Changing Enterprises (and individuals in them)

How to move ahead and seize opportunities by making elephants dance, pigs fly, etc.

                       

Overview

• Yeah, we know it’s hard
• But it needs to happen
• Database of Targets (Contacts)
  • Bateson Stakeholder Map
• Response Tracking Systems
• Terms Defined
• References

Here are my notes studying for DevOps Institute’s DOL (DevOps Leader) certification, now in v2.0 based on the DevOps Collective Body of Knowledge (CBok).

NOTE: Content here are my personal opinions, and not intended to represent any employer (past or present). “PROTIP:” here highlight information I haven’t seen elsewhere on the internet because it is hard-won, little-know but significant facts based on my personal research and experience.

Yeah, we know it’s hard

“there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things.” –Niccolò Machiavelli in “The Prince”

But it needs to happen

“You can’t spell CHALLENGE without CHANGE”.

Database of Targets (Contacts)

1. Do you have a database of your target audience?

2. Metadata about each person?
   • Email
   • Nickname
   • Honorific (Dr, etc.)
   • Title
   • Manager
   • Tenure
   • Location
   • Time Zone
   • Preferred working hours
   • etc.
     
     

   Such information may come from a company directory, but due to privacy protections may not be readily available.

   When people are working on bringing new ways of thinking and new ways of working to an organization, there will naturally be some people more open and ready for the change than others who will be more resistant – as we learned looking at the change curve in the DevOps Foundation course. It’s an important skill for a DevOps Leader to be able to identify their supporters and early adopters.

   Bateson Stakeholder Map

3. Assess each stakeholder’s Level of Understanding and Level of Emotional Engagement Map into one of six categories:

   critics, cynics, spectators, unengaged, ambassadors, and enthusiasts

   This activity ensures that the most appropriate messages are sent to specific individuals based upon , to elevate each stakeholder through the categories over time.

   This approach comes from Ranger4’s Philippa Hale, building on the change curve.

4. The “Bateson Stakeholder Map” summarizes the number of stakeholders in each category to provide a visualization of the collective mindset at points in time.

   Response Tracking Systems

5. It helps if you have a way of tracking responses by specific individuals:

   • Who opened your email?
   • Who attended your Zoom call?
   • Who completed the training?
     
     

   That enables your team to conduct “AB experiments”. Instead of sending a communication to everyone at once, divide your send list into several groups, and send each group a slightly different title, to see which one generated the best response.

   Tracking indiviual responses enables you to send out reminders that are applicable.

Terms Defined

Terms mentioned in the curriculum are from various experts in organizational psychology:

• 12 Factor App

• Agile Framework

• Backlog Grooming (Agile ceremony)

• Change Curve

• Gantt chart (timeline)

• Guilds (from Spotify’s Squad Model)

• Kolb’s Learning Style

• Karpman Drama Triangle (Rescuer, Persecutor, Victim)

• Mindset

• Retrospectives (Agile ceremony)

• SKIL Framework: Skills, Knowledge, Ideas, and Learning. https://devopsinstitute.com/about/about-the-skil-framework/
  
  

• Top-down and bottom-up organizational hierarchy

• “Training from the Back of the Room” — the 4 Cs (Connection, Concept, Concrete, Conclusion)

• “Way of Working”

• Wilber’s Quadrants

“Change is inevitible. Growth is optional” “Change begins at the end of your comfort zone” – Roy T. Bennett

References

https://medium.com/humans-of-devops/case-study-the-benefits-received-by-implementing-the-learnings-of-the-devops-leader-course-in-a-1c3172ff3ff

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