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Alignment and Autonomy in Strategy Deployment

Following on from my previous What is Strategy Deployment and Dynamics of Strategy Deployment posts, there is a model I like which I think helps to show how the mechanics and the dynamics work together. In The Art of Action, Stephen Bungay describes how Field Marshall Helmuth von Moltke, Chief of Staff of the Prussian Army for 30 years from …

Dynamics of Strategy Deployment

Following on from my last post, and based on the feedback in the comments, I want to say more about the dynamics of Strategy Deployment. The first point is to do with the directionality. Strategy isn’t deployed by being pushed down from the top of the organisation, with the expectation that the right tactics simply need to be discovered. Rather, the strategy …

What is Strategy Deployment?

I’ve been writing about Strategy Deployment a lot recently but realised that I haven’t properly defined what I mean by the term. Actually, I sort of did in my last post, so I’m going to repeat, expand and build on that here. In a nutshell, Strategy Deployment is any form of organisational improvement in which solutions emerge from the people …

Agility is a Strategy, Agile is a Tactic

Ron Jeffries recently blogged about his reflections on the Agile Manifesto, and what he wished the authors had done and said differently with hindsight. His conclusion was that he would have rather focussed on practices. I have a different perspective. My concern with an even stronger focus on practice is that it would lead to even more Cargo Culting than …

Are we tabby cats trying to emulate cheetahs?

Credit for the title of this post goes to Sam Murphy, Section Editor at Runners World UK. Those of you who have seen me recently we will probably know that as well as being an advocate of Lean and Agile, I also have a passion for running, and I subscribe to Runners World. Sam used this title for an article of …

Kanban Deployment with the X-Matrix

This is a continuation of my musings on Strategy Deployment, the X-Matrix and Kanban Thinking (including Strategy Deployment as Organisational Improv and How Do I Know If Agile Is Working). I’ve been thinking more about the overlap between Strategy Deployment and Kanban and come to the conclusion that the intersection of the two is what could be called “Kanban Deployment” [1]. Let …

Strategy Deployment as Organisational Improv

At Agile Cymru this week Neil Mullarkey gave a superb keynote, introducing his rules of improv (left). He suggested that businesses can apply these rules to be more creative and collaborative, and that there is a lot of synergy with Agile. Like all the best keynotes, it got me thinking and making connections, in particular about how Strategy Deployment could be …

How Do I Know If Agile Is Working?

“How do I know if Agile is working?” This is a question I’ve been asked a lot recently in one form or another. If not Agile, its Scrum, or Kanban or SAFe or something similar. My usual response is something along the lines of “How do you know of anything is working?” And there generally isn’t a quick and easy …

Understanding SAFe PI Planning with Cynefin

Within SAFe, PI Planning (or Release Planning) is when all the people on an Agile Release Train (ART), including all team members and anyone else involved in delivering the Program Increment (PI), get together to collaborate on co-creating a plan. The goal is to create confidence around the ability to deliver business benefits and meet business objectives over the coming weeks and months …

A Kanban Thinking Pixar Pitch

I’ve been using the Pixar Pitch as a fun way for teams to discuss and explore the problem they are trying to solve by telling a story about what has been happening that led to the need for a kanban system. I thought it might be useful to use the formula to tell a dramatised story of what led me …