Liv Up Operating System
How I organized my first-month findings of Liv Up’s context and culture to guide my work as an Agile Coach.
I’m a brand new joiner in Liv Up’s Product & Tech team, assuming a brand new position for the company as the first Agile Coach.
As you can imagine, lots of uncertainties are present in this situation:
1) From the team’s side to mine:
- What is an Agile Coach?
- Why do we need one?
- What does an Agile Coach do? And what doesn’t she?
2) From my side to theirs:
- What are the problems/opportunities people sense?
- What are the strengths of this group?
- What are the context and culture?
- Where and how can I contribute more?
Using these questions as a starting point, I decided to work on two steps:
(1) Put together in a presentation for the whole team some concepts and personal beliefs regarding Agility overall; (topic for another post)
(2) Be able to see and understand the current scenario; (the reason for this post)
While thinking about how to solve the puzzle of the second step, one sentence kept coming to my mind: “Our [Liv Up] culture is amazing.” I heard it from every single person that I had the opportunity to chat with. It was the first answer I got when I asked people “What do you like most here?”. For me, it was an expressive and impressive result. I needed to understand more. I was curious.
So, I decided to look deeper into it. Why is our culture amazing? What is culture? How can it be so present and valid for all? That’s when I recover from my memory my favorite definitions about this matter:
(1) “Culture is like a shadow. You cannot change it, but it changes all the time. Culture is read-only.” — Author Niels Pflaeging
(2) Culture is a consequence of “The Organizational Operating System”:
Every team has at its core a set of assumptions, beliefs, principles, practices, processes, and policies that act as the foundation upon which the day-to-day work unfolds. I refer to this as an operating system (OS) — a collection of implicit and explicit constraints that shape how we operate. This organizational “DNA” is so pervasive, unquestioned, and deeply held that we don’t even notice it. —
Aaron Dignan
A-ha! That’s it! I need to map Liv Up’s OS.
Mapping the OS
As a start point and inspiration, I decided to go with the canvas created by Aaron Dignan’s company: The Operating System Canvas, which I consider an excellent tool to organize and present all the pieces of information, creating a transparent and unified vision of tensions and bright spots.
To collect these points, I decided to run one-on-one sessions with the whole Product & Tech team. Here are some reasons for choosing it instead of a group workshop, as proposed in the same blog post:
- The Product & Tech team was small enough to go individually (~30 people * 30 min session = 1 week to cover the whole group);
- I was new to the team, so I didn’t know how safe would be the environment if I had everybody in the same room; Would people feel comfortable to expose stuff?
- It was a good opportunity to connect individually with the people, creating an open channel and understanding more of each profile in the team;
The one-on-one agenda:
- Present the objective and the steps of the dynamic
I need your help to understand more of our current context and how things work here so that I can prioritize better the backlog of initiatives based on the impact and relevance.
I propose to go through three steps: (1) Tensions, (2) Bright Spots, (3) Positioning in the canvas;
Don’t worry. There is no right or wrong;
Everything that you’ve sensed so far is important and relevant;
I am going to share a consolidated version, and no one will be identified. Feel safe to share anything you want to. - Tensions (5min)
Tensions are everything that is preventing you (or your team) from doing your best work.
You have 5 minutes to list them on sticky notes (one per note); Give me 3 to 5;
Questions that can help you come out with some notes:
- What is preventing you (or your team) from doing your best work?
- What is slowing you (or your team) down?
- What is our biggest problem as an organization? - Bright spots (5min)
Bright spots are everything that is enabling you (your team) to do your best work.
You have 5 minutes to list them on sticky notes (one per note); Give me 3 to 5;
Questions that can help you come out with some notes:
- What is speeding you (or your team) up?
- What is helping you make better decisions?
- What is our biggest strength as an organization? - The canvas (15 min)
Now, it is the last step. Take a look in the canvas and let’s, together, place all the tensions and bright spots in the most appropriated area;
* PS.: I had a printed version of the canvas
* PS.2: The idea of placing the items together in the canvas is to check my understanding regarding the topic since I would be the person consolidating all of them; - Thank the time and contribution, and commit sharing the results
- Ask for any comments or questions related or not with the activity
*After talking to ~80% of the group, the results started to repeat, but anyway, the gain of creating an open channel with the people was still valid and valuable;
Results
All the effort and energy investment paid off.
After one week, I had at hand:
- A concrete and organized picture, grouping tensions and bright spots by dimensions;
- An easy way to create co-relations between tensions and bright spots;
- A thermometer of the dimensions pointing out where to focus first;
- A collaboration catalyzer: it is an open document shared with all. They have the same information I do, so they have the same conditions to create, run, or suggest experiments;
- The input I needed to build the Agile Coach experiments backlog;
- The answer to the question that was resonating in my mind:
Why is our culture amazing?
(1) The company’s purpose is clear and widespread;
(2) People who work here are personally connected with the company’s purpose;
(3) Autonomy is encouraged and present in all layers of the company. Be protagonist.
Next steps
Updating the Canvas
This canvas is out-of-date at the moment it is done. I don’t see it as a problem since it is not meant to be perfect or the only source of truth, it is just a way to organize perceptions and inspire change.
The idea is to run group workshops from time to time to see how things change in the period and what are the new challenges.
[later edition]
Tackling tensions
With a more unobstructed view of what is going on, it is time to start experimenting.
By experimenting, I mean running some projects/initiatives by myself, but also engaging others to do the same.
Here are some projects that came out:
(1) Work inside the teams to instigate the “stop starting, start finishing” mindset along with continuous improvement approach;
(2) Establish the “Review & Synchronize” meeting to promote a space where teams can exchange updates, identify dependencies and process their tensions;
(3) Start Guilds to address topics like Hiring, Diversity & Inclusion, and Architecture;
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Edited: We are hiring! I need a partner into that Agility Journey. https://apply.workable.com/livup/j/862BB5125D/
