When transformation journeys fail
An example based on my personal experience during an agile transformation journey.
To set the context: I’m writing this article based on my own experience and observations. Readers may agree or disagree with me.
I have seen a transformation journey fail. I got hired as a product manager for an enterprise that was in the beginning of a digital transformation journey. I got hired to fulfill a traditional product manger role, leading the change, setting the vision, shifting mindsets. Really exciting.
What I didn’t know was that this transformation was initiated as part of a growth strategy to satisfy investors and shareholders with the ultimate goal to stabilize the company stock price. With success, since the announcement of initiating a digital transformation the stock price was raising and reached an all time high.
They created a tech hub and hired a lot of new roles, coaches and consultants came in to support the transformation journey and to coach employees growing into the new roles and agile framework.
Just right after I joined, I started to see all kinds of struggles my team was faced with: no transparent company strategy, no roadmap, no clear roles and responsibilities, little technical competencies, many new hires trying to find their places. And the worst: two different agile frameworks (SAFe & Scrum) were implemented through out the company.
In the beginning I thought, alright this is a great challenge, but we can manage as a team and within our domain. I overworked to create a product vision, strategy and roadmap and brought the backlog into shape — all within my first two months. During these months I was faced with implementation wishlists from business stakeholders, pressured into unrealistic deadlines and even threatened to deliver the roadmap within three month at all costs. There was no space in evaluating the value or questioning the whole product.
“Just tell me when you can deliver” was a sentence I heard almost every week.
I got a high budget to grow a delivery team, even though I already knew, more people won’t deliver faster or more value. Same in pregnancy: Can two women deliver a baby in only 5 month? Well, no, some things take time. And again product management is not about “Just deliver”. Once you’re in this delivery mill you tend to forget this and get floated away. Everything felt so wrong and I found myself in between power battles, taking fights with the business or trying to explain agile principles.
That was the point where I realized, the mindset of the business was off. There was never a commitment or buy-in of the executive level to truly drive and understand this transformation. The understanding that an agile transformation is firstly a great mindset shift was completely missing.
Instead of giving product management a voice, empower product teams and to focus on high-value deliveries, they started to micro-manage teams and product owners. And even worse, every time I highlighted struggles caused due to time pressure and unfeasible asks, delivery managers got pulled into the picture to “fix the delay”. Suddenly delivery managers performed product discovery and facilitated team refinement sessions. That’s where I lost grip.
It’s painful to write all of this down. It’s just so much against every agile principle, but also against my personal values and everything I feel is important to be self-driven and empowered.
I lost control over my own role and responsibilities. I lost purpose. I lost faith. I lost the meaning of getting to work every day.
I’m glad I pulled the plug, when I realized that I found myself in a dysfunctional work environment. In the end I left.
For me this is a sad example of a failing transformation journey.
A transformation starts in the mind. It’s a transformative process that will lead to a new, different environment. And it will leave pattern, that are no longer needed, behind.
Dear leaders, dear executives, please start with your own mindset.
Understand the values behind agile, understand your company values and understand your own values. How do you lead your company and why do you want to change that way? What are your own believes and can you question them?
Please don’t initiate an agile transformation journey because you and your shareholder think it’s cool. It is not cool. It is a set of values.
Dear reader, thank you for reading this very personal piece of work. Dedicating your time to my article honors me deeply.
Read my article Why being agile is a mindset for more thoughts on agile transformation journeys.
