Heading into detour territory
If you’ve followed this site from the start, then you know that it’s my attempt at a book project. It’s a tricky thing; using a blog to shape your book idea. You may have noticed that I’ve tried to keep a logical sequence to the posts on this site.
We started off with the reasons we need a better, more asynchronous way to work.
Next, we looked at the reasons your organisation or your team may resist asynchronous work and how you can build a mindset for change.
Then, we spent some time on the skills and tools you and your team will need to precipitate this shift. We also reflected on the principles to drive this way of working.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve described best practices to include asynchronous work techniques in your existing agile process.
The trouble is that when you’re trying to write about a single topic; in this case, asynchronous agile; your head’s always buzzing with ideas. There are several triggers for this - the research you do, the situations you encounter at work, and to be honest, sometimes, a need for catharsis. Every once in a while, you’ll find an article that’s out of turn - like the one I wrote about the true value of being face-to-face. I must thank you, dear reader, especially if you’ve supported the project from the beginning, for bearing with those detours. That said, I want to warn you - we’re headed into detour territory for some time.
I recently read “Shape Up” by Ryan Singer and there’s a quote in the book that resonates with where I’m at right now.
“Projects are opaque at the macro scale. You can’t see all the little micro-details of a project until you get down into the work.”
Over the next few weeks, I want to step away from writing about the agile process, and focus on the management and leadership that supports an asynchronous-first work culture. This is stuff I’m still thinking about as I write. Ryan uses the metaphor of a hill, where your to-do list for a project grows as you figure things out by getting into the weeds of work. You get to the top of the hill when there’s no unknown work to discover. From that point on, it’s all about getting things done by rolling the ball down the slope.
A hill chart for some sections of this book project
Stretching that metaphor to the book, the “best practices” section is almost all the way down the slope of getting things done. In contrast, the leadership and management section is a project that’s still on the left-hand side of the hill. I’ve given it some thought and I know of a bunch of things I have to write about. Have I totally nailed the scope, though? Not sure. So as I push this ball up the slope over the next few weeks, expect a few detours. Some posts will be out of sequence. Others may not even make it to the final book. Hang in there though! I’ll do my best to make this fun.