Transformationists: Only hire consultants with a plan to build people
So this may be a funny blog post to write, as an agile coach who is also a consultant. But I’m not joking. If you are a company serious about the success of your transformation, do not hire agile consultants who are not working to help you build your own people to drive the future of the transformation.
In the beginning, you will likely need outside help. There are many things to get right to ensure you are on your best path. Build great teams. Establish a product organization and mindset. Advise management in servant leadership. Create the right awareness, culture change and education capabilities.
But do not forget to build and fortify your own strategic people. You will need an army of scrum masters, product owners and agile coaches of your own long after your consultants have left. It’s easy to get distracted in the building of teams, project to product shift, and cultural and political challenges.
The single most important thing a company can do, however, is to focus on creating the people infrastructure to sustain itself once it’s figured out the big pieces of the transformation. That means having the right HR focus on role definitions, building career paths, organizational design, salary ranges, hiring strategies and immersive education techniques to grow, attract, and retain the right people who will continue to help your organization thrive in the future. Change is here to stay. It’s a VUCA world now.
The best partners will not just be knowledgeable enough to spark what your organization needs to build and scale in a lean, agile, modern way… but will also help you grow from within and attract the right people to build upon your early successes so you can accelerate your growth and transformation over time.
About the Author: Brian Link is the author of AgileMisconceptions.com (also available on Amazon) and the owner of Practical Agilist, LLC. Brian provides leadership and coaching services as an Agile Coach at LeanDog. Follow Brian on Twitter @blinkdaddy or LinkedIn, and subscribe to his newsletter.
