The Role of Leadership in Building/ Transforming an Agile Organization

Abstract

As the world of business is changing at a pace higher than ever before, there is an increased
need for organizations to rapidly adapt and respond to these internal and external changes
such as technological, political, social or environmental. In management, agility is a term
which is frequently used today in response to the new business environment, which
frequently includes the use of agile methodologies for product development. As
organizations need to adopt agile methodologies, old traditional leadership and management
models fade and this void is being filled by new and emerging agile leadership models.
Additionally, self-organizing and cross-functional teams become key concepts. All these
transformations are bound to culminate in a considerable alteration in the role of the
leadership. This study examines the new role of leadership in building or transforming an
agile organization.

Introduction

An Agile Transformation is a process of transforming the organization structure and culture

to one that fosters true business agility. Agile organizations, viewed as living systems, have
evolved to thrive in an unpredictable, rapidly changing environment. These organizations are
both stable and dynamic. They focus on customers, embedding customer-centricity in all they
do. They have tried and tested practices that can fluidly adapt and adjust to market changes,
innovative technology, customer feedback, and government regulation. They are open,
inclusive, and non-hierarchical, evolving continually without the frequent disruptive
restructurings required in more mechanistic organizations; and they embrace uncertainty and
ambiguity with greater confidence. In addition, the global economy challenges organizations
to quickly react to these advances in their surroundings (Joiner & Josephs, 2007). This new
kind of agile organization requires a new and fundamentally different kind of leadership.
Leaders play a key role in the Agile Transformation. There are several aspects where the
change from traditional to agile management. The ideas surrounding the agile philosophy are
similar to those found in leadership styles that have emerged during the last decades, some of
them being transformational leadership but also post-heroic leadership such as shared and
servant leadership. The emphasis is often on providing vision, inspiration, and, in the case of
the servant leader, serving the team (Alimo-Metcalfe, 2013).

Literature review

Leadership:

One of the most commonly adopted models that emerged from the challenges that were
discovered was transformational leadership (Alimo-Metcalfe, 2013). The model of
transformational leadership (Bass, 1990) describes four characterizations of the
transformational leader: (1) charisma, the leader provides vision, a sense of mission, injects
pride, respect and trust; (2) inspiration, the leader have high expectations and expresses
purpose in simple ways; (3) intellectual stimulation, the leader advocates intelligence,
rationality and problem solving; (4) individualized consideration, the leader acts as coach
and gives personal attention and advise to each employee (Alimo-Metcalfe, 2013).An
example of transactional leadership in an organizational context is offering promotions to
excelling employees.

Recently, there have been emerging a lot of different styles of leadership. Some of these
include a “shared leadership”, “authentic leadership” and “servant leadership”,. In shared
leadership, leadership should be diffused rather than centralized. When the team and team
leaders share leadership, leadership is rotated to the person with the key knowledge, skills,
and abilities for the particular issues facing the team at any given moment (Nils Brede Moe1,
Torgeir Dingsøyr, Øyvind Kvangardsnes, 2009). Authentic leadership concerns the
authenticity or integrity of leadership and is one of the newest areas of leadership. Servant
leadership challenges our traditional beliefs and promotes a leader that leads by serving
others. Some of the characteristics of servant leadership are strong relationships, ethics and
serving the greater good (Alimo-Metcalfe, 2013).

Agile approach:

Agile is often considered an evolution of lean production into software and product
development. A big part of the agile approach can be summarized as a set of methodologies
that focus on simplifying and continuously improving software development by putting
customers and the product at the center of attention (Fowler & Highsmith, 2001).Agile
software development comprises a number of practices and methods. Among the most known
and adopted agile methods are Extreme Programming (XP), Scrum and Kanban. In Scrum,
the team is given significant authority and responsibility for many aspects of their work, such
as planning, scheduling, assigning tasks to members, and making decisions (Nils Brede
Moe1, Torgeir Dingsøyr, Øyvind Kvangardsnes, 2009).

Agile Leadership

Scrum and Agile development favour a leadership and collaboration style of management.
Agile methodologies support this view and require a shift from command and control
management to leadership and collaboration (Nils Brede Moe1, Torgeir Dingsøyr, Øyvind
Kvangardsnes, 2009). The first part of embracing the agile form of management is a change
of mindset, as managers tend to stick with old mindsets, not aligned with the agile methods.

In research studies around agile leadership and cross-functional teams, one word that is
constantly highlighted in the literature is empowerment. . Highsmith (2009) holds the view
that the line managers’, also referred to as functional managers, participation in these
planning session could help the team better understand priority issues based on the strategy,
and also to show support and commitment for a project. Some even discuss the interesting
strategy of having the same person acting as line manager and Scrum Master. Recent research
studies also confirm that leadership and how leadership shapes culture are the biggest barriers
to and the biggest enablers of successful agile transformations.
Change is becoming complex due to diversity and fragmentation and knowledge plays a
crucial role in making business sustainable. But with knowledge, organization need
distributed leadership - leaders need to be agile in sensing, communicating and coordinating
(McKenzie. J, Aitken. P, 2012). Agile leaders are clear on the shift from current to future and
help organization make better use of their knowledge and speed. ‘Methodologies which are
being implemented nowadays follows agile principles, they put people over process, they
belief in collaboration rather than negotiation, they are made to respond to change rather than
following plan - different from traditional approach, which is process oriented’(Bonner. N,
2010).
Agile Culture

Meyer (2014), through her extensive research identified a Culture Map that helps us
understand how people think, lead and get things done across different cultures. The Culture
Map comprises of:
1. Communicating - low-context vs. high-context
2. Evaluating - direct negative feedback vs. indirect negative feedback
3. Persuading – principles-first vs. applications-first
4. Leading – egalitarian vs. hierarchical
5. Deciding – consensual vs. top-down
6. Trusting – task-based vs. relationship-based
7. Disagreeing – confrontational vs. avoids confrontation
8. Scheduling – linear-time vs. flexible-time

According to Schein (2016), the primary role of leadership is in building, embedding and
evolving culture. How Agile leaders of an organisation believe things should be done drives
the kind of Agile Culture that is established. Agile leaders are role model to others but never
fail to stick to their personal purpose and values. They not only make sense but are also
termed as sense giving. Agile Leaders maintain transparent and open culture by closely
connecting the senior management team to client facing delivery teams and focus on
improving result on continuous basis by following competitive and collaborative structure
(McKenzie. J, Aitken. P, 2012)

Theoretical framework:

a) For Agile Leadership

The Agile Leader is one who adapts, yet there are many good leaders in organisations who
rarely adapt. Some leaders have a command and control style of leadership, but that is not to
say they are bad leaders. However, many of these leaders find it harder than others to adapt
because of their mindset. The 3C’s of Agile Leadership Principle Guidance for

 Communication
1. Developing
 2. Reflecting
3. Learning
 Commitment
4. Inspiring
5. Engaging
6. Unifying
 Collaboration
7. Empowering
8. Achieving
9. Innovating

1. Agile Leadership is something that varies and improves over time. We believe that the
above principles are useful start for any senior executive or manager engaging in the work of
transforming their organisation into an Agile one.

Roger David Hall Caroline Ann Rowland mentioned in his paper “Leadership development
for managers in turbulent times” on the basis of grounded theory approach how the concept
of VUCA can be used to investigate the impact of desired attributes of leaders. The
Framework is shown below,
Though the Leaders and managers are acquiring knowledge with the change in development
they don't make it a critical point that their behaviour is as agile as their knowledge. The
framework has tried to explore the relationship between the Agility leaders have and the
content in terms of both cognitive and behavioural are aligned with the management studies.
The readiness the leaders should have to behave in the change or VUCA theory is being
imparted by the management studies. The significance of this framework is that the leaders
should focus on developing their behavioural skills while they are learning the cognitive
skills. According to the framework the below are the suggested "top ten characteristics that
managers need” to acquire:

1. Clear sense of purpose

2. Strong values and personal integrity
3. Commitment to developing others through coaching and mentoring
4. Champion of diversity
5. Ability to engage and communicate across all levels
6. Self-awareness and taking time to reflect
7. Collaborative, networked and non-hierarchical
8. Agile and innovative, technologically curious and savvy
9. Personal resilience and grit
10. Excellent track record of delivery

2. The below framework illustrates the process of becoming an Agile leaders and their
contributions in organization.
3. To assess the individual propensity for success as leader in agile environment –
characteristics of agile leaders when mapped with the specific inquiry mode, gives insights
into which leader or manager will be successful in agile environment’ (Bonner. N, 2010).

Role of Agile Project Managers – which are: Collaborative, Facilitator, Co-ordinator,

backbone for efficient software development, inspire team members, facilitate group decision
making, Trust team members, continuous guidance, outward facing perspective, work outside
the norm, continuous learning, leading by example, motivator.
b) For Agile Culture
Culture & Leadership is essential for an organisation to function effectively both on a
day to day basis as well as during times of change. Agile Leadership is essential to
focus and navigate the change; without it, the current culture will prevail and a diluted
form of organisational change will emerge.

The Schneider Culture Model defines four distinct cultures:

1. Collaboration culture is about working together

2. Control culture is about getting and keeping control
3. Competence culture is about being the best
4. Cultivation culture is about learning and growing with a sense of purpose

The diagram below summarizes the Schneider Culture Model. Each of the four
cultures are depicted – one in each quadrant. Each has a name, a “descriptive quote”,
a picture, and some words that characterize that quadrant. Please take a moment to
read through the diagram and get a sense of the model and where your company fits.
The following may be the leadership challenges in building such a transformation

 Communication and co-ordination: Specifically, the inter-group communication

and coordination is very important.
 Loosening control. A challenge for the managers may be the barrier and resistance
stems from themselves. The new agile way of working demands a lot more trust from
the manager’s side towards the employees, as the aim in the long run should be
building self-managed teams.
 Mastering agile methods: In some cases, managers may be severely undertrained for
their new role as an agile manager. Companies should not expect managers to
perform impeccable when the right training has not been offered all along, why big
responsibility lies on organizations to improve the manager’s skills before such a
transition.

Conclusion
Many organizations today still have transformational and transactional leadership in place. In
addition to new roles, agile methods also promotes self-managing teams which results in a
leadership model closer to that of shared leadership. However, as the leadership agility model
illustrates, there are certain levels of leadership agility that needs to be reached before one
can make the jump from heroic, transformational leadership to post-heroic, shared leadership.

References:

Nils Brede Moe1, Torgeir Dingsøyr, Øyvind Kvangardsnes. (2009). Understanding Shared
Leadership in Agile Development: A Case Study, 1-3.

Alimo-Metcalfe, B. (2013). A critical review of leadership theory. The Wiley Blackwell

handbook of the psychology of leadership, change, and organizational development, 13–47.

Fowler, M., & Highsmith, J. (2001). The agile manifesto. Software Development, 28–35.

Joiner, B., & Josephs, S. (2007). Developing agile leaders. Industrial and commercial
training, 35–42.

Schein, E. H., (2016), “Organizational Culture and Leadership”, The Jossey-Bass (John
Wiley & sons), 6th Edition, London.

Michael Sahota. An Agile Adoption and Transformation Survival Guide: Working with
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Bonner, N., (2010). Predicting Leadership Success in Agile Environments: An Inquiring

Systems Approach. Academy of Information and Management Sciences Journal, Volume 13

Bass, B. M. (1990). From transactional to transformational leadership: Learning to share the

vision. Organizational dynamics, 19–31.

Roger David Hall Caroline Ann Rowland, (2016),"Leadership development for managers in
turbulent times", Journal of Management Development, Vol. 35, 1-2.

McKenzie, J.,& Aitken, P., (2012). Learning to lead the knowledgeable organization:
developing leadership agility. Strategic HR Review. VOL. 11 NO. 6 2012, 329-334.