This week I start another step of my own journey. My manager has received a great opportunity to take a temporary assignment with our Engineering team. We have spoken many times about career opportunities and our futures (something that I greatly appreciate). She's wanted to be part of the Engineering team for a long time, as she sees great learning opportunities with them as well as a great opportunity to bring a new perspective into the team. I think she is going to do a fantastic job there, as her leadership and genuine caring for others is a great asset for any team. While she takes that position, I have been given an opportunity to lead our team in her absence. I want to reflect a little about this before the week begins as a sort of plan for myself during this temporary assignment.
I again come back to the image of a river. The one pictured here is from a hike I took a few weeks ago. I will normally stop by any river I come across and use the time to just relax. I have often been told to take some time for my own wellness, and I have found that it is greatly important to do this as much as I can. What I love about rivers is how different they can be from each other, and how different they can be depending on when you watch them. I can make many parallels with things in life based on the image of river and it generally gives me a sense of peace, even when things look chaotic. The river flows constantly. As long as there is water, the river guides the flow. There are times when the water can become too great, in which case we see it breach the sides of the river and cause flooding. Given time, the flood waters recede and the river once again flows as usual. There is something about this constancy that can take a lot of stress away.
In leadership roles in an organization I think this description applies. When management or leadership changes in a team, there is a bit of stress added to the team. Is the river changing? Are we going to flow our work differently? How will our own flow of value to the organization change because of this change? I find it extremely important to teams to remain constant in the purpose of the team. The underlying river remains the same. If you wish to move a river, you wouldn't want to take bulldozers trying to move one as it already flows. You wouldn't want to force a dam in the middle of the river and stop the flow either. There is a great importance then given to the flow, and to the river itself.
In leadership then what does it all mean? For me, this means to communicate the purpose of the team and to ensure that the river remains. It means opening up the dialogue during this time to ensure the team is able to address any potential barriers that we may think may cause our flow to be interrupted. It also means not upending processes or direction for the sake of myself. We remain constant to the idea of continuous improvement. This is easy for our team as we have taken this idea and have been living it for some time now. We constantly change, looking for kaizen (change for better) and learning from and improving on kaiaku (change for worse). Change remains however as we continue to remove the many boulders and interruptions to the flow of our value to the organization and our Customers.
I have seen managers and leaders change in teams and the entire direction of the river changes. Imagine a river that goes through an abrupt change. What happens to the water? The water that flows is the value flowing to the Customer. When leaders make abrupt changes to the river, the flow becomes more chaotic. In practical terms, we add more costs as the team adapts and re-learns whatever new way the leader or manager has introduced. However, there is one caveat to all of this. If a previous manager or leader thrived on causing chaos, then a new approach can save the team and organization. Often though, we find the opposite. New management or leadership want to leave a mark, show their greatness. And so they make arbitrary changes based only on their own thoughts and experiences and people either adapt, leave, or worse, pretend to follow.
My plan then is rather simple. I think we have the correct river, flowing to the correct Customers. We may have additional rivers that we can create, but right now it is important to remain constant to the idea of finding and removing all interruptions in our current flow of value. If we add more rivers, more value streams, we may not have the ability to flow in either stream. So first thing I will do is to communicate with the team. I will communicate this constancy of purpose and take away any perceived barriers that may be added due to this leadership change. It's easier to communicate this since I am already part of the team, and it is easier knowing that this is a temporary change for the team for the next few months. Second, I plan on continuing the learning and growing aspect of our team that our previous leader has established. I find this as one of our most important and valuable pieces as a team. To do this, I will participate in team huddles, and set up one-on-one huddles with each team member. This should help continue and strengthen our relationships with each other, as well as help to address any issues we are having quickly. Third, I will work on the fundamentals of Lean Leadership. To do this, I will work towards the Mindset of Support, live our Leadership Principles, help level our workloads as a team, continue standardizing and improving upon our own processes, and help strengthen our abilities to detect and address problems.
Success in this assignment is not making my own mark. Success is standing back as a team and seeing a more peaceful river than it was yesterday, because we have removed just a bit more of the barriers that is keeping it from flowing. As I go on my hikes and look at rivers, I am always reminded by that thought of wellness, whether it is for my own well-being, the well-being of the team I'm a part of, the well-being of the organization as a whole, or the well-being of the Customer.
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