When do you need to stop coaching an Agile team? In his blog post “An Exit Strategy for the Agile Coach”, Len Lagestee discusses this question and explains how he will gradually work to be ready to leave and let the Scrum team be ready to carry the Agile values on its own.
Len Lagestee starts providing a definition of his Agile coaching: “My entire mission as a coach can be summed up by answering one question: How fast can I make myself no longer necessary?” This is motivated by the urgent need of change by organizations. He shares some of the characteristics that he uses to determine if organizations are gaining agility and resilience: self-healing, taking ownership of the change, experimentation, natural growth and delivering value.
The post continues by explaining the process of one of his coaching mission, from the first days to getting close to the end. He explains how he starts by teaching Agile values and principles and being an example when they start applying new techniques like user stories. Then he starts to observe and assess the confidence level of the Scrum team and practice “just enough coaching”. Finally, he emphasizes the creation of communities of practices where people can share, learn and grow.
His conclusion is that “If I come back to an organization 6 months after leaving and I wanted to understand how well an organization is doing on their journey, I believe my first questions would be “How are the communities doing? Are they still a place of healing and growth?” Most importantly, are the people I was coaching now doing the things I was doing – teaching, modeling, coaching, connecting – with each other? It should all come full circle. The end is the beginning.”
Read the full article on http://illustratedagile.com/2016/10/24/exit-strategy-agile-coach/