Tag: training

Agendashift roundup, May 2023

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Leading in a Transforming Organisation; Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F); Keynote, webinar, and media pages; Agendashift Academy update; Top posts

Leading in a Transforming Organisation

The “London Event” (June) now has a proper name, a confirmed venue, and already a strong list of delegates signed up. In October it transfers to Melbourne, Australia, ahead of Kanban Australia, where I’m giving a keynote. In both cases, you can choose to do one, two, or three days, covering Leading with Outcomes: Foundation and Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I & II). Also, as outlined here, there is an upgrade path to Authorised Facilitator that bypasses TTT/F (more on that in a moment). Information on both events:

Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F)

The latest online TTT/F concluded last week and there were a couple of nice updates on LinkedIn from Stan Wade and Zvonko Podbojec afterwards. The next TTT/F is now in the calendar for September, this time in the UK afternoons – a lot more convenient for timezones west of here! In December, I’ll be doing one in person in Bengaluru, India, (and yes, giving a keynote at Kanban India beforehand).

See also:

Keynote, webinar, and media pages

My talk “Between spaces, scopes, and scales” continues to iterate! The latest recording is now available on a new keynotes page. Related to that talk, a new webinars page has the recording of Flight Levels creator Klaus Leopold’s guest appearance at our monthly webinar.

I also had a lot of fun bringing up to date my “Right to Left” talk. You’ll find that and (from a few months ago) my short SEACOM keynote on the keynotes page too. In short, the latest versions of some of my favourite talks, together with slides, references, and links to related resources. Past recordings remain on the media page too if you want to see how things have evolved.

The next webinar:

I’m due to give “Between spaces, scopes, and scales” again on June 8th online and on July 6th in Nottingham. Unfortunately, at the time of writing, booking pages for those aren’t yet available. It’s looking tight for the 8th, so watch the events page for updates.

Agendashift Academy update

Now that all four modules of Leading with Outcomes are available online, I promised that after spending the month of May away from the camera I would give an update on future plans for the Agendashift Academy. Not necessarily in release order, I’m planning the following:

  • “Right to Left Bitesize” – a long series of bite-sized (ie short) episodes based on the assessment prompts that go with the Right to Left book, brought up to date (the book was published in 2019, the audiobook in 2020 with minimal changes). There are 60 prompts and I expect to use most if not all of them, so that will keep me going for some time!
  • “Right to Left: The Agendashift Academy podcast” featuring selected (ie a minority) of the above episodes, together with other material I’m happy to release publicly
  • As an experiment, hosting the above in the Academy’s community platform, with a view to migrating content to there from the training platform
  • Adding a “supporter” tier for access to material outside of the core Leading with Outcomes curriculum

Top posts

To see #1 and #3 on this list brought up to date, see also (under “Keynotes” above) the updated Right to Left talk.

  1. #2MBM: Meaning before Metric, Measure before Method (July 2020)
  2. Leaders as keepers of context (September 2022)
  3. I’m really enjoying Challenge Mapping (June 2020)
  4. My favourite Clean Language question (January 2021)
  5. Your organisation in 5 networks (November 2022)

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

Agendashift roundup, April 2023

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Adaptive Organisation (II) is complete; Events in May; Events in June; Latest additions to the media page; Top posts

Adaptive Organisation (II) is complete

Never say finished, but the last chapter of the last part of the last module of our leadership and organisation development programme Leading with Outcomes was released this week. Already the first certificates of completion have been issued! Read more and watch a short video (11:39):

As mentioned there, I’ll be taking a break from recording during May, not least because we have the builders in. No later than next month’s roundup I’ll outline what’s coming next content-wise.

Events in May

First up:

Related to that (my talk references his work), on May 15th at 15:00 BST, 16:00 CEST, 10am EDT we are joined for our monthly webinar/AMA by a very special guest, Flight Levels creator Klaus Leopold:

Last but not least, on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings (UK time), May 16th, 16th, 23rd, and 24th is our next Leading with Outcomes: Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F). This is likely the only time this year that we will run TTT/F in this time slot. If you are based east of the UK, this may be your best option!

Programme information:

Booking page:

Also worth bearing in mind may be these two TTT/F alternatives that aren’t in the calendar yet: In Melbourne, Australia in October I’ll be doing a 3-day event similar to the June event in London that will be upgradeable to Facilitator, though not to Trainer. And in December there will be a full TTT/F in Bengaluru, India, in person. Thank you to the Kanban Australia and Kanban India conferences for their kind invitations. About that upgrade option:

Events in June

I haven’t scheduled the June webinar/AMA yet, so just these two events in the calendar so far:

That second event is really two or three events in one, and although all sales so far have been for all three days, there are other options. The equivalent self-paced modules:

More: Events

Latest additions to the media page

In addition to the Adaptive Organisation “closing thoughts” video (see above), this podcast review of the Agendashift book:

  • 05 April, audio, podcast:
    Ep. 83: Agendashift
    Definitely, Maybe Agile – Peter Maddison and Dave Sharrock

More: Media

Top posts

  1. On one slide, a five-way mashup (April)
  2. A new pathway to Leading with Outcomes Facilitator (April)
  3. Start where you are (February)
  4. Your organisation in 5 networks (November)
  5. Sell the pain, not the solution, the theory, or the blame (December)

More: Blog

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

Adaptive Organisation (II) is complete – and with it, Leading with Outcomes too

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Another big milestone passed: yesterday evening I released the last chapter of the two-part module Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale. That means Leading with Outcomes is complete!

I say “complete” and not “finished” because I’ll always be making improvements. Adaptive Organisation went through two major revisions and I’ve lost count of how many iterations I’ve done on Foundation! That is not to say that I’m dissatisfied – far from it – but there is always learning to be done, especially now that there are other trainers and facilitators using the Leading with Outcomes material.

Next month we have the builders in at home so I’ll be taking a break from recording. No later than May’s roundup I will outline my plans for new content, and I have a book to finish (a commission, not a Wholehearted / Adaptive Organisation book, that one is yet to start). Today though, I will allow myself to enjoy the moment 🙂

Just to put Adaptive Organisation in some context, it’s the most advanced module of Leading with Outcomes, covering what I think of as the “deep magic” of organising, using a model that puts relationships (of several kinds) front and centre. Although there is more theory to cover, it does it very much in the style of Leading with Outcomes (outcome-oriented, “every scale” engagement, etc), it refers back to other modules, and it completes Leading with Outcomes nicely I think. That said, I have taken care not to assume too much in the way of prior knowledge. If the subject matter interests you, feel free to dive right in.

Check out the sections below for ways to access this material both in your own time and with me – mostly online, but in person in the case of the London event. The webinars and meetups (another one added only today) are all highly relevant and the next one is only two days away. One way or another (or several), please join me!

I leave you with this video (11:39), my closing thoughts from that final chapter of that final module. I hope that it makes sense standalone, or at least that it intrigues!

Closing thoughts on Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (11:39)

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Upcoming events

With me (Mike Burrows) unless otherwise indicated.

June:

Later:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

A new pathway to Leading with Outcomes Facilitator

Posted on by Mike Burrows

I couldn’t help noticing that the upcoming Leading with Outcomes: Foundation and Adaptive Organisation (I) & (II) (London, 20-22 June) overlaps somewhat with Leading with Outcomes: Train-the-Trainer/Facilitator (TTT/F). In particular, it will cover:

Accordingly, as worked out with the Trainer community and as now described on the event page, you can take all three days of the London event and become an Authorised Facilitator without needing to take TTT/F:

  1. Take out an Agendashift Academy subscription – from £24.50 per month, noting that an annual subscription (£245) will save you 40% on this training, so do this first!
  2. Complete Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact – you may prefer to do this after taking Foundation, ie after this event
  3. Take out a Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator subscription – free for the first year, then £245 annually, less the 10%-40% discount
  4. Join me for a quick onboarding call over Zoom covering assessment/survey administration and customising workshop materials

As an Authorised Leading with Outcomes Facilitator, you can:

  • Administer surveys using our full range of assessment templates and without size restrictions
  • Facilitate with our workshop materials the Leading with Outcomes Discovery Workshop, the Assessment Debrief Workshop (use with our full range of assessment templates), and the Outside-in Strategy Review
  • Get listed in our partner directory as an Authorised Facilitator

For further information on both Facilitator and Trainer:

If you can’t make it to London or you want to become a Trainer, the next TTT/F is next month:

That’s four sessions of 4 hours each on the mornings (UK time) of Tuesday 16th, Wednesday 17th, Tuesday 23rd, and Wednesday 24th May 2023, beginning 08:30BST, 09:30CEST. If you’re a subscriber or partner, don’t forget your discount code. Similarly, ping me for a code if you’re employed in the government, healthcare, education, or non-profit sectors.

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Upcoming events

With me (Mike Burrows) unless otherwise indicated.

June:

Later:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

On one slide, a five-way mashup

Posted on by Mike Burrows

The slide in question:

Structures – static and dynamic – that fit

In the background, two models:

  1. Klaus Leopold’s Flight Levels, described in his book Rethinking Agile (2020)
  2. The Deliberately Adaptive Organisation, my 21st-century take on Stafford Beer’s Viable System Model, and here in particular, what’s happening in the relationships between different scales (between team and team-of-teams, for example)

And in the foreground, two more:

  1. A phrase (“Reaching…”) borrowed from the opening question of my Outside-in Strategy Review, as described in my book Right to Left: The digital leader’s guide to Lean and Agile (2019, audiobook 2020), and below it, four questions: Who, Where, What, When
  2. From his book The Fractal Organisation (2009), Patrick Hoverstadt’s four dimensions/axes of organisation (lower left) – how to understand an organisation structure that is at least trying to be good fit for its business environment

Not shown, but we’ll come to it in a moment:

  1. Bob Moesta’s Demand-Side Sales 101: Stop Selling and Help Your Customers Make Progress (2020) – ostensibly about sales but really a great book on jobs-to-be-done (JTBD), a book I keep finding myself recommending

Let’s take the last three of those more slowly. The Outside-in Strategy Review – free template here, and the corresponding Leading with Outcomes module here – takes you from the outside of the organisation through to its inside, walking you through the five layers of Customer, Organisation, Product, Platform, and Team(s).

The challenge question for the Customer layer goes as follows:

What’s happening when we’re reaching the right customers, meeting their strategic needs*?

*strategic needs: their needs, our strategy

By design, facilitated dialogue around that question can explore any number of issues. Not to prejudge anything but to help ensure that nothing crucial gets overlooked, we like to unpack it explicitly, hence the Who, Where, What, When questions on the slide.

Notice the correspondences between those customer-related questions and Patrick’s axes/dimensions. These are about how you structure your organisation to best fit your business environment:

  • Where you have different teams serving different user personas or customer segments, you are organising in the Customer dimension
  • Where different teams serve different locations, you are organising in the Geography dimension
  • Where different teams provide different solutions to different customer needs, you are organising in the Technology dimension (technology used in its broadest possible sense here)
  • Where different teams work at (for example) different stages of a product’s lifecycle, or simply at different times of day, you are organising in the Time dimension.

Organisations don’t need to be enormous before using each of those. I once managed a global department of around 100 people; its structure divided along the time axis first, then geography (with some regulatory accountabilities reaching in from higher up too), then customer and technology together, those last two in an informal matrix. On top of all that, we had a time & geography follow-the-sun thing going as well!

Technology and time come together in jobs-to-be-done (JTBD), hence the Bob Moesta reference. In fact, they come together in at least two ways:

  1. There’s the ‘when’ of what Bob calls a “struggling moment”, or what in one of my more successful posts I called an “authentic situation of need“. This is when the need arises, creating the job-to-be-done and your opportunity to be there for your customer.
  2. There’s another lifecycle, that of the customer’s relationship with you. How do they go from not knowing of your existence to being your champion? Between those extremes, through what stages to they pass, and what are their needs at each stage? Crudely, you can think of the functional separation of things like marketing, sales, and support as organising along this dimension, but read Bob’s book to understand this dimension more deeply in customer and product terms.

Bottom line, if your organisation’s structure doesn’t help it enjoy a healthy and productive relationship with its business environment, it’s going to struggle. Being able to understand its structure in the above terms is a good sign, and a much better starting point I think than the one that emphasises bigger structures and bigger processes for bigger projects, which both sadly and ironically is where Agile seems to be these days¹.

All five models of the complete mashup are brought together in Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale, the fourth and final module of Leading with Outcomes (more on that in the informational section below). The first two models, Flight Levels and the Deliberately Adaptive Organisation are emphasised in my upcoming meetup talk (already two iterations on from the March version as I’ve done it privately since, and I’m aiming for keynote quality):

I’m delighted that Flight Levels creator Klaus Leopold joins me for May’s webinar session:

And looking ahead to June, it’s all covered on days two and three of this three-day event – book your place now!

As always, there are discounts available to employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors – and of course to Academy subscribers. If in doubt, ping me for a coupon code!

¹In times of change, what scales better than process? (youtube.com) ​​

[This post shared on LinkedIn here – interaction of any kind appreciated!]

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Upcoming events

With me (Mike Burrows) unless otherwise indicated.

June:

Later:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

Agendashift roundup, March 2023

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Adaptive Organisation (I) and (II); Three days in sunny June (date change); The questions that drive us (Webinar/AMA); Top posts; Events, self-paced training, and media

Adaptive Organisation (I) and (II)

Three related news items:

  1. Adaptive Organisation (I) part I of Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale has been out a few days now
  2. Chapter 4. Between and Across Scales: What the scaling frameworks don’t tell you, the first chapter of part II is just out
  3. April 27th meetup: Between spaces, scopes, and scales: What the scaling frameworks don’t tell you

Just two more chapters to go now! You can start part I now, claim your certificate for that, and you’ll be well placed to finish part II by the end of April.

Three days in sunny June (date change)

Please note: To accommodate two anticipated block bookings, we’ve pushed this event back by a week.

Three days, each available separately, each certified. Buy two consecutive days and save 20%. Buy all three together and save 30%:

  • Day 1. Tuesday, June 20th: Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  • Day 2. Wednesday, June 21st: Adaptive Organisation (I): Business agility at every scale
  • Day 3. Thursday, June 22nd: Adaptive Organisation (II): Between spaces, scopes, and scales

Save a further 10-40% with the discount code shown on your Agendashift Academy subscription – see the What’s included page of your Welcome course in your Academy library.

Book your 1, 2, or 3 days here:

The questions that drive us (Webinar/AMA)

The next of our monthly webinar/AMA sessions approaches quickly – it’s this coming Tuesday:

For May I’m thrilled to announce a special guest (we compared diaries only a few minutes ago):

If you missed it, February’s was recorded:

Top posts

  1. Balance, constraint, and freedom (March)
  2. Three days in sunny June, London (updated) (March)
  3. Sell the pain, not the solution, the theory, or the blame (December)
  4. Between spaces, scopes, and scales (February)
  5. Your organisation in 5 networks (November)

Events, self-paced training, and media

Upcoming events

With me (Mike Burrows) unless otherwise indicated.

June:

Later:

Self-paced training

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Media

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

Adaptive Organisation (I)

Posted on by Mike Burrows
Announcing Adaptive Organisation part I (00:01:53)

Out now: chapter 3 of Adaptive Organisation, the fourth and final module of Leading with Outcomes. This latest chapter, Mutual Trust Building, completes part I, for which a certificate of completion applies.

Part I, Business agility at every scale covers the three overlapping “spaces” of the Deliberately Adaptive Organisation, an accessible, “start where you are”, and complexity-conscious rendition of the Viable System Model:

  1. Delivery, Discovery, and Renewal:
    • Inside value creation’s inner learning loop
    • Turning intent into progress, and experiments into intelligence and insights
    • Reconciling Agile and business agility
  2. Adaptive Strategy:
    • Making organising commitments, autonomy at every scope and scale
    • Understanding self and environment, creating and managing options accordingly
    • Actively maintaining coherent identity, purpose, and values 
  3. Mutual Trust Building:
    • Models of trust-building leadership
    • The systemic role of trust
    • Sensemaking – making meaningful progress in the presence of ambiguity

The Deliberately Adaptive Organisation as described in part I is already a fractal, “every scale” model. Nevertheless, when it comes to challenges of scale, there is still plenty to talk about that is not well covered elsewhere. What should be happening between scales? How can we think less statically about structure and process? How do we get the organisation engaged on all of this?

With all of that on the agenda, Part II, Between spaces, scopes, and scales should begin its rollout in the coming days, one chapter at a time:

  1. Between and across scales:
    • Navigating formal structure
    • Your organisation in 5 networks
    • Between and across scales: Structuring, connecting, translating, and reconciling
  2. Organising at human scale 
    • Thinking in circles – organising without reorganising
    • Teaming and re-teaming
    • The developmental organisation 
  3. Possibility and purpose
    • Conversations on organisation in the language of outcomes
    • Developing and pursuing strategy

Read on to find out how to access Adaptive Organisation!

Leading with Outcomes from the Agendashift Academy
“Leadership and strategy in the transforming organisation”

Leading with Outcomes is our modular curriculum in leadership and organisation development. Each module is available as self-paced online training or as private, instructor-led training (online or in-person). Certificates of completion or participation according to format. Its four modules in the recommended order:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Inside-out Strategy: Fit for maximum impact
  3. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success
  4. Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale (parts I and II, a certificate for each)

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 per month, business subscriptions from £269 per month, with discounts available on both kinds of plan for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors.

For public training events, see our Events calendar. These are discounted for subscribers when the event is operated by us.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes yourself, see our Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes. Our next TTT/F trainings take place in September (online) and December (Bengaluru, India).

Upcoming events

With me (Mike Burrows) unless otherwise indicated.

June:

Later:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Media | Contact | Mike
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Trainer and Facilitator Programmes

We help leaders and engaged team members at every level to gain fluency in the language of outcomes – developing and pursuing strategies together, innovating, learning, and adapting as the organisation renews and transforms itself from the inside.

Meaningfulness, significance, and direction

Posted on by Mike Burrows

As I mentioned last week, I’m busy working on a leaner, fitter version of Leading with Outcomes: Foundation. This updates the first self-paced study module at the Agendashift Academy and also makes it available in the form of interactive training, productised for use by other trainers.

Since last week’s announcement, I have renamed the middle session (of three). On reflection, “Aspiring to performance” seemed a bit generic – clichéd even. Its replacement, “Meaningfulness, significance, and direction” emerges quite naturally from the content – not summarising it exactly, but those three qualities do correspond nicely to the Ideal, Obstacles, Outcomes model – the IdOO (“I do”) pattern that is introduced (through hands-on practice) in session 1 and further developed in chapter 2 (again through practice).

The core of the model goes like this:

  • Ideal – envision a compelling future
  • Obstacles – identify what’s in the way of what we want
  • Outcomes – look beyond those obstacles to something better

As you learn to move easily between those elements, properly contextualise those conversations, and organise what they produce into something coherent, you’re getting better at strategy. This can be “everyday” strategy – quick conversations to clarify the thinking around everyday bits of work – or as the overall arc of the “set piece” strategy occasion – participatory strategy reviews and the like. It’s even a model for leadership!

And so to meaningfulness, significance, and direction. Not a new model, but capturing some of the intent behind the IdOO pattern and Agendashift more broadly:

  • Meaningfulness – outcomes not as metrics or targets, but things meaningful to us, identified and articulated through authentic dialogue. Often, we set this up in the Ideal part with stories of people making meaningful progress.
  • Significance – instead of falling into the trap of solving problems just because they are there, choosing our obstacles for what they represent and taking the trouble to frame them carefully
  • Direction – our direction is set by the outcomes we’re choosing to pursue, not by monolithic solutions (perhaps sold to us with outcomes), or by plans whose all-consuming execution comes at the expense of what’s meaningful and significant. Outcome-orientation, in other words.

As well as re-recording the self-paced study version of Foundation, I’m also hosting it in the form of participatory online training over the 23rd, 24th, and 25th of November. All sessions 14:00-16:00GMT, over Zoom, and highly hands-on. Price: just £195 + VAT. Ping us for a discount code if:

  • You have an Academy subscription
  • You’re an Agendashift partner
  • You’re an employee of a government, educational, or non-profit organisation, or are currently unemployed – we’re glad to offer significant discounts here
  • You completed September’s TTT/F or are booked on December’s – for you it’s free

Book here:

And if interested in teaching it yourself or in facilitating the related workshops:

Upcoming

Anytime:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Facilitator and Trainer Programmes
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A leaner, fitter Foundation

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Big news: I’m switching the Agendashift Academy’s top two priorities. Instead of recording the next self-paced training module Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale, I’m postponing that in favour of a leaner, fitter Leading with Outcomes: Foundation. If you were waiting for the former, expect that now in the new year.

In the coming weeks, as well as re-recording the self-paced study version of Foundation, I’m also hosting it in the form of participatory online training, 22-24 November, three two-hour sessions in the afternoons, UK time. The three sessions:

  1. Tuesday 22nd: Leading in a transforming organisation – introducing outcome-oriented change
  2. Wednesday 23rd: Aspiring to performance – two kinds of strategy and a virtuous circle
  3. Thursday 24th: Moving into action – ideas, experiments, feedback, and learning

All sessions 14:00-16:00GMT, over Zoom, and highly hands-on.

Compared to the self-paced study version, there is of course the experience of working with others in a participatory process. What makes this new version very much leaner and fitter:

  • We engage with the IdOO (“I do”) pattern (Ideal, Obstacles, Outcomes) much sooner, reducing the number of new concepts that need to be introduced as part of the bigger strategy conversations
  • We introduce inside-out and outside-in strategy together – one chapter instead of two
  • We lose the Adaptive Organisation chapter altogether; it gets a mention when the rest of the Leading with Outcomes curriculum is covered at the end

Compared to the self-paced study version, there is the experience of working with others in a participatory process.

The three sessions (or chapters, in the self-paced version):

  1. Leading in a transforming organisation – introducing outcome-oriented change
  2. Aspiring to performance – two kinds of strategy and a virtuous circle
  3. Moving into action – ideas, experiments, feedback, and learning

If you can identify in any way with the Agendashift Academy’s strapline “leadership and strategy in a transforming organisation”, then this is for you. And don’t worry if you’re not sure what that means! If you can imagine making a contribution to a strategy process that invites participation – whether that’s for your first-hand experience of your organisation’s challenges, your domain expertise, your sponsorship, your ownership of the change process, or your interest in the process as a facilitator, coach, consultant, or host – you’ll fit right in. And for prospective trainers, Foundation is where Leading with Outcomes begins; it’s your chance to experience it outside of the more trainer-focussed atmosphere of TTT/F.

Price: just £195 + VAT. Ping us for a discount code if:

  • You have an Academy subscription
  • You’re an Agendashift partner
  • You’re an employee of a government, educational, or non-profit organisation, or are currently unemployed – we’re glad to offer significant discounts here
  • You completed September’s TTT/F or are booked on December’s – for you it’s free

Book here:

While we’re here, yet more savings

I’m the opening speaker at The Study of Enterprise Agility Conference (SEACON) part 2 in London on November 7th. Offers:

Upcoming

Anytime:

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Facilitator and Trainer Programmes
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Contact | Mike
Resources: Tools & Materials | Media | Books | Assessments 
Blog: Monthly roundups | Classic posts
Community: Slack | LinkedIn group | Twitter

Agendashift roundup, August 2022

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Patterns of generative conversations; December TTT/F; (The Deliberately) Adaptive Organisation; Upcoming; Top posts

Patterns of generative conversations

Something to celebrate: This morning I delivered the manuscript for my fourth book, working title Patterns of Generative Conversations, a shortish (100-page) commission for Gervase Bushe and Bob Marshak’s BMI series in dialogic organisation development. If you’ve read the Agendashift 2nd edition, it expands on the “one model to the tune of another” reconciliation I did between Agendashift and Gervase’s Generative Change Model. If you haven’t, it will be an accessible and (I’m told) energetic introduction to both. As soon as I have a publication schedule I will of course announce it here.

December TTT/F

We have a quorum for September’s Leading with Outcomes Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator, so December’s is now open. It will take place over Zoom in the evenings UK time, beginning 17:30 GMT, 12:30 ET, 09:30 PT. If that’s too late for you, the September one begins 13:00 BST (places still available), and the February one (to be opened in due course) will take place in the morning, UK time.

More information:

To go directly to the booking pages:

And don’t forget to use your discount code! 30% off for partners, 25-40% off for most Academy subscribers (according to your subscription plan), 40% off for government, non-profit, education, etc also. If you don’t have your code already, ping me.

(The Deliberately) Adaptive Organisation

August has been a strangely productive month – that’s what a diary mostly empty of meetings does for you! Over September I’ll start recording the fourth module of Leading with Outcomes, Adaptive Organisation: Business agility at every scale, and as part of my preparations, some blog posts:

There’s a book there too, my next big writing project.

The Deliberately Adaptive Organisation

Upcoming

Anytime:

Top posts

  1. Six commitments: Putting the ‘Deliberate’ into the Deliberately Adaptive Organisation
  2. Open AMA (Ask Mike Anything) sessions
  3. New! Authorised Facilitator and Trainer Programmes for Leading with Outcomes (July)
  4. My favourite Clean Language question (January 2019)
  5. What does it mean to lead in a wholehearted organisation?

Agendashift™: Serving the transforming organisation
Agendashift  Academy: Leading with Outcomes | Facilitator and Trainer Programmes
Links: Home | Subscribe | Events | Contact | Mike
Resources: Tools & Materials | Media | Books | Assessments 
Blog: Monthly roundups | Classic posts
Community: Slack | LinkedIn group | Twitter