Moving past traditional management science circles, I like Robert Pirsig’s philosophy on quality from his classic book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.   Here, Pirsig presents quality not as a thing, but “as an event” – representing a path to discovery of the “right facts” between the creator and her creation.   When you apply his definition to knowledge work it begs the question – do we understand how quality is affected by the relationship between a worker and the tools and materials with which she works?  Consider the elevated joy and satisfaction an individual derives from programming in Ruby vs. Visual Basic, for example.  Returning to the definition proposed by both Deming and Drucker, it’s easy to imagine how Pirsig’s interpretation of quality is the event that leads to creation of customer value.

So there you have it, two perspectives on quality, one is customer centric, the other is manufacturing centric, both highly dependent on one another for the reasons Seth Godin presents in his quality of design vs. quality of manufacture post.

Can we therefore agree that in knowledge work, more important than our collective understanding of the characteristics that constitute ’high-quality’ is the understanding of the subtle factors that allow these characteristics to emerge?

Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images

Now there’s increasing evidence to suggest that Agile software development and Agile management practices have finally earned the interest and attention of larger organizations,  the same organizations who usually find comfort hiring from a pool of 400,000 management professionals carrying the widely recognized PMP industry certification.  This certification, (known as the Project Management Professional), is a leading certification for project managers offered by the Project Management Institute (PMI).  The certification’s popularity makes the PMI very influential in establishing culture and practice of management within larger organizations.  The PMI has now turned their attention to Agile.

But in the spirit of Agile’s promotion of continuous feedback and adjustment, I’ve encountered quite a few challenges scaling agile in larger organizations.  Some of these challenges are structural, others cultural, and so it’s time for me to adjust my own tune on the realities that come from adopting Agile in such environments.

The following are four challenges confronting Agile practitioners in larger organizations:

1. “System of reporting” differs from the “System of production” – The corporate hierarchy (i.e. “system of reporting”) renders difficult the self-organization and a cross-functional focus required for successful Agile teams.
2. Financial cycles differ from management cycles which differ from project cycles – Excellent article by Jim Highsmith on the temporal challenges an iterative approach brings when the organization thinks and acts on a quarterly and yearly basis.
3. Definition of done –  Procurement, budgeting and yearly reviews all necessitate a formal understanding of when the project will finish. You may even reach consensus on a scope and date to appease management but your first release plan that extends past the terms of this definition may present problems.
4. Rewarding individuals over teams – Yearly corporate performance review programs focus on the individual yet Agile makes no provisions for this kind of evaluation, in fact it can be detrimental (pdf) to the team’s trust and self-organization.

What challenges have you encountered scaling Agile in larger organizations? How are you overcoming them?

During this flashback, Mickey offers Rocky remarkably wise lessons on life.  These lessons carry with them a curious applicability to knowledge work,  which is the subject of this post.

1. “Slip the jab”

Mickey’s insistance that Rocky “slip the jab” refers to a common practice in boxing whereby a boxer learns avoid incoming punches, while also quickly regrouping in order to seize the vulnerability resulting from the missed punch.

A knowledge worker requires similar preemptive and reflexive abilities in order to look ahead, avoid oncoming industry, organizational, or career perils, while simultaneously positioning herself for success once the peril subsides.

“Slipping the jab” for a knowledge worker allows her to operate as the CEO of her professional life.  To do so effectively, she should borrow from leadership models such as Peter Drucker’s Effective Executive, or career management techniques such as Charles Handy’s Sigmoid Curve.

2. “Mesmerize”

“Mesmerize!  See that bum in front of you, see yourself do right and you do right”.  What a wise set of words from Mickey as he instructs Rocky to the benefits of looking ahead and envisioning the result during his shadow boxing session.

Effectiveness is wisdom, and wisdom requires prediction.  What better way for a knowledge worker to boost his effectiveness than to envision the scenarios that may unfold in his project, while also imagining the best possible ways he can respond.

An example of this predictive component can be found  in some software development practices.  Consider test-driven development, whereby a programmer “envisions” his future implementation by first establishing the boundaries for success.

3. “Motavisation”

“The fact that you’re here and doing as well as your doing gives me the, what do they call it  - motavisation – to continue on.” Here Mickey opens up with Rocky, revealing just how important his relationship with the promising young fighter truly is (while succumbing in his struggles to correctly pronounce the word).

Motivation has become a key lever in management’s quest to build  high-performance knowledge worker teams.   Daniel Pink’s Drive offers a simplistic but helpful understanding to the components of this Motivation, as does Fredrick Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory.

But the real essence of a knowledge worker’s Motivation is implied in Mickey’s words.  Think about it – Rocky’s career is doing well, Mickey is his trainer, and so he has every reason to believe he is being effective as a trainer.  Effectiveness brings motivation as is the case with Mickey.  A highly-motivated Mickey will only increase Rocky’s chance to be a successful boxer.

The same applies to knowledge work.  Staying motivated requires an individual increase the chances her efforts will lead to the desired effect.  Aligning work with strengths offers one such way for an individual, as does a strengths-based hiring approach for organizations.

4. “Nature’s smarter than people think”

“People die when they don’t want to live anymore, and nature is smarter than people think”.

Not only is nature smarter than people think, as Mickey suggests, but there’s a growing pervasiveness to incorporate the principles of Evolutionary theory and Complexity Science into management and engineering disciplines to prove it.  Just look at the recent successes of adaptive approaches to management and software development, for example.

5. “Outside the ring”

Later in Rocky’s flashback, Mickey is heard saying “When I leave you, you’ll not only know how to fight but you’ll know how to take care of yourself outside the ring”.

The idea of improving not just one aspect of an individual’s life, but larger aspects is not unlike principles we see in software development and/or manufacturing.  Consider, for example, the “See the whole” principle which is a cornerstone of Lean software development and Continuous improvement.   In order for Rocky to remain a champion fighter for a long time, Mickey realizes he’ll need to ensure Rocky’s success outside the ring as well.

This fits the continuous improvement mantra.  Sustaining and leveraging the improvements in knowledge worker processes requires improving their dependent aspects as well.

6. “Angel on your shoulders”

Finally, towards the end of Rocky’s flashback, Mickey is seen removing his most favorite possession, a cufflink given to him by Rocky Marciano.  He offers this as a gift to Rocky suggesting it will serve as “an angel on your shoulders”, while also suggesting when Rocky feels himself going down “the little angel will scream at you saying: get up you son of a bitch cause Mickey loves you”.

Whether we’re talking about mentors, coaches, retrospectives or daily stand up meetings, to name a few, the key point is to establish necessary feedback channels in order to help individuals and teams adjust early and often.

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I hope you enjoyed this post.  For any questions or comments please email techdoer@gmail.com.

Figure 1: DIKW Pyramid

So from Drucker we know that management represents efficiency, leadership represents effectiveness, executives need to be leaders, and all knowledge workers need to think and act like executives.

This leaves us with a curious relationship between [Knowledge, Management, Efficiency]  vs. [Wisdom, Leadership, Effectiveness]. Description is at the heart of the former, which defined work in the 20th century.  Prediction, on the other hand, is at the heart of the latter, and it will define work in this 21st century.

You might try to convince me otherwise by showing how it’s clearly possible for a best practice, like SWOT, in helping a naturally deliberate person find his new career path (read part 1 and part 2 first), or how there’s not a lack for imagination in applying Theory of Constraints to electronic trading.  Heck, you could even remind me of my own past success with Charles Handy’s Sigmoid Curve, or the undeniable boost in software quality brought by test-driven development.

Backpedaling, I would formulate my own rebuttal, including convincing and equally dizzying material from David Snowden on best practices in complex adaptive systems.  ”Those examples worked because the system was ordered!”, I’d bark.

I had the pleasure of listening to David Snowden speak on the issue of effectiveness in Complex Adaptive Systems.   He suggests to lay off best practices, particularly in knowledge management when applied to complex domains.  To understand why, simply imagine what comes of trying ‘to fit the square peg to a round hole’.   A best practice represents a codification of knowledge, and “knowledge cannot be entirely codified”.  He instead advocates using approaches which promote the discovery of shared context:

“…shared context is vital to knowledge exchange, and such context always involves some human trusted validation.  This is not to say that codification of material in advance of need is not advantageous, but the effective reference is nearly always human.” – David Snowden

Returning to our discussion, the lightbulb finally goes off for the both of us.  ”To boost effectiveness in complex domains, practices need to be adaptive and promote continuous feedback, the software industry must have known this all along when they moved away from predictive practices towards adaptive ones like Agile”, I conclude.  To which you respond,  ”yes, but even David Snowden suggests there’s still plenty of value to glean from a best practice.”

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Visit the newest version of Boost Practices – the strengths based knowledge worker practice tool: http://boostpractices.freebaseapps.com.