Leadership in Self Organizing Teams (SOTs)

Probably nothing has been more misinterpreted than the term “self-organizing teams” in the agile world of software development. For some, SOTs are “leader-less-teams”. They are seen as teams with highly motivated individuals, collaborating with each other to deliver tasks. In his recent Cutter article, Jim Highsmith said, “for some, self-organized teams have become, antiorganization!” It is often viewed (by the misinformed crowd) that, because of the operational style of these “super-heroes” of SOTs, there is no necessity for leaders.

Well, I beg to differ.

In my opinion, leaders’ role is more crucial in “self organizing teams” than any other style. Lack of leadership nearly kills teams of any form, self organized or otherwise. Leaders are important for teams for many reasons: translate vision into deliverables, set standards for interactions - inter/intra team communication, unite and lead team members towards achieving common goal etc.

SOTs are highly disciplined teams as contrary to the popular misconceptions. Sanjiv Augustine, in his “Managing Agile Projects”, refers to these teams as “Organic Teams, enabling connections and adaptation through close relationships on small, flexible teams”. Obviously leaderless teams find it very challenging to accomplish these objectives.

I think leaders are naturally chosen by the teams. In all my projects (especially with “agile” flavor), I saw this happen. When you don’t name leaders, teams are naturally going to choose leaders. I think that is the best way for leaders to emerge. But a word of caution: I have also experienced chaos when people were confused and didn’t see big picture. So, you should be extra-cautious in observing the process patterns and ready to adapt to changes.

I also liked Jim Highsmith’s “six-point-formula” on creating empowered teams. May be we will discuss it sometime later.

Huh, heavy stuff? Let me sign-off on a lighter note. This is my favorite on XP :-)
Courtesy - http://beingextreme.blogspot.com/2005/11/light-bulb-jokes.html

How many XP developers does it take to change a light bulb?
What's the test for your use of the room? We cannot possibly estimate the amount of work or the resources required without understanding the "what". Why do you want light in the room? We can simplify the room by deleting the roof, walls and light bulb so that you can get light at least 8 hours a day - of course you should only be doing 40 hours in there anyway. And you'll never need a new light bulb! Which has tangible business value over the life of the system? We estimate it will take 2 developers 4 ideal days provided the roof doesn't cause injury if we refactor the floor first.

Gandhigiri and You!

Latest flick from Bollywood has some great ideas on how "Gandhism" can be applied to current world (our global audience who may not know, Gandhi is our "Father of The Nation" and played key role in Indian independence movement - a quick Google gets you 23 million results on "Gandhi"!).

 

Gandhiji is, unfortunately, is a forgotten hero today.  You may disagree with his actions, but you will agree that he was a great leader.  History tells us how powerful his ideology was in bringing an entire nation together!  That's the fact.  Though many of us (in this generation) almost forgot this gentleman, he was a hero for millions of our fathers' generation.  Gandhiji demonstrated some of the best success principles.  We will see how they can be applied (or at least related) in the context of organizational leadership.

 

Truthfulness and honesty are the core of Gandhiji's values.  He learnt very early in life how valuable these qualities are, and practiced them for the rest of his life.  His leadership-by-example model (practice-what-you-preach) inspired many to develop these qualities.  Let's see how they matter in our context.

 

Honesty and Leadership

Honesty is the best policy.  Isn't it?  I believe honesty is the best way to coexist and build long lasting organizations.  An organization is only as good as it's leaders.  It is the leaders who energize teams with their energy (incidentally, these two qualities - energize and energy - are the first two of Jack Welch's 4E's of leadership).  It becomes much easier for the leadership to motive and energize people when they gain buy-in.  And trust forms the core of this.  People only trust those who are honest.  Obviously, you yourself don’t like bluff-masters, do you?

 

I believe trust forms core of human relationships.  Trusting and being trusted are clearly visible in any healthy relationship.  And lacking them obviously results in conflicts.  Trust is built on the great foundation called "honesty".

 

Honesty is being yourself.  It is about being comfortable without having to wear masks.  It is this core value of people that lets them win others trust.  And honesty is strongly coupled with truth.  They are the Siamese twins of success.  As we observed earlier, without these qualities, people find it very challenging to gain trust.  It is this quality of being upfront builds reputation and wins trust.  Gandhigiri suggests the following simple practice steps:

 

1.      Don’t wear masks.  They are invisible to only ONE person in this world.  And that's unfortunately - you.

2.      Be genuinely interested in people.  Tell them how much you value them.  Tell them how you few being associated with them.

3.      Develop an important quality of leadership - listening.  Understand trust is NOT a one-way route.  Understand what people are genuinely interested in.  And show them how they can achieve them by doing what you want them to do.

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