Tag: training

Agendashift roundup, June 2024

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Organising Conversations; Leading in a Transforming Organisation and TTT/F; Conferences; Olivier’s phylogenetic study; Top posts

Organizing Conversations

Organizing Conversations, my fourth book, has been out for four weeks now. If you missed the original announcement, it includes a short video interview I did with series editor Gervase Bushe:

More recently:

And a longer interview for the Agile Uprising podcast (thank you Jay!):

On that last one I couldn’t resist mentioning book 5, but more on that in the months to come. Meanwhile, your Amazon ratings and reviews on book 4 would be most gratefully received!

Leading in a Transforming Organisation and TTT/F

Two weeks after doing it in Berlin (thank you Markus Hipelli), this week I was in London for Leading in a Transforming Organisation, my last public training until after an extended summer break. Across the two sessions, here’s how participants summarised it:

  • A human-centred way of understanding organisations, teams of teams, and teams
  • Challenges you to look at organisations and their dysfunctions in a new and refreshing way
  • The only “3D” training on modern organisation and operating models out there!
  • Addressing the real issues within the org
  • Great approach to ensuring meaningful change in your company
  • Generalised approach to collaborative org design and coaching
  • Brain food!

See also this longer feedback from Chris Combe on LinkedIn.

The “3D” term above isn’t mine but I was very pleased to see it. Most of what we do in Leading in a Transforming Organisation is orthogonal and complementary to team-centric and process-centric approaches, taking you into different organisational dimensions. When it comes to strategy, organisation, and certain crucial aspects of leadership, most Agile training barely scratches the surface.

The next one will be in Southampton in October:

Before that, there will be an online TTT/F, and I’m planning some significant updates to the material before then (past participants can re-attend for free, and there’s a 60% discount for part attendees of Leading in a Transforming Organisation also):

Note the four consecutive afternoons there – I’m experimenting with not splitting it over two weeks.

Likely rounding off the year training-wise, in December I’ll be doing another in-person one in Bangalore:

Conferences

That trip to Bangalore coincides with Kanban India, and with a brand new talk I’m very glad to be keynoting there again! You can register for that here:

The autumn conference season kicks off for me in early October:

Olivier’s phylogenetic study

The number of Adaptive Organisation assessments submitted for Olivier Bertrand’s PhD research exceeds 50, but twice that many would be great! To participate, visit Survey: Phylogenetic research study: Adaptive Organisation Assessment. Be assured that no personally identifying information will be shared without permission, and any subsequent communication will be on an opt-in basis. You can read the original announcement here: Help our research: an “Organisational DNA test”.

If you’ve done one already and would like to submit another for a different organisation, either register with a different email or ping me and and I’ll invite you to an alternative survey.

Top posts

  1. “Organizing Conversations” is out on Kindle (May)
  2. A taste of my own medicine: Why “Organizing Conversations” took two and a half years to write (June)
  3. My favourite Clean Language question (January 2019)
  4. Agile’s Great Rebalancing: My next book’s take on the Agile manifesto (April)
  5. From Flow to Business Agility (January)

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

Agendashift roundup, May 2024

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this edition: Organising Conversations; Olivier’s PhD research; Leading in a Transforming Organisation; Featureban on Kanban Zone; Top posts

Organizing Conversations

As announced on Wednesday (linkedin.com), I’m thrilled to announce that my fourth book, Organizing Conversations: Preparing Groups to Take on Adaptive Challenges is now out – first on Kindle and now in print too.

This book was a commission for the Bushe-Barshak Insitute’s BMI Series in Dialogic Organization Development. Watch a short conversation with series editor Gervase Bushe recorded earlier this week:

Read the announcement in full here, and here are the links for the Kindle edition on amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, and amazon.de.

Olivier’s PhD research

Without wishing to take anything away from book 4, Olivier Bertrand’s PhD research into phylogenetic approaches to understanding organisational evolution is making use of Agendashift’s Adaptive Organisation assessment. This is the assessment tool that powers the 1-day Adaptive Organisation workshop and days two and three of Leading in a Transforming Organisation. In due course, it will feature in book 5, Wholehearted: Engaging with Complexity in the Deliberately Adaptive Organisation also.

You can help! By participating in the survey – thereby getting an early sight of the full version of the assessment tool – you’ll provide valuable input to Olivier’s research, which will, in turn, feed into the book. Exciting stuff!

To participate, visit Survey: Phylogenetic research study: Adaptive Organisation Assessment. Be assured that no personally identifying information will be shared without permission, and any subsequent communication will be on an opt-in basis. You can read a more detailed announcement here: Help our research: an “Organisational DNA test”.

Leading in a Transforming Organisation

All three events in the calendar currently are for Leading in a Transforming Organisation – Berlin, London, and Southampton (June, June, and October, respectively):

Berlin is sold out, but Silke Noll has organised something informal over food for Monday evening. If you can make it, you can sign up here. For London and Southampton, I won’t reiterate all the usual reasons for discount codes, but ping me if you think you might qualify.

Notable by their absence are Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and the monthly webinars and experience/practice sessions. I’ll add an autumn TTT/F to the calendar soonish, and I’ll think about the rest when I have a bit more headroom. June in particular will be very busy.

Featureban on Kanban Zone

One of the best ways to introduce Kanban is by running a simulation using Featureban. It’s a much more effective way to learn by doing.

So said Kanban Zone founder Dimitri Ponomareff recently in a follow-up to the the online session I ran with Allan Kelly a few weeks ago. Read his announcement: Featureban is now available inside Kanban Zone! (linkedin.com).

Allan is running another session himself. Use coupon code Agendashift20 for an 20% saving here: Featureban public online game.

As ever, you can request the original Creative Commons materials here. When I get a moment I will replace the broken video there with this one.

Top posts

  1. Help our research: an “Organisational DNA test” (May)
  2. “Organizing Conversations” is out on Kindle (May)
  3. Agile’s Great Rebalancing: My next book’s take on the Agile manifesto (April)
  4. From Flow to Business Agility (January)
  5. My favourite Clean Language question (January 2019)

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

The May TTT/F begins in a week’s time

Posted on by Mike Burrows

A quick reminder that the May Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator begins in a week’s time. It’s not too late to book your place:

It covers:

  • Leading with Outcomes: Foundation – patterns for strategy conversations in the language of needs, obstacles, and outcomes
  • The Discovery and assessment-related parts of the Inside-out Strategy workshops and training – classic Agendashift with a leadership development twist, featuring favourite exercises including Celebration-5W, Obstacles Fast and Slow, 15-minute FOTO, and Option Relationship Mapping
  • In overview, of the remainder of the Leading with Outcomes curriculum

TTT/F is one of two routes into becoming an authorised Leading with Outcomes facilitator or trainer (subscriptions required), through which you can get access to the full range of Agendashift assessments, materials for all of the Leading with Outcomes workshops, and for trainers, training materials also.

Past participants can re-attend for free, a popular perk. Alternatively, if you have attended a past Leading in a Transforming Organisation event or are signed up to one of the upcoming events (see below), you can get 60% off. And for all of our paid events and subscriptions, there is a 40% discount for employees of public sector, healthcare, and non-profit organisations. Ping me for coupon codes if any of these apply.

Together with a modest amount of additional self-study, the second route is via Leading in a Transforming Organisation:

Most people attend Leading in a Transforming Organisation for its own sake rather than as a TTT/F alternative, but the option is there. Again, ping me for coupon codes if any of the usual discount reasons apply, including past participation at either kind of event.

And sorry, yes, Berlin really is sold out! But check these out:

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

Leading with Outcomes Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F)

Venue confirmed for Leading in a Transforming Organisation (London)

Posted on by Mike Burrows

I am pleased to confirm the venue for the London 2024 edition of Leading in a Transforming Organisation. I am grateful to PA Consulting for hosting us again, this time at their Farringdon office, a short walk from Farringdon tube station.

You can book your place now:

Alternatively, there’s Berlin and Southampton also:

Online, the closest thing is TTT/F, just five weeks away:

For both kinds of events, ping me for coupon codes if any of the following apply:

  • Employees in public sector, education, and non-profit organisations get 40% off, as do authorised trainers and facilitators
  • There are subscription-specific discounts for Agendashift Academy subscribers
  • Members of the old partner programme get 30% off
  • Past participants of Leading in a Transforming Organisation can re-attend with 60% off (75% if you work for a public sector, education, or non-profit organisation)
  • Past TTT/F participants can re-attend online for free

About Leading in a Transforming Organisation

What they said:

“I wish I’d had this training years ago!”

“A language for exploring and discussing organisational issues – issues that aren’t only process-related”

“Found the ideas of context and awareness tied well into managing different relationships”

“This rounds out organisational change aspects any serious practitioner should know”

“Really related to Organising at Human Scale; Energised by the mapping exercises before and after it”

Three modules of Leading with Outcomes as an integrated, workshop-style training experience:

Day 1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation

Day 2. Adaptive Organisation (I): Business agility at every scale

Day 3. Adaptive Organisation (II): Between spaces, scopes, and scales

We’ll be exploring what it means to lead in an organisation where change is happening wherever it’s needed, at the pace it’s needed, and engaging the people who are needed – everyone whose energy, insights, and innovations you’ll need.

On day 1 (Foundation) we look at how to develop and pursue strategy in the language of outcomes, introducing some key conversational and organisational patterns and tools. You’ll be developing skills you can not only bring to set-piece strategy events such as reviews and workshops but apply in everyday settings too.

On days 2 and 3 (Adaptive Organisation parts I and II), we will be exercising those skills further as we get to grips with a classic and powerful model of organisation that we’ve made accessible and brought up to date, applicable to organisations of all shapes and sizes.

For any given organisational scale (day 2), what are the preconditions for business agility, and what gets in the way of that? Similarly, in what practical ways can we help the relationships between organisational scales (day 3) to be more healthy and productive? You’ll be learning some of the “deep magic” of organising – how to understand it in terms of relationships and constraints – and you won’t look at organisations in quite the same way again!

Audience

You can approach Leading in a Transforming Organisation in complementary ways:

  • As a workshop, an opportunity to explore how your organisation (or your client organisation) works and how you might influence that
  • As leadership development, participants invited for their growth potential
  • As technical training, participants attending out of interest in the models covered
  • Per the final section below, as a near-alternative to Leading with Outcomes: Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator

If any of those speak to you, you’re invited!

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

A big update to 15-minute FOTO

Posted on by Mike Burrows

In this new version of our Clean Language-inspired coaching game:

  1. Integrating the Classic and Lite editions formats
  2. Cheat mode
  3. General tidyup
  4. Standard and premium versions

1. Integrating the Classic and Lite formats

The Lite format (or ‘edition’, as it has been called up to now) was introduced in 2019 in version 7 thus:

To understand why we’ve wanted to make changes, consider what each participant is doing when they play the game for the first time:

  • Familiarising themselves with the Clean Language questions (from the cue card if it’s an in-room workshop, from the screen if it’s online)
  • Taking turns in the role of client, coach, scribe, or observer, participating in or supporting what can be an intense 1-on-1 coaching conversation
  • Worrying about the game’s objective, which to generate and capture outcomes

That’s a lot! Instead of doing this all at once, the Lite edition starts with a familiarisation exercise, turns the conversation into one for the table group as a whole, and the objective matters only after everyone has had a chance to get comfortable with it all.

If, as happens in many of our workshops, you plan to do 15-minute FOTO twice, you can start with the Lite edition and do the classic edition the second time round.

Since 2021 and version 11, the Scribe and Observer roles have been combined into a Host role. With the latest wording for the Lite format, the formats and roles are now described as follows:

  • Classic format – rotating every few minutes through the roles of Client, Coach, and Host so that everyone gets a turn in every role
  • Lite format – anyone can ask, anyone can answer – but don’t get stuck too long in one role or on one obstacle

Role responsibilities:

  • Client: Chooses obstacles, responds to the coach’s questions with short, bullet point answers
  • Coach: Guides the conversation using only the clean questions from the card and the client’s own words
  • Host: Helps others enjoy a productive conversation, ensuring that “anything that sounds like an outcome” gets captured

Previously, the slides for the Lite format didn’t mention roles until the debrief. We have found however that participants find them helpful, to the extent that some facilitators choose to skip the introductory Lite format and go straight to the altogether more intense Classic format. They are now integrated such that with just one Classic slide, Lite participants gain a clearer picture of how the game can proceed, and are free to play the game anywhere on a wide spectrum between only loosely coordinated and the highly structured Classic format itself.

Facilitators may skip/hide slides or explain both formats as they prefer, perhaps leaving decisions on that until the last moment. Training and workshop decks need only one set of 15-minute FOTO slides, not two. These benefits are substantial – not least to me, who maintains it all!

2. Cheat mode

Introduced recently in the blog post 15-minute FOTO’s cheat mode, the game now allows an additional question (or variants thereof):

  • Why is that important?

For reasons explained in that article, this question is not included on the cue card.

3. General tidyup

I won’t describe them all in detail, but there has been a raft of minor-to-moderate changes, including:

  • The sequencing of slides in the facilitation deck
  • A thorough overhaul of the 15-minute FOTO page on agendashift.com – well worth a read
  • Wording aligned with Leading with Outcomes

An example of that last one is this tip:

  • Treat What would you like to have happen? as inviting a small outcome – a first, tiniest sign that something interesting might be beginning to emerge

That wording comes from the commentary I use behind a progression familiar to Adademy students. Long before we introduce 15-minute FOTO in a later module, we see this from Foundation onwards:

  • Signs of emergence
  • Indicators of progress
  • Measures of success
  • Goals and aspirations

It’s outcomes all the way down!

4. Standard and premium versions

As ever, the standard Creative Commons (CC-BY-SA) version of the materials that has the same look and feel as other open source resources is available via the 15-minute FOTO page on agendashift.com. This format also includes translations in to French, German, Swedish, Danish, and Italian, some of these more up to date than others. If you’ve accessed it via Dropbox previously, you’ll find the latest materials – deck, cue card, etc – already there for you.

The premium version of 15-minute FOTO has the Agendashift Academy look and feel, some bonus slides, and a short video. Together with other premium resources, it is available to Academy subscribers and supporters here. For access to that and much more, visit the store. The bonus slides:

  • A nice introductory slide that facilitators can practice speaking over as it builds up
  • An extra slide in the debrief exploring the relationship between coaching conversations and strategy conversations
  • A parting shot: Client, Coach, Host: Who’s the leader here?

All of that is explained in the Leading with Outcomes module Inside-out Strategy (I): On the same page, with purpose. We will take a second look in Inside-out Strategy (II): Fit for maximum impact (recording beginning shortly), and it is used in the Adaptive Organisation and Outside-in Strategy modules also. 15-minute FOTO features also in nearly all of our workshops – often the highlight!

While we’re here, Obstacles Fast and Slow

One prerequisite for 15-minute FOTO is a list of obstacles, suitably framed. To that end, don’t miss our upcoming webinar:

Obstacles Fast and Slow is an update to the exercise formerly known as Good Obstacle, Bad Obstacle, and the webinar recording will go on the revised page.

Related

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

Make the most of your breakouts

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Part-way through the February Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator, I was prompted to create a new slide on the topic of breakouts. We agreed that it would be helpful to add it to every training or workshop deck – hidden by default and kept in reserve, it would be there as a reminder to the host, and available as a resource if needed. Its four key points (which I’ll expand on) are easy enough to remember, and they apply both to remote and in-person events:

  1. Don’t let tools get in the way of a good conversation
  2. Don’t wait to get started
  3. Don’t let yourself get stuck too long in one role
  4. Help each other enjoy a productive conversation

It will seem in what follows that I am writing to breakout participants, but of course the message is to hosts too. There were some wry smiles and chuckles as we discussed it!

1. Don’t let tools get in the way of a good conversation

Disguised perhaps as a warm-up exercise, a fact of life now is the necessary chore of familiarising ourselves with the event’s Miro or Mural board and learning where its most important tools are hidden. But this tip is even more basic than that. Quoting from my new slide:

Put the sticky notes aside until you are ready

At a training event held abroad shortly before the pandemic, the first exercise was getting underway. On each table was a supply of pens and paper (and little else). I watched first with satisfaction as the conversations on each table began, then in dismay as one participant dug out their personal supply of sticky notes and handed them around the table. That group fell silent, the conversation killed.

Sticky notes are great and so are Miro and Mural, but in their place. None of them is capable of capturing a conversation that never happened. Don’t let them get in the way.

2. Don’t wait to get started

You might remember this from 15-minute FOTO:

If a minute passes without progress, something is wrong
– a meta conversation or some other distraction

Often the hardest thing is to get started. Time spent clarifying instructions or objectives might seem time well spent, but often the best way to get started is simply to get started. Don’t confuse the conversation that needs to happen with a conversation about the conversation, and certainly don’t let the latter displace the former.

If you are genuinely stuck or confused don’t hesitate to ask the host for help, but better still, deal with it before the breakout starts. If you’re unsure about something, likely others are too. Don’t carry that uncertainty into the breakout!

3. Don’t let yourself get stuck too long in one role

From the Lite edition of 15-minute FOTO, but it applies to most breakouts:

Anyone can ask, anyone can answer (including answering your own question), and listening is good too

In the worst car crash of a breakout I have ever been embarrassed (as the host) to witness, one participant lined up the other participants on the other side of the table and proceeded to interrogate them. That’s an extreme example, but when we get stuck in one mode for too long, we make ourselves unable to contribute in other ways. Leave yourself open to describing what you are thinking or feeling, to being respectfully curious, to serving the group as observer, scribe, or encourager – but none of those to the exclusion of the others. The more freely you and others can move between those roles, the richer the conversation.

4. Help each other enjoy a productive conversation

• Curious, descriptive, inclusive, safe, generative
• Ready to share key points, captured as appropriate

This final point brings together the three “Don’ts” into something more positive. A productive conversation is one that is actually happening, actually underway, everyone able to contribute in multiple ways. Part of “productive” is also to be able to relate key points back afterwards, but let’s keep that in perspective. Speaking to myself here (I still get this wrong), clarity from the host is especially helpful where the guidance is not what participants might be expecting. Especially in those more tentative early exercises, enjoy it. One way or another, the threads that matter will be picked up again.

Related updates:

  • Watch this space for a new version of 15-minute FOTO, its Classic and Lite editions (rotating roles and “anyone can ask, anyone can answer”, respectively) integrated into one deck, plus other enhancements
  • The next Leading with Outcomes Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator will be in May. See the upcoming events below, also the Store page for subscription options and discounts

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

About today’s release – and save 25%

Posted on by Mike Burrows

The great consolidation continues apace! Landing this morning on the newer of the two Agendashift Academy platforms was part I of the latest version of the Inside-out Strategy module. Part I introduces many of our most popular exercises, most notably:

  • Our trusty, context-capturing kickoff exercise Celebration-5W
  • The inspiring (and sometimes cathartic) True North: Ideal
  • Our Clean Language-inspired coaching game 15-minute FOTO
  • Obstacles Fast and Slow, the exercise formerly known as Good Obstacle, Bad Obstacle

The last two of those have received some updates. Standalone materials in premium and Creative Commons incarnations will be published in the coming weeks.

For a taste, here’s the module introduction (08:03):

Introduction to Inside-out Strategy (I): On the same page, with purpose

Once part II Inside-out Strategy (II): Fit for maximum impact is recorded, that leaves only the final module Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success to be done before the old learning platform can be retired. Quite apart from that steady stream of content updates, that consolidation smooths the onboarding process greatly and reduces the administration burden too.

To get an early advance on that win/win, you can now join just the new platform on its own. It means for a few weeks forgoing the two modules still left behind on the old platform, but saving 25% in perpetuity. If you have an old-style subscription you are more than welcome to take up this offer too, especially if your annual subscriptions is up for renewal soon. Ping me to get your old one cancelled, and over the coming months I will actively reach out to subscribers as their annual or monthly subscriptions approach their anniversary. Watch this space for simplifications to billing arrangements for trainers and facilitators also.

Subscribe here:

Grab that saving while it lasts!

With that business stuff out of the way, what’s changing content-wise?

The old version of Inside-out Strategy did not keep up with significant progress elsewhere. The new version has a much clearer and more productive relationship with the Foundation module and it overlaps less with the other two modules. Nevertheless, part I does nicely introduce Outside-in Strategy, and part II will do the same for Adaptive Organisation. That’s because as well as exploring leadership, organisation, and strategy as all the Leading with Outcomes modules do, an additional function the two parts fulfil is to explain how two families of workshops are constructed, ie those that can usefully be understood as derived from the Discovery and Assessment Debrief workshops respectively.

That is good news in turn for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F), whose middle two sessions are now Inside-out Strategy parts I and II, both sessions packed with our most popular exercises. The next one of those begins in two weeks:

Ping me for coupon codes if any of the following apply:

  • Past TTT/F participants can join again for free (a popular perk)
  • Past participants of Leading in a Transforming Organisation get 60% off
  • Employees in public sector, education, and non-profit organisations get 40% off
  • Members of the old partner programme get 30% off
  • Last but not least, Agendashift Academy subscribers get subscription-specific discounts also

Then what? In this order:

  1. For trainers only, the Inside-out Strategy (I) training materials
  2. For both trainers and facilitators, a new version of the Leading with Outcomes Discovery Workshop
  3. New versions of the 15-minute FOTO and Obstacles Fast and Slow exercises – premium then Creative Commons versions
  4. Inside-out Strategy (II): Fit for maximum impact – the new recording and materials for trainers
  5. For both trainers and facilitators, a new version of the Leading with Outcomes Assessment Debrief Workshop
  6. Outside-in Strategy: Positioned for success – re-recording, training and workshop materials
  7. Retire the old platform

Enough to keep me busy for a while!

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

What’s in store for 2024

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Welcome to 2024! Happy New Year!

2024 has already started of course, and with the valued help of over 20 contributors I iterated several times over the holiday period on this article posted on the blog here yesterday:

Also new is a section on the Agendashift Academy site for facilitated Leading with Outcomes workshops:

In the calendar (see Upcoming events below):

Regarding that last one, see Upcoming events below re discounts.

In the pipeline:

Most pressing is the re-recording of the Inside-out and Outside-in strategy modules. Like the Adaptive Organisation module, Inside-out will be split into two, likely titles:

  • Inside-out Strategy (I): On the same page, with purpose
  • Inside-out Strategy (II): Fit for maximum impact (keeping the title of the original one-part module)

Once Inside-out and Outside-in are on the new learning management system there will be significant opportunity for rationalisation. If you’re not already on board there, check these out:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation
  2. Adaptive Organisation, two parts:

Or get in touch about holding a Leading in a Transforming Organisation training workshop near you; this covers Foundation and Adaptive Organisation, with all the benefits of an in-person experience, and some unique features too. I’m not asking anyone to take responsibility for the event (though that can be arranged); just your interest would be good to know.

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

Agendashift roundup of the year 2023

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Whether you have followed Agendashift and Leading with Outcomes over the years or have only just found us, thank you for your interest and support. As we approach the Christmas and New Year break, let me wish you a time of peace and renewal.

In this end-of-year edition: December looking forward; Top 10 posts of the year; Upcoming events (most of them free)

December looking forward

The usual monthly list of the top 5 most-read posts would overlap quite a bit with the year’s top 10, so instead I’ll point out just one recent post:

As for the rest of the month, I have my fourth book to finish, and only then (though my head feels fit to burst) my fifth to start. Two very different books, their provisional titles:

  • Organizing Conversations: Patterns of Dialog for the Transforming Organisation – for the BMI series in dialogic organisation development, hence the American spelling
  • Wholehearted: Engaging with complexity in the Deliberately Adaptive Organisation

It would be quite something to get both books published in 2024, ten years since my first. Wish me luck! In relation to that second one, I have in the past couple of days updated the Everywhere all at once white paper to include a brief section on the recent What Lies Beneath stuff. You can request your copy here.

Of course 2024 won’t only be spent writing. Two modules of Leading with Outcomes still live on the old learning management system. Once their videos are re-recorded, I can consolidate everything onto the new platform. I’m looking forward also to doing more in-person training and workshops. I intend to put on the 3-day Leading in a Transforming Organisation publicly at least twice in the UK, hope to do it at least once in mainland Europe, and further afield as opportunities arise. Opportunities to do the private 1-day Adaptive Organisation workshop are materialising too; introductory pricing remains available for bookings taken in the next few weeks.

Top 10 posts of 2023

Most popular first, these are this year’s most-read posts:

  1. #2MBM: Meaning before Metric, Measure before Method (July 2020) – the prototype for the Meaning, Measure, Method pattern that features now in every Leading with Outcomes module
  2. Your organisation in 5 networks (November 2022) – now part of the Leading with Outcomes module Adaptive Organisation (II)
  3. My favourite Clean Language question (January 2019) – the oldest post in this list, still a regular fixture on our monthly top 5
  4. What Lies Beneath (Spoiler: Constraints) (October 2023) – only a few weeks old but already #4 for the year!
  5. Explaining the “unreasonable effectiveness” of Agile (July 2023) – expect more on this in the coming months
  6. 15-minute FOTO’s cheat mode (October 2023) – another recent entrant
  7. It’s 10 years since the post that changed my career (January 2023) – referring to the evergreen Introducing Kanban through its values (January 2013), the post that spawned my first book
  8. Start where you are (July 2023) – a twist on an old idea
  9. Sell the pain, not the solution, the theory, or the blame (December 2022) – a tip repeated several times across Leading with Outcomes; see also the March webinar below
  10. Avoiding the disaster that is ‘solution-driven’ (June 2023) – why outcome-orientation matters

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.

Developing and pursuing strategy in the language of outcomes

Confirming some changes to Leading with Outcomes

Posted on by Mike Burrows

Last week’s Leading with Outcomes trainer/facilitator Zoom [1] confirmed some changes. The first two relate to two of our favourite exercises:

  1. The exercise Good Obstacle, Bad Obstacle has been renamed Obstacles Fast and Slow (yes, both names are indeed references to books). As time passes, the more we have learned to appreciate this exercise, and the latest slideware reflects its importance.
  2. The workshop and training decks now explicitly support 15-minute FOTO’s cheat mode.

In both cases, watch out for releases in the coming weeks of standalone versions of these tools. In relation to Obstacles Fast and Slow, the March edition of our monthly webinar series will be devoted to it, with the goal of replacing the old Good Obstacle, Bad Obstacle video and related material.

The rest of this post relates to the agenda of February’s Leading with Outcomes Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F), which comes in four half-day sessions – Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons UK time, beginning on Tuesday, February 6th, finishing Wednesday 14th.

The old TTT/F agenda:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation, chapters 1 & 2 (of 3) – introducing and applying the IdOO (“I do”) pattern, Ideal, Obstacles, Outcomes
  2. The Leading with Outcomes Discovery Workshop – a high-level application of the IdOO pattern, covering the classic exercises Celebration-5W, True North, Obstacles Fast and Slow, 15-minute FOTO, and Plan on a Page
  3. The Leading with Outcomes Assessment Debrief Workshop – the assessment, survey debrief, and Areas of Opportunity, then for a second time Obstacles Fast and Slow and 15-minute FOTO (both of those well worth the repeat), and finishing at Option Relationship Mapping, leaving the ideation part to session 4
  4. Beyond inside-out strategy – Leading with Outcomes: Foundation chapter 3, which covers the ideation part of the Assessment Debrief workshop left over from the previous session, followed by overviews of the Outside-in and Adaptive Organisation parts of the Leading with Outcomes curriculum and their related workshop offerings

That structure has worked well enough, but session 4 can feel a bit of mixed bag. The new agenda brings forward some of that content, achieved by seeing sessions 2 and 3 less exclusively in terms of inside-out strategy and more as representing two families of workshops:

  1. Leading with Outcomes: Foundation, chapters 1 & 2 (of 3) – as before
  2. Discovery-level workshops – not only the classic Leading with Outcomes Discovery Workshop and variations thereof, but the Outside-in Strategy Review (OI-SR), understood here as building on Discovery’s basic structure
  3. Assessment-based workshops – the generic survey debrief and other workshops, some of which incorporate additional training content, for example a Reverse STATIK workshop [2] and the Adaptive Organisation Workshop [3]
  4. Moving into action – completing (as before) Leading with Outcomes: Foundation chapter 3, then delving deeper into Adaptive Organisation, possibly including (this is under development) a look at narrative enquiry

Discovery workshops can now be seen as choosing from the following:

Assessment-based workshops similarly:

Details vary, but the IdOO and Meaning, Measure, Method patterns are shared, the former pattern bracketed by establishing context and organising the strategy. The new TTT/F structure should build the confidence not only to make use of these workshop designs, but to innovate new ones.

Not that TTT/F is only about workshops – doing this under the Leading with Outcomes banner means a strong emphasis on leadership development, for which the Foundation training module sets the tone very effectively. Furthermore, I’ll be re-recording the Inside-out and Outside-in training modules in the new year, and to the extent possible within the time available, sessions 2 & 3 will use those latest materials.

You can book your place at the February TTT/F here. Ping me for coupon codes if any of the following apply:

  • Past TTT/F participants can join again for free (quite a popular option)
  • Leading in a Transforming Organisation participants get 60% off
  • Employees in public sector, education, and non-profit organisations get 40% off
  • Members of the old partner programme get 30% off
  • Last but not least, Agendashift Academy subscribers get subscription-specific discounts also

For an overview of Leading with Outcomes in general and the Trainer / Facilitator programmes specifically, the store page is a good place to start.

Notes

[1] I haven’t published the recording and notes but they’re available on request. Intended audience: trainers, facilitators, members of the old partner programme, participants in a past TTT/F or Leading in a Transforming Organisation, or anyone curious about any of these

[2] The Reverse STATIK workshop is how I like to introduce Kanban. It is not officially part of Leading with Outcomes but that might change. The point here is that much of it can be recreated from parts already available to Leading with Outcomes trainers and facilitators.

[3] About the new 1-day Adaptive Organisation workshop, introductory pricing remains available if you’d like to book one for your organisation. In-person very strongly preferred, which means UK and European destinations easily reachable from Manchester unless a longer trip can be made worthwhile. That’s less of an issue for the 3-day Leading in a Transforming Organisation – I have done that as far away as Australia, albeit with a conference keynote and a family visit also!

Upcoming events

February

March

*TTT/F and (where shown) LIKE events include free one-year membership of the Leading with Outcomes Authorised Facilitator programme, upgradeable to Authorised Trainer at any time. Both of those include access to the video-based Leading with Outcomes training and the full range of Agendashift assessment tools.

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 modules in the recommended order:

  1. Foundation module:
  2. Inside-out Strategy:
  3. Adaptive Organisation:
  4. Outside-in Strategy:

Individual subscriptions from £24.50 £18.40 per month after a 7-day free trial, with discounts available for employees and employers in the government, healthcare, education, and non-profit sectors. For bulk subscriptions, ask for our Agendashift for Business brochure.

To deliver Leading with Outcomes training or workshops yourself, see our Authorised Trainer and Authorised Facilitator programmes. See our events calendar for Train-the-Trainer / Facilitator (TTT/F) and Leading in a Transforming Organisation trainings.

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

At every scope and scale, developing strategy together, pursuing strategy together, outcomes before solutions, working backwards (“right to left”) from key moments of impact and learning.