Agile Management - Embracing Metamorphosis
Why you need to be both, an enabler and a disrupter.
In Kafka’s Metamorphosis, ‘when Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin.’ Following which, began a series of negative responses to his altered state.
The responses might seem appropriate, after-all who wants to be a vermin? but when viewed more analytically, it presents the perfect visual metaphor to resistance of change, especially if it does not look and feel like the norm. Samsa’s depiction, therefore, accurately portrays the underlying fear associated with change.
But what does Kafka’s Metamorphosis and this blog have in common? Well, in discussing the fundamentals of change, Kafka’s fear is an evocative visual metaphor which can be used to represent the fear found in many businesses to date, especially those built around a traditional, hierarchy-based structure with a pre-determined vision based on societal standards/historical success models.
Bluntly, it takes courage to accept and welcome change.
Or a Global Pandemic leaving us no choice but to ‘embrace uncertainty’.
The former, positions you as a leader, the latter a reactionary approach which saw several businesses struggle to perform in uncertainty. Mostly because an open-minded culture shift was not pre-determined first. However, here is where Agile methods are often most useful. Although, rooted in software development where rapid testing, failing, learning, testing, failing, learning are commonplace, it is a method, leadership style, organisational strategy, framework that is finding its feet in many other sectors.
Hayward describes, ‘Agile Management as a flexible and incremental approach to solve complex problems. Where Agile leaders, are both enablers and disrupters, creating a joined-up society and at the same time challenging how it operates at the most fundamental level.’ The commonly known Scrum approach to agile working, feeds into this but requires high levels of process discipline which can be challenging if not undertaken systemically. The barriers therefore are formulated around ‘fear-based culture, lack of clarity, distance from customers and weak collaboration within strong silo’s.’
Despite it’s identified barriers, Agile methodology is pertinent in todays’ fast-paced digital world. Requiring a values-led culture, the priorities must be built around four values:
1. ‘Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
2. Working software over comprehensive documentation
3. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
4. Responding to change over following a plan’
If undertaken with authenticity, research by Agile Future Forum in the UK has identified that more agile working practices, for example, are already delivering, value equivalent to between 3 and 13% of workforce costs in employers adopting them effectively. (cannon, 2017) Is this enough for it to be adopted across all sectors? One can only wait and see.
For references and more details on this topic, please read:
The Agile Leader, How to create an Agile Business in the Digital Age, Simon Hayward
The Metamorphosis, Kafka
Harvard Business Review https://hbr.org/2016/05/embracing-agile
