The Ideal Team Player
Scene 1: We are embarking on a Digital Transformation Journey, Scrum here we come!
You are a mid-level Leader in a large organization that is undertaking several key initiatives to embark on Digital Transformation. Your organization has opted to pivot with Scrum, a popular and widely used Agile framework. The Senior Leadership team has entrusted you with the accountability for overseeing the initiatives and making them a success.
In the course of the next few months, multiple Scrum teams aka Squads will be spawned. Internal employees will be trained on Scrum. External consultants will be brought in to provide Consultation. 100+ full-time staff will have to be hired across myriad skill sets — front end developers, back end developers, full-stack developers, test Automation Engineers, Software Architects, DevOps Specialists, Scrum Masters, and Agile Coaches. 50+ contract staff will be onboarded from a Service Provider your organization has recently signed a multi-year deal with.
The market is hot where demand for these skills is high and supply is low. Your organization has decided to revise its pay structure to provide competitive compensation to attract and retain talent. The clock is ticking and you are responsible for overseeing the Hiring Process to ensure folks who are hired are experts in their field.
Scene 2: The Hiring
The interview process begins and given the number of open positions that need to be staffed and the myriad roles, an interview panel has been identified and for all critical roles, senior leaders want the last interview to be conducted by you as they trust your gut for weeding out candidates who do not have the right behavioral skills.
Within a few months, all the positions are staffed. There was management pressure not to be too choosey and the panel had to make a decision even if the candidate did not check all the key boxes.
Scene 3: The mystery behind attrition
A few months pass by and it's time for the Performance Review cycle in the organization. Your leaders and you have been regularly providing feedback to your direct reports but some of the team members are disengaged and withdrawn. You have discussed the situation with disengaged individuals, Scrum Masters, Agile Coaches, and HR and have assigned mentors for these individuals to help with a skillset and/or mindset shift to enable them to succeed.
During the last few months, it has dawned upon you based on your interaction with the 150+ full-time associates and vendor staff that some squads are more successful than others. Moreover, you have noted that some individuals with average skill sets have enabled their teams to accomplish a lot more as compared to some teams that landed with all A-star associates. You had expected some churn as new hires understand the culture of your organization and current staff adjust to new ways of working. However, the churn has been 20%. This leaves you intrigued and you dig more and try to find some logic or rationale.
You have a feeling that attrition would just increase if you don’t figure out the causes behind the churn. You know you need data and you go looking for it. Some thoughts that run past your mind
- Did we hire for culture fit or culture add?
- Did we make decisions that led to increased toxicity in some parts of this large initiative?
- Did we account for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion?
You also know that you will have to keep your Confirmation Bias in check else you will always find evidence that corroborates your theory and that might not necessarily be true.
Scene 4: When the student is ready, the teacher appears
You speak to your mentor in the industry and she understands your situation and recommends you to read Patrick Lencioni’s National Best Seller, The Ideal Team Player.
You read the book cover to cover and re-read it. The message is simple, yet profound. You realize that these individuals who were not exceptionally talented but were remarkably instrumental in their squads' success exhibited 3 common traits described by Patrick Lencioni’s which are a must-have for an Ideal Team Player. They were Humble, Hungry, and Smart. Exploring these traits further you realize that Patrick’s observations echo your observations too.
Humble people do not see themselves as greater than they are but neither do they discount their talents and contributions. They praise teammates without hesitation, admit their mistakes, share credit for accomplishments and offer and accept apologies graciously.
Hungry people look to contribute outside of their area of responsibility, do more than what is required in their own job & are willing to take on challenging tasks whenever necessary.
Smart people are Emotionally smart as they demonstrate empathy, are active listeners and can adjust their behavior and style to fit the nature of a conversation or Relationship.
The combination of all 3 traits is essential to be an ideal team player. Take one of the traits away and teamwork becomes more difficult.
Scene 5: When the rubber meets the road
You observe Scrum teams that are great, good, mediocre, and poor. Your benchmark is not velocity but trusts the team members have in one another, team engagement, accountability, productive conflicts, focus on aligned goals, and value delivery.
You observe behaviors at the individual and team levels that do not align with the 3 traits.
You use your allies- Agile Coaches, Scrum Masters & Leaders to help create high performing Scrum teams
- You make it clear that these 3 traits of being Humble, Hungry, and Smart are a part of the culture. You will be providing all help and support required for folks to improve on these skills
- You want to lead by example so you also participate in training and workshops along with your direct reports and Agile Coaches and Scrum Masters on further deep diving into these 3 traits and understanding High-Performance Team Culture
- Agile Coaches and Scrum Masters organize training, coaching, and mentoring to teams and individuals to help them get the skills and mindset required to work as a cohesive unit.
Overtime 3 things happen
- Folks who wanted to improve got the required support and became better team players
- Folks who wanted to improve but could not improve found it difficult to work in the new culture and quit
- Folks who did not want to improve continued to stay and made matters worse
You have an epiphany. Good Employees quit when bad employees stay and leaders tolerate bad behavior.
You empower your leaders to make decisions they think are best for the collective success of the teams.
Your leaders now understand not everyone is cut out for transformation initiatives that require a different mindset and skillset. They try finding a new assignment for #3 or put them on performance improvement programs and occasionally they have to make some tough decisions and let go. They now understand that Scrum brings problems to the surface and does not necessarily solve it.
The team morale improves, attrition has reduced.
Scene 6: Bottom-up adoption is good, top-down adoption is better
The CEO pays a visit as he has heard about the struggles with the initiatives and also the turnaround story. He is keen to see what led to the turnaround as many Business units would soon be embarking on Digital Transformation initiatives. After all, isn’t Scrum all about using empiricism, inspecting and adapting, and being transparent in the journey?
Your team is super excited to share the journey and you take a step back and let your team shine in the glory. After all, what joy it is to preach if you yourself don’t practice.
Your team acknowledges gratitude and thanks towards you for providing an environment with psychological safety and having the courage to make some tough decisions and also enable leaders and teams to take tough decisions.
The CEO is mesmerized by the simplicity of the formula to identify team players. He has a 1 on 1 conversation with you and says “I have another 3 Business units embarking on large scale transformation initiatives. I want to ensure I have leaders who are humble, smart, and hungry else the transformation will fall apart”
While you knew your CEO was extremely well respected in the industry, you witness the 3 traits in the conversation with him and you know what makes him the Ideal Team Player.
He pats you on the back and congratulates you and the program for the phenomenal learnings.
A few months later, there are announcements from the CEO's office about the 3 Business Units embarking on the Transformation journey, and alongside there is a new organization structure announcement especially at the leadership level to support these initiatives. Something catches your eye. The announcement has a statement in bold that reads “ Stay humble, Stay Hungry and Stay Smart”. You smile. You receive a Thank You note from the CEO for the insights you and your team provided to him on his visit.
Scene 7: When the student is ready, the teacher disappears- All the teacher asks of the student is to Pay it forward
You go back to your mentor and thank her for pointing you to such an amazing read. You want to explore more. She reminds you of Shu Ha Ri. She tells you that you are in the Ha phase transitioning to Ri. She asks you to pay it forward. You decide to summarize the learnings from the book clubbed with your observations and experience on a blog and put a disclaimer saying “This ain’t a cookie-cutter recipe, what works for me, might not work for you. This is as much art as it is science. Try it at your own risk. If it works, pay it forward. If it doesn’t keep experimenting till you find what works for you”
PS: This is a fable. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.
Rolling Credits: Message on Scrum Values
