Habit 6: Talk Less, Listen More

A coach listens more than they say. A coach postpones judgment on what they hear and lets others talk while they listen with care. To get to the heart of a problem or gain a deep understanding of a situation, a coach asks open questions, questions that cannot by answered by a mere “Yes” or “No.” Open questions begin with words like “What happened?”, “How would you do things differently?”, “Why do you think the same problem keeps recurring?”

Exercise: All Ears

Imagine all you can do is ask questions and listen. And, when asking questions is inappropriate, the only option is to listen.

What do you notice about the quality of conversations you have in comparison with your usual way of communicating? And what about the differences in the level of engagement you get from those you usually interact with?

My grandmother used to say, “There’s a reason why we have two ears and one mouth.” Help people answer their own questions and maybe they’ll help answer yours.

Give peer coaching a go with “The Yellow Brick Road—Fresh Insights Through Peer Coaching.”

Habit 5: Pull not Push

As the saying goes, “the teacher appears when the student is ready.” A coach waits and is always ready when someone asks for help. A coach creates and offers learning opportunities instead of thrusting their ideas, advice, and views onto others.

Exercise: Coaching Offer

Make yourself available by offering 20-30 minute coaching sessions over coffee for free. Advertise by word of mouth and poster or wiki page so people can contact you to arrange a session. Explain up front how the session serves two goals. The first is for you to assist the person asking for help. The second is for that person to give you feedback on your coaching so that you can improve. If no one takes you up on your offer, reflect on why that is, as this may provide a useful lesson in itself.

For more ideas on personal and team improvement, take a look at “The Dream Team Nightmare: Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques”.

Habit 4: Think with Your Head and Feel with Your Heart

In solving problems, people typically favour one or the other, thinking or feeling. A coach balances thinking and feeling. They apply logical thinking as well as empathy when solving problems. A coach is both the Scarecrow and the Tin Man. A coach understands that change begins with the individual and that only you can change yourself for the better. They speak and act with understanding, compassion, and determination.

Exercise: Facts and Feelings

Think of a problem you’re trying to solve. On the left side of a sheet paper, write down up to seven facts about the problem. On the right side of the same sheet of paper, write down your feelings about the problem.
If you find it easier to come up with facts, it’s likely your preference is thinking over feeling. If you find it easier to describe how you feel about the problem, it’s likely you prefer to feel than think. Neither of these is good nor bad. It simply increases your self-awareness when it comes to achieving a thinking-feeling equilibrium.

For more information, see: What Type Am I? Discover Who You Really Are by Renee Baron, a book that examines the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, including the two preferences of thinking versus feeling.

Habit 3: Set a Sustainable Pace

A coach works at a sustainable pace so they can think and act clearly at all times. A coach stays calm when others around them lose their heads. They know when to say “Yes” and when to say “No.” They know their physical, cognitive, social, and emotional limits and when those limits can be stretched without compromising their personal effectiveness and efficiency.

Exercise: Coach’s Log

Write a daily log to keep track of what you do as well as make you mindful of how the day has affected you. Consider recording the day’s activities, things that went well that day, things that went wrong and personal improvement actions. You can even rate the day out of 10, where 10 is “It’s been a fantastic day!” and 0 is “I wish I’d never got out of bed.” Begin the next day by reviewing the improvement actions and choose at least one to work on to keep you improving.

You’ll find more tools like this one in “The Dream Team Nightmare – Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques“.

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

A coach knows they have to keep their eye on the goal to score. Question them and they will always know why they’re doing what they’re doing. They keep the end goal at the forefront of their mind so they don’t get lost in the minutiae. A coach works backwards from the goal to figure out the most effective and efficient way of getting from A to B.

Exercise: The 5 Whys for Goal Discovery

The 5 Whys is a popular Lean tool for discovering the root cause of problems. Start with a problem and ask why it exists. Repeat asking “Why?” to each subsequent answer. Ask “Why?” for a maximum of 5 times to discover the root cause of a problem.

In the context of goal discovery, ask “Why?” up to five times in the same way you do for root cause analysis to find out what the root or real goal is to understand why you’re doing what you’re doing.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Coaches is a mini series of blog entries inspired by the style of Paul Coelho‘s “Manual of the Warrior of Light“.

Habit 1: Lead by Example

A coach doesn’t just talk the talk, they walk the walk. This means living by the values and principles they espouse as well as applying the tools and techniques they know to themselves and to their work. They know when they’ve failed to lead by example and always strive to get themselves back on track. A coach knows their limits and asks others for help. A coach appreciates when others stretch their knowledge, skills, and experience beyond their comfort zone because they know that’s where the real learning happens.

Exercise: The Flaw Workout

No one’s perfect. Everyone has at least one flaw. Share one of your personal flaws with someone you’re coaching. Ask them for ideas on how you can address that flaw in order to improve yourself. Commit to actively improve regarding that particular flaw over a certain time period of your choice. After that time has passed, ask that other person to rate your behaviour before you tried to improve. Then ask them to rate your behaviour after a period of attempting to improve. Inquire about the person’s thinking behind the ratings to come up with more ideas for improving yourself.

When rating, I suggest using a range of 0-10 where “0” means “There’s plenty of room for improvement” and “10” means “What flaw? You’re already behaving perfectly!”

For more information, see: “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There” by Marshall Goldsmith where he provides similar exercises for personal and professional development for highly successful individuals.

For more ideas on personal and team improvement, why not read “The Dream Team Nightmare” and go on an Agile Adventure?

Romancing a Dream

When I was 18, I met a boy in Paris. One summer, I was invited to stay with the family at their holiday home in Normandy. There I learned a lesson I would always remember.

As I understood it (as all our exchanges were in French), his father was someone important. Monsieur E. worked as part of the entourage that protected the interests of the French President at the time.

He was evidently successful both in terms of career and at home. And so I asked him for a life lesson. It’s amazing what insights people will share if you ask politely and listen carefully.

“If you’re unhappy, don’t cheat on your wife or leave your family. Change your job. It has an overwhelming bearing on things.”

Ever since then it’s one of the first thoughts that springs to mind whenever I’m unhappy with my job.

Monsieur E.’s advice has served me well over the years and I’ve found jobs I enjoy doing a little bit more with each move.

Of course it makes sense to change jobs every so often. Circumstances change, ambitions grow, people morph.

And yet, when I look back at the well-trodden path of my professional life, I now see something else. A recurring yet subtle pattern that sticks out like a sore thumb when emotions fade and memories crystallise.

It’s easy to condemn a job for things like office politics, insane bureaucracy and a toxic culture. It’s even easier to leave.

Sticking around when the going gets tough is hard. Running away is almost always the easier option.

What can you do to change the system around you to help create the place where you long to belong? It won’t be easy, but you could make it worth your while.

To be a writer you have to write

To celebrate National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), I’d like to share some hard-earned insights from writing my first ever novel, “The Dream Team Nightmare: Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques“. In my experience, these insights apply to any creative endeavour, not just to novel writing alone.

1. Write daily
Bring your project to life then keep it going by working on it little and often. After all, you’re the sole caretaker of your creation. Its existence depends wholly on you. By “write daily”, I mean work on your project every day for at least 30 minutes. Why wouldn’t you do this if it really matters to you? Activities like brainstorming ideas or doing a simple sketch all count. If you get stuck, write about what’s stopping you from writing. It’s a surprisingly effective way of unblocking a gnarly case of writer’s block.

2. Rest one day a week
Take a day off every 6 days or when you feel you need to. If you take a break at the right time, you’ll want to get back to writing after the break. Imagine yourself as a vessel, a coffee mug or a tea cup or something more novel. Whatever works for you. By taking a break, you allow yourself to re-charge so that you have a full cup to work from or at least a new idea to get you writing again.

3. Clear your mind
Most creatives I know have many ideas buzzing in their heads at any one time. This makes getting things done really hard. The secret to focus is to empty your brain of all ideas so that you can focus more effectively on one idea at a time. Jot down all your ideas via brainstorming or make a simple list. Then pick one and focus on only that idea until you get as much written about it as possible right now. You can always add to the content relating to that one idea later on when, no doubt, more ideas will be jostled into existence by your busy imagination.

4. Separate writing from editing
There’s a time and place for everything. When you’re writing, be sure to focus on getting words down on paper. Write freely to achieve flow. Send your inner critic on holiday. Only when you’re editing do you invite them to the party.

5. Have fun!
This is absolutely essential if you wish to create something you love instead of resent. Play gets us moving and keeps us going. I get tedious or tough going tasks done by making it fun. It was really tough, at first, to sit down and work on my project for 30 minutes a day. So I treated myself to some really beautiful stickers and awarded myself one per day on my physical calendar. I figured that if it works for children, why not me? I only needed to do this for 10 days before working on my book took on a momentum of its own and the daily 30-minute timebox became a habit!

6. Stay fit and healthy
A healthy body begets a healthy mind and vice-versa. Go for walks or to the gym to give all your muscles a workout. This time doubles up as a break and a way to stay fit. Bonus!

7. Never give up
You can probably come up with a million reasons why your project won’t succeed and why you should stop right now. In fact, there are plenty of people out there ready to pat you on the back for giving up on an impossible dream. Only you can write your novel. “Just keep writing, just keep writing…”

Happy NaNoWriMo!

On Wednesday, 20 November 2013, I held my second newborn child in my arms for the first time. I am, of course, referring to my first ever novel in print, “The Dream Team Nightmare – Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques“.

I start by counting all the fingers and toes. Then I slowly study this printed creation, one feature at a time. Even though I’ve spent the past two years painstakingly breathing life into the book – writing, editing, rewriting and tweaking – I’m astounded by the stranger before me. It’s like meeting a penpal in person for the first time after having corresponded with them for years. And now that I can actually flick through physical pages, reading the gamebook is as much fun as I’d hoped it would be when I first decided on using the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure style format for this business novel.

My greatest hope is that you, as Jim Hopper, an agile coach, and me can help make the world of work a better place, one baby step at a time.

The book is now on sale from the Pragmatic Bookshelf and amazon.com. It will be available in a couple of weeks on amazon.co.uk and other amazon sites.

Happy Agile Adventure!

When we’re sixty…

“When you get older, time speeds up,” an old lady once confided in me as I fed the ducks by the pond.

Not long after, an elderly gentleman with whom I shared a bench at the playground said, “When you’re my age, you’ll have less time to do the stuff you want to do.”

While this phenomenon of time speeding up with one’s age has yet to be scientifically proven, I don’t want to take any chances.

I’ve learned enough life lessons and made many more mistakes besides over the years to leave my life to chance alone.

When I was young, I’d happily bumble along life’s well-trodden path like Frodo before the ring.

Now that I’m older, I’ve distilled my beliefs into a list of 3 guiding principles and devise strategies guided by them.

1. Have fun
Life’s too short to be taken too seriously. Let your hair down. Dance like no one can see you. Sing like you’re in the shower. Play brings people together and enables us to do impossible things.

2. Dream, believe and achieve – together
This is really three principles rolled into one. I first came across it as the motto of one of my favourite local primary schools. It inspired me back then and inspires me still.

3. Do things with heart
See a world where there’s enough to go around. Give freely whenever I can. Operate by a gift economy instead of only trade. What’s more, give generously to those who share my values and principles to co-create a better world.

Why do you do what you do?