Culture is the key to productivity
India is one of the most favored and favorable offshore/outsourced destination in the world - thanks to the mass scale of engineers it produces. But now the time has come for us to see how we can better productivity - without sacrificing quality (that goes without saying), which will contribute directly to our margins and net profit. The game has changed from just scaling and being cost- effective to how we can provide maximum business value with less effort.
It’s high time we gave preference to productivity and quality rather than just harp on quantity. There are numerous factors that contribute towards productivity.
Here, I would like to discuss how good culture where ‘Self organized teams’ thrive can contribute to better productivity.
Steve Denning, in his research, found that "most of the high performing teams were not manager-led teams. They were teams whose management had deliberately stepped back, or were inattentive, thus enabling teams to self-organize"
Compared to them, the ‘self-governing’ teams did not demonstrate high-performance even on a single occasion. Their struggle for “what to do” always came in the way of their performance. Hence you need leaders on the team to set overall direction in technology, process, and business/product.
Most ‘Self-organized’ teams have the following characteristics
- Ability to commit to the sprint goals together
- They work aggressively to remove impediments to their progress
- Collective focus on highest-priority stories
- Choose to pair wherever required
- Freedom to take risks and to say NO
| Country | PDI |
| China | 80 |
| India | 77 |
| Brazil | 69 |
| United States | 40 |
| Netherlands | 38 |
| UK | 35 |
| Finland | 33 |
| Norway | 31 |
| Denmark | 18 |
A PDI score of 70+ for India clearly indicates that people are far less likely to resist the changes – whatsoever - suggested by authority. Not a progressive sign, eh? This applies to teams as well. They are more susceptible to if we hire a command and control manager/leaders and team may NOT resist this openly.
Building an organization which has self-organizing character, with absolutely no hierarchy is immensely tough – more so – as it’s a constant struggle against our own culture/mind set.
Preserving this self-organizing culture while we scale is a battle and hence it is extremely important who we bring on-board from middle to senior management. He/she should be a person who is open to work as servant leaders.
A key practice for hyper productivity teams is to have servant leaders like product owners and agile coach who provide team leadership as well as work for and with the teams to actively remove impediments.
A common pitfall that self-organized team face is the perception that they do not need any management. While it is true that ‘management’ –in its mere traditional roles - allocating tasks, monitoring progress etc - is not required for self-organized teams, the need for GOOD LEADERSHIP is paramount. A person, who is progressive in thinking, shows agility, open for change, and accept newer ways of doing & who enjoys giving and taking freedom.
Good leadership on new agile teams includes
- Guiding them on collaborating effectively with customers
- Showing way
- Mentoring them on agile principles and practices
- Gradually passing on these roles and responsibilities to the team members
Filed under: Agile, General, Leadership, Project Development Methodologies, Project Management, Scrum
Interesting thoughts. Self-organizing means you have power to choose instead of being told what to do. However, a new book argues that if things are decided by somebody else for you is not necessarily bad. In some cultures, people flourish when they do not have choices.
Yeah you are right. Self-organizing teams implicitly assumes that you have matured team who can make good decisions on their own. So when you don’t have such team, then someone there to make choice for you would be needed. But this should do be done only initially(short term), and not always. These are the leaders on team who would do for the team, but gradually would step out when team is capable to run on its own. Choosing brings accountability which we should not undermine.
Self organizing team is an interesting thought as it makes people more responsible and accountable. However developing the culture where transparency, mutual respect, and self discipline are the key ingredient in building such team.
Also the healthy competition among team member would help individual to grow and indeed the organization to grow as well.
I can’t agree more. This article is so important and must read for IT leadership in India. In our constant pursuit for industrialization, de-skilling the jobs; we have changed our focus from people to processes. It is really pendulum going the other way.
“The game has changed from just scaling and being cost- effective to how we can provide maximum business value with less effort” So true…. Attractive price points [Dollars per Hr.] as value proposition is like race to the bottom; there is nothing called enough. I haven’t seen many instances of sustainable success built on just ‘attractive price points’.
You view on performance difference between Self-organize and self-governing team is insightful. I have no doubt in my mind that in increasingly commoditized business of Offshoring; great organizational culture will be a competitive advantage.