Fixing the People Problem: Soft Skills that Lead to Successful Teams

Troy Bitter

October 2013

Introducing Troy Bitter

• Senior Manager Consultant @ Sogeti

• Nearly 2 decades in IT, predominantly project management

• Over 7 years of experience applying tonight’s techniques

• Involved in local project management and agile communities

• PMI Director for PMI-ACP training

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Abstract

The biggest root cause for project failure is people. While processes and tools can contribute, people are at the center of it all providing sub 40% success rates. To address the problem, we need to fix people – or at least how they interact and communicate. Newer project paradigms promote individuals collaborating and constantly interacting to respond to change as key contributors to success, providing higher success rates of meeting time, scope, AND schedule. Applying the Virginia Satir communication model provides a strong framework to drive better interaction, team engagement, and potential for success.

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Contents

Results

• Empowering teams to their full potential • Trust through engagement • Soft skills that directly contribute to team success

Focus

• Explain why effective interactions are so critical to project success

• List the 5 Freedoms of the Satir model • Identify behaviors that can transform

teams from good to great

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Group Time: What is a Team?

Describe

• They sink or swim together

• No one person is more valuable then the next

• The team is flat versus a traditional hierarchical structure

Benefits

• Strong commitment to one another and the common goal

• Minimizes politics and maximizes communication

• Teams become more efficient over time

• Cross training

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Supporting Paradigms Agile Manifesto

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Communication over process NOT communication

without process

Working software over comprehensive documentation

Working software is more important than excessive

documentation NOT there is no need for

documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Customers working with developers to address a

business need NOT developers satisfying a

contractual obligation

Responding to change over following a plan

Adapting to change NOT failing to plan

Interactions means communication.

Communication & Soft skills from

tech people?

Collaboration / people working

together requires communication

Change needs to be communicated

Working software is built in

collaboration

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What if we applied with low emphasis on interactions & communication?

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Have you ever felt like a cog in the machine?

Decisions made (good or bad) without input or interaction

Code what you are told to code

Run these tests

Check this checklist

Unintended Consequences

Lower Creativity

Less Ownership

Diminished Morale

Loss of Productivity Sounds like faster waterfall

Those consequences don’t align with team – more ownership provides improved creativity and increased productivity. All of this positively affects morale.

Table Time: Communication Challenges

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Have you been to the Land of Assumptions?

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He just got a call that his wife went into labor. He needs to get to the hospital now. How does this context change your reaction?

Someone cut you off

You are driving down the expressway. Some maniac is speeding, cuts you off, and ‘almost caused an accident.’

How do you react?

Have you been to the Land of Quick Interpretation?

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Code Migration Quality

The code was migrated to the test environment. It appears that a lot isn’t working.

Let’s listen to the conversation with Tom the Tester and Dave the Developer.

Yes interactions should occur, but this interaction may not be optimal

Have you been to the Land of Must Be Right?

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Working Software

Requirement: Quantity is numeric within 1-35.

Solution Provided: Quantity is a drop down list of values 1-35. We thought it would be a text field or spin control that only accepted numeric values within the range.

Yes interactions should occur, but unsure if this was an effective use of time

Have you been to the Land of Silence?

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Unsure or Quiet Person Built a customized navigation bar for an application. It had scalability issues and other challenges after production launch. In the production triage meeting, James mentions a Google toolkit control that we could use. Offline, I learned that he had this idea during the original project but felt like no one would consider it – ‘decision was made.’

Need an environment that people feel comfortable contributing ideas,

not just hands on keyboards

5 Freedoms of Satir Model The freedom to see and hear what is here, instead of

what should be, was, or will be

The freedom to say what you feel and think, instead of what you should

The freedom to feel what you feel, instead of what you ought to

The freedom to ask for what you want, instead of always waiting for permission

The freedom to take risks on your own behalf, instead of choosing to be only “secure” and not rocking the boat

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Table Time: Learning through Sharing

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5 Freedoms of Satir Model – In Action N

D

M

The freedom to see and hear what is here

The freedom to feel what you feel

The freedom to say what you feel and think R

The freedom to ask for what you want

J

The freedom to take risks on your own

behalf

From Philosophy to Behaviors

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How do we turn a philosophy into behaviors?

Congruent behaviors are a core concept in the Satir model. The ability to be aware of and fully value the many dimensions of your self, others, and the contexts in which you work and relate.

Congruence

Clear communication 3 C’s of communication What is Done

Cooperation rather than competition My idea doesn’t have to win Inquiry over advocacy Quicker decision making

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Congruence (continued)

Empowerment rather than subjugation Increased ownership More creativity

Uniqueness rather than categorization Work on things I’m good at (fit) Higher quality

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Congruence (and some more) Use of authority to guide and accomplish "what fits," rather than forced compliance, tyranny or power

Carrot vs stick management. MBWA instead of MBF More leading, less managing

Being personally and socially responsible Responsible for interactions Responsible for intangibles like maintainability

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To use problems as challenges and opportunities for creative solutions

Keep moving forward thinking

Summary

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Questions

Closing

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513-655-7432

tbitter@us.sogeti.com