As 2023 draws to a close, I take a moment to reflect back on a challenging year of ups and downs, both personally and professionally.
Personal tragedies and setbacks in the midst of global warfare and catastrophes have been a constant reminder of the frail nature of the human condition. Learning that resilience emerges when we stay in the moment and choose hope over fear.
And on the flip side of 2023, professionally…
Highs
- Growth in expertise:
- Becoming a Disciplined Agile (DA) Coach
- Value Stream Mapping (VSM) proficiency.
- Big Room Planning (BRP) proficiency.
- Honing the art of training:
- Integrating Training from the Back of the Room (TBR) principles and practices into every teaching moment.
- Mentorship of internal change agents & catchers:
- Leadership coaching
- Agile Coach, Scrum Master mentoring
- Product Owner coaching
Lows
- Delivery over Improvement:
- No time or interest for improving
- Leadership fragility:
- Changes at the top unravel all that’s come before
- A failure to reconcile a leadership marriage of convenience
- Prescriptive standards
- Micro-managing the means to the detriment or in the absence of the ends
Biggest “Aha” Moments
- I have a bigger role in failure than I had hoped for: “Change doesn’t fail because of the strategy or issues with technology. Instead, it fails because you, as a coach, didn’t win your team members’ hearts and minds.” (Discipled Agile)
- When my coaching efforts are sub-optimal or fail, don’t blame the coachees
- Start with blaming myself and ask: “What else could I have done?”
- I’ve wasted so much mental energy wrongly hating on others
- People are not who they seem to be on the surface
- Labelling people based on behaviours alone will bias my perception of them
- Deeper face-to-face discussions can reveal a wholly different perception
Now with 2024 around the corner, I feel 2023 is ending on a higher note than it started. For that, I am grateful. Let’s see what happens in 2024.
Happy New Year! 🎉
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