What Do the Managers Do?
Thanks for your interest in learning more about the Three Jobs of Agile Management! We’re excited to share what we’ve learned. We (Richard Lawrence and Peter Green) have been leading Agile transformations for 20 years. In that time, we developed a good answer for almost every question someone might ask during training or coaching—every question except one: “If Agile teams are self-organizing, what do the managers do?”
We searched for good answers to that question in case studies, articles, and anywhere else we could think of and didn’t like what we found. Some things were over-simplified memes about the difference between leaders and managers. Some experts said we should just get rid of all the managers. Others provided well-meaning but fuzzy advice, like telling managers they just needed to learn how to be servant leaders to the teams. None of those answers were very satisfying to us, or to the very smart, well-intentioned managers we were working with.
The Manager Role in Agile is Different
We spent over a decade searching for better answers to that question and have found some answers that have helped managers in organizations across multiple industries empower teams, increase engagement, and provide innovation and value that significantly improved business results.
We’ve been teaching these tools to private clients for several years now, and have decided to share them more broadly. We’ve built out a ½ day workshop that helps managers:
- Get a clear map of the agile manager’s role: Three Jobs with two lenses
- Identify the most important area to focus on right away to start having a bigger impact
- Decide what you can delegate to the team vs. what actions you should own as a manager
- Understand the key difference between a management backlog (for an individual or a management team) and a traditional agile team’s backlog
- Understand how to refine that management backlog and what iteration on those backlog items looks like (hint: it’s not the same as working in Sprints with done increments)
What to Expect
Intro to Agile Management
May 9, 2022
10:00AM to 1:00PM MDT (Denver)
The workshop is hosted virtually to allow for people everywhere to participate, but it’s not a boring, slide-driven webinar. You’ll have fun collaborating with other attendees as we work through the concepts and how they apply in your context. Most participants get as much benefit from networking and learning from their peers as they do from the workshop content!
Our Guarantee
If you’re ready to up your management skills, register below. We’ve had such a good experience sharing this content with others that we’ll guarantee it’s worth your time and money. If you leave this workshop unsatisfied with the value of the time you invested with us, we’ll provide a full refund.