Re: Re: Do C-Level managers, and business drivers really need to know about XP?

Hi Steve,

 > I started by putting up a list of opportunities and asking
 > people to sign up for work.  I did it in "unattended mode" and
 > came back to find a lot of blank stares and nothing signed up
 > for...so I then went back to the more old fashioned way of
 > finding someone who is available, then discussing the project
 > with them.

One test of whether you're truly empowering (in a specific 
situation) is how you react if you don't get the result you were 
hoping for.  If you react by asserting control, then there's a 
good chance you were not empowering, but abdicating.  (I'm not 
saying that you were abdicating here.)

I think of three fundamental management questions:
     - What results do we want?
     - How will we achieve the results?
     - What results are we achieving?

The team needs to answer each of these questions over and over, 
at various levels of specificity.  A key meta-question is: Who 
gets to answer each question?

In the situation you describe, you answered the first question 
yourself (what results do we want?): Sign up for the work.  Seems 
like a directive thing to do, and perhaps an appropriate thing 
for you to direct.  Is that asserting "too much" control?  I 
dunno.  What do you think?  What did your team think?

You left the other questions to the team, and the team didn't 
know how to answer them, or feared they might do it "wrong," or 
something.  How can you empower a team who does not know how to 
achieve the results, or who do not know how to tell what results 
they are achieving?

 > My definition of success was that they enjoyed what they were
 > doing, did it the best they could, and grew in the process.

These is similar to my conditions for success.  I usually include 
one more:  The customers are happy with the results.

 > Therein lies my dilemna.  How do you strike the right balance?
 > Is it entirely determined by the team?  They want high command
 > and control, because that is their current comfort zone.  I am
 > not particularly comfortable running a development shop like a
 > military department.  Should I have rigidly defined areas of
 > doubt and uncertainty?

Empowering doesn't have to be all-or-nothing.  I often use a tool 
I invented called The Ladder of Delegation.  I think of a task as 
involving a number of questions and an action:

     What result do we want?
     How will we know we're done?
     How might we achieve the result?
     Which approach will we choose?
     How will we know we're making progress?
     Do it.
     Are we making progress?
     Are we done?

I order these as a "ladder."  The bottom rung of the ladder is 
the step I'll most readily allow someone else to do.  The top 
rung is the step I'm most reluctant to give up.  For most tasks, 
and for most people to whom I might delegate, my ladder looks 
like this:

     (Hardest to delegate) What result do we want?
     How will we know we're done?
     Are we done?
     Which approach will we choose?
     How might we achieve the result?
     How will we know we're making progress?
     Are we making progress?
     (Easiest to delegate) Do it.

You might include different rungs in your ladder, or you might 
order them differently.  The key is to see that you don't have to 
jump all the way to the top.  You can take it one step at a time, 
depending on what each of your teammates is prepared to take on, 
and what you are prepared to trust each to take on.  What would 
have to happen for me to take one more step up the ladder (for 
this task, for this person)?  Under what conditions might I take 
a step down the ladder?

I'm seeing that the ladder may be useful not just for me (and my 
trust), but also for people on the team.  What would have to 
happen for this person to be willing to take one step up the ladder?

Dale

-- 
E-mail: [email protected]
Web:    http://www.dhemery.com



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