha! moments where he learned the power and impact of innovation in terms of:

• technology
• work process
• focus on the why? and targeting impacts
• people
• having real conversations.

Enjoy! Larry

Thank you Janet for being the co-host on this event and for your highly insightful questions.

0:00
Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast
2:18
The first time Larry moved away from how projects were done And the Ice service in CANADA
3:55
Speed of delivery through early version of service orientated architecture
5:29
Learned that innovation delivered great results, this time changing how people work together
7:32
More Aha! moments - the importance of why and impact
9:02
Training on Agility and Value management, working with PMI and Prince2 on Agile - Too early
10:41
Cognitive diversity and putting people at the centre of transformation
11:23
The system is the villain and the people are the protagonist
11:49
Change is about engaging with people and creating the environment for it to happen
12:34
The Theme of Larry's Agility Narrative
13:54
Optimizing contribution - Intuitively knowing how best to contribute and the invite
15:06
Constrained innovation and Covid-19. If you are not willing to look at the fundamentals, then you are not serious about change
18:24
What is at stake for government and commerce if they don't take change seriously
19:28
How do you address your villain i.e. "the system"? A fundamental change in how leaders think.
20:46
Learning to be comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity as they have weaned on predictive planning
21:10
Thinking/behaviour patterns, and real conversations
23:32
Call to action - Start small, invite people and see how it works
25:27
We just need to understand how to have a conversation
27:41
Acknowledging the conversation we have had and going full circle.
28:02
Thank you and opportunity to take the threads of this conversation forward.

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Peter Merel, founder of xScale Alliance, in his Agility Narrative talks through the xScale's approach to agility, and enabling organizations build capability to respond to market conditions.

He talks through how learning flow in an organization is key to responding to market change. This is something that 95% of agile transformations do not achieve effectively, according to the longest and largest survey in the Agile world, "The state of Agile Report".

Peter is highly entertaining, with great stories of the birth of Agile and XP. Enjoy...

0:01 Welcome & Intro

1:21 Peter's early engagement with XP

3:49 The birth of Agile (before the manifesto)

5:01 then Snowbird happened and I was busy...

5:21 The story of to xScale

8:35 Why is learning flow so critical?

11:00 How to improve learning flow by looking at constraints?

12:14 Learning flows as a product

13:03 Importance of market constraints

13:51 Onboarding people

15:33 "The Progressives"

17:00 using trust to scale teams

19:04 Responding to market conditions

21:01 Changing market conditions, design and patterns

24:32 "How do teams make decisions?"

29:19 Villains are also heroes

30:33 Changing the game - game theoretics to reward mutual benefit

32:28 What at stake for us?

35:22 Noble intent and the wrong track

37:04 Call to action - key learning constraint, starting with an open space

40:39 Pattern language used to have a conversation

42:21 Ongoing process, 3 month change increment

44:40 The threats and opportunities are often same

47:31 Getting ahead - pirate canvas

48:11 As business agilists, who are our clients?

49:08 xScale Alliance offering's

50:50 The importance of these conversations

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Mike's journey has been driven through curiosity. As an agilist with IT software delivery background, he brings organizational & relational systems coach and mediator to leadership coaching.

He uses a broad set of tools he integrates to great effect to help leaders as a coach. His protagonists in his agility narrative are leaders seeking change. The theme is meaningful connection with showing how fear, the villain of the narrative, breaks trust and connection. He also discusses resolution processes where interests compete and trust is in place.

His call to action is to work with neutral third parties to help lay out your thoughts, similar to how executive coaches are used today, but for relational issues. He sees great opportunity in the movement towards the engaged workforce, people oriented cultures, purpose driven organizations.

We really enjoyed this conversation and seeing how Mike integrates mediation into his coaching practice with leaders. We hope you will enjoy this conversation and find it insightful. We did.

00:00:00
Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast

00:00:13
Mike's Introduction

00:00:46
Mike's Agile Origin Story

00:02:19
Mike's journey to the organizational-leadership aspects of Agile

00:05:02
Mike's experience with conflict

00:06:28
Context to Mike's agility narrative - How he integrates coaching, relational techniques and mediation

00:08:49
Martin's experience with integrating different relational approaches

00:09:47
Mike's protagonist - Leaders wanting to make an impact

00:10:00
Mike's theme is connection to self, others and the ecosystem

00:10:58
We are hardwired to be in connection

00:14:18
Discussing the "villain" - Fear breaks connection

00:17:32
Fear, conversations, assumptions, experiments and challenging assumptions

00:19:20
Exploring interests in context of trust and shared interests

00:21:04
Exploring competing and underlying interests are

00:24:23
What's at stake of not having these types of conversation that make connection meaningful

00:25:52
The call to action - Understand the value of a neutral third party

00:28:01
The opportunity in movement towards the engaged workforce, people oriented cultures, purpose driven organizations

00:29:10
Threats to human connection

00:29:55
Thank you - Sharing about how we enjoyed "geeking out" as agilists and mediators

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**I really enjoyed hearing about Francois' transition from an early idealistic young agile evangelist to an independent coach and trainer. And how a crucial conversation with a wise mentor helped him make the decision to transition. The context of his Agility Narrative is leadership in a VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous) world. Key insights he shared are about sensing reality, being open about our models’ limitations, connecting through conversations and iteratively taking adaptive action. He cites examples such as COVID-19 and Climate change. He talks about types of leaders we need in a VUCA world and we discussed how aspiration or fear impacts how we respond and take adaptive action.

In his Agility Narrative, he identifies that this journey starts with ourselves doing personal work to create a culture of conversation, referencing gardening and permaculture. With his narrative theme, he invites us to improve how we have conversations, how we listen/hear ourselves, our teams and organizations, and the broader world including Mother Earth. Francois wants for his clients to venture into deeper conversations and explore the many dimensions of working together. He talks about the value of clarity, learning from antagonists, learning to let go, and the importance of generative conversations to face our future. Thanks Francois.

0:00
Welcome to The Agility Narratives Podcast
1:11
Francois's introduction to Agile
3:11
Francois's story of the young evangelist comes home.
4:57
Francois's leap into being an independent coach and trainer for scrum teams
5:59
Agile in 2008-2010 - Speaking at conferences, training and helping establish new teams in a diverse set of mandates
8:16
Francois's career at 2015-2016 - Big frameworks competing, certifications, lipstick on the pig!
10:04
Context for The Agility Narrative - VUCA World - who is suitable to lead in a world with Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity? i.e. during COVID-19 and Climate Change
13:47
Impact of aspiration and fear as a driver of adaptive action. We need the type of creativity that comes from safety
16:59
One of the protagonists in Francois' Agility narrative - Your soul searching, your heart, your guts, your thinking and way of looking at the world
18:00
The WE quadrant - culture eats strategy for breakfast AND comes from gardening
19:29
The "Learning to be in conversation" is the theme of Francois' agility narrative
22:00
Listening to ourselves
23:41
Relating the power of listening for Agile and Organizations
25:37
Francois struggles with naming constraints as Villains - they are reasons for our adaptive action! How can we make this interplay between protagonist and antagonist as fruitful as possible.
29:01
Clarity in conversations around constraints enable the protagonist to refine the journey
31:27
What's at stake? My turning point in Francois's Agility Narrative journey came when I realized it is about people
32:34
What is the value of your narrative? Have I been able to deepen the conservation?
34:31
The monkey trap and what do you feel you need to let go?
36:01
Conversations, neutrality, and Switzerland - commit to be part of the conversation and a catalyst for a generative conversation
39:30
Thank you**

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We started this conversation with Steve Tendon talking about the theory of constraints and doing a deep dive into how Steve has taken the theory of constraints and applied it to knowledge work. It's fascinating. It's interesting. We didn't end up getting to the agility narrative until 25 minutes in. Feel free to skip around this interview.

Steve has applied the theory of constraints to a service based business. The big challenge when searching for the core constraint in the system is the high variance in knowledge work. i.e. The wandering constraints symptom

He explains that he instruments for work execution signals studying how work moves across the organization. Logging when work starts and finishes provides the core data to manage operational flow.

Steve introduces Herbie as the constraint that limits the performance of a system. How can we find Herbie? Finding the constraint in each team i.e. the constraints in the work process. And the constraint that limits performance of the entire system - The constraint in the workflow. And finally the constraint in the work execution

And much more….

**Steve talks about the value of agility and who is his protagonist in his agility narrative. Steve's theme for the Agility Narrative? 3 Foundational Patterns - Inspired leadership, Unity of Purpose and Community of Trust. And he identifies the more important question is to connect intent with "what I should not do today?"

More about Steve and his work can be found on https://tameflow.com/**

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Ardi learned Agile & fell in love with products working with small teams in a startup and a 3D product company. After this, she became an Agile coach, exploring agile in government, through consulting assignments and in large financial services.  She has impacted many in the Toronto area as a community leader, supporting and running meetups. 

For Ardi, Agile is like bamboo - a living organism, flexible and strong. It's sustainable and green. It grows and evolves.  In her agility narrative, the protagonist is the organization that needs to fully adopt  agile. She sees herself as an advisor helping this happen, understanding how hard structural change is, especially when it involves adapting governance. 

The theme of the narrative is continuous delivery with sustainability and a strong focus on customer.  She reminds us to know frameworks but apply as it makes sense. To learn from challengers.  And to take the opportunity with agile as survival, and/or growth could be at stake. 

For leaders and coaches, she calls for more courage to do what it is right and consider the human side to increase employee engagement.

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Michelle shared her story of going behind the iron curtain visiting East Germany as a 16 year old and wanting to become a spy. Disillusioned by a CIA job fair decided to be a management consultant and worked with PwC and E&Y in Russia.

Her protagonist for her agility narrative is a caring leader that sought for the team high performance and high well being. The theme was about breaking through the iron curtain  of oppressive technology that seemed to eat attention and oppressive leadership to recover from stress.   The villain was largely tech that focused on stealing our attention. Her hope for the future is that we will be the masters of our tools again and that we as humans will continue to be as creative, as innovative and as magnificent as we are able to be without compromising our own well-being.

Learn about Michelle's perspective on  the battle for attention.  

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Enjoy Alok's personal story as a change maker, his patterns for success delivery of agility, organizational constraints, and his call to action... (a list of 5).

There is no cookie cutter... Yet Alok outlines key principles and lights the path towards success.

Alok, Thank you for sharing Your Agility Narrative.

ENJOY!

4:04
Alok's origin story with Agile
5:55
Alok's first experience with iterative process (DSDM) - Early Agile
6:52
Back to India and a process role - how this connected for him
7:54
Learnings from advising on effectiveness and efficiency
9:18
Balancing internal controls with external delivery - still as part of the mid-career journey
11:30
Starting Alok's agility narrative for today - Change maker or Agile leader?
12:35
Alok introduces the protagonist in his Agility narrative
13:56
When Agile is working well, what does that feel like?
16:10
Alok outlines patterns for success
16:41
Pattern #1 - Leadership through sense of purpose - The Why
18:38
Pattern #2 - Establishing The Agility Why
19:14
Pattern #3 - Know your customer
19:31
Pattern #4 - Adapt Agile to your core agility requirements
20:00
Pattern #5 - information radiators - Data, data, data
20:28
Pattern #6 - Equipping people to co-create the Culture Change
21:19
Intro to exploring underlying constraints
22:18
Organization structure as a constraint
23:32
Constraint created by lack of clarity for Middle management
24:47
Hard"er" constraints
25:39
The unspoken "internally-held" constraints
28:41
Alok, what is your theme for this Agility Narrative?
29:51
Villians! "impediments" - who are they?
31:02
What's at stake if these impediments aren't addressed?
33:14
In talking to a leadership who aren't where they want to be, what is your call to action?
33:45
Action #1 - go and meet organizations who have been on this journey
34:28
Action #2 - Articulate the need for change - The Why as well as the Upside & downside - real open discussion - Have guard rails
35:10
Action #3 - Based on that - agree on certain guard rails
35:38
Action #4 - Leadership create a safety net
35:56
Action #5 - Use an iterative approach to do transformation - And build in inspect and adapt
36:53
Exploring a practice shift to Product thinking
37:42
Exploring site reliability engineering
38:17
Alok, Thank you for sharing Your Agility Narrative

Episode is Live
Published: Nov. 19, 2021 @11PM Edit