Co-creation As The Transformative Approach To Agile Change | Aliona Zapanovici

Summary

Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile Storytelling from the Trenches

Episode Summary: "Co-creation As The Transformative Approach To Agile Change" featuring Aliona (Alena) Zapanovici

Release Date: November 27, 2024
Host: Vasco Duarte, Agile Coach, Certified Scrum Master, Certified Product Owner
Guest: Aliona (Alena) Zapanovici

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1. Introduction

In this insightful episode, host Vasco Duarte welcomes Aliona Zapanovici to discuss the pivotal role of co-creation in driving agile change within teams. The conversation delves into real-world experiences, challenges faced during change initiatives, and effective strategies to foster collaborative environments.

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2. Aliona's Perspective on Change

Aliona opens the discussion with a profound reflection on the nature of change:

"Nothing is permanent except change. To me, it's a reminder that change is a constant and without it, we can't grow or improve."
— Aliona Zapanovici [01:09]

She emphasizes that while change is essential for growth, it cannot be forced without understanding and involving the team.

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3. Recognizing and Understanding Resistance

Aliona shares her experience with resistance during a process improvement initiative:

"When you try to push change, it often meets with huge resistance. And instead of making progress, people spend their energy resisting it."
— Aliona Zapanovici [01:09]

She initially perceived the pushback as a natural reaction but soon realized that enforcing change without team involvement was counterproductive.

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4. Shifting to a Co-Creation Approach

The conversation transitions to the importance of involving the team in the change process. Aliona recounts how she adjusted her approach after recognizing her initial missteps:

"I started listening to them and co-creating the change, the improvements, and together designing the new processes. It became an opportunity for us to collaborate rather than something that felt forced upon them."
— Aliona Zapanovici [04:17]

This shift from a directive to a collaborative approach significantly reduced resistance and fostered a sense of ownership among team members.

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5. Techniques for Successful Change

Aliona outlines several key techniques that have proven effective in her experience:

• Listen First, Act Later: Prioritize understanding the team's pain points, motivations, and concerns before proposing changes.

  "To listen first and act later before even proposing any changes."
  — Aliona Zapanovici [04:17]

• Co-Create Solutions: Involve the team in designing solutions to ensure they feel invested in the outcomes.

  "Co-creating solutions not only reduces resistance but also gives them ownership."
  — Aliona Zapanovici [04:17]

• Implement Incremental Changes: Start with small, manageable changes rather than overwhelming the team with large-scale shifts.

  "Change in small increments instead of one big change."
  — Aliona Zapanovici [04:17]

• Celebrate Wins: Recognize and celebrate the positive outcomes of changes to maintain motivation and momentum.

  "When the team sees the positive outcomes of the changes they helped create, it motivates them to continue pushing for improvement."
  — Aliona Zapanovici [04:17]

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6. Building Trust for Co-Creation

A cornerstone of successful co-creation is trust. Aliona discusses strategies to build and maintain trust within teams:

"It's all about building trust. If you trust your team, if you trust that if you voice your opinion, something will actually happen. And that is transparency."
— Aliona Zapanovici [06:42]

She highlights transparency and the celebration of wins as critical factors in fostering an environment where team members feel safe to express their ideas and contribute to change initiatives.

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7. Practical Applications and Examples

Vasco Duarte adds practical insights into initiating co-creation processes:

"Start with a problem that they want to solve... even though the long-term change might be something completely different."
— Vasco Duarte [09:05]

He suggests beginning with immediate, tangible problems to demonstrate the effectiveness of collaborative approaches, thereby modeling the desired behavior and encouraging team participation.

Aliona concurs, reinforcing the importance of addressing current issues collaboratively to pave the way for broader, long-term changes.

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8. Conclusion

The episode wraps up with a mutual appreciation for the shared insights on leading change through co-creation. Aliona and Vasco agree that empowering teams by involving them in the change process not only mitigates resistance but also cultivates a culture of continuous improvement and ownership.

Vasco teases the next episode, highlighting the ongoing journey of Scrum Masters in defining and achieving success through continuous learning and adaptation.

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Key Takeaways:

• Embrace Change: Recognize that change is a constant and essential for growth.
• Avoid Forcing Change: Forcing change without team involvement leads to resistance.
• Co-Creation is Crucial: Involving the team in designing and implementing changes fosters ownership and reduces pushback.
• Build Trust: Transparency and celebrating successes build trust, enabling open communication and collaboration.
• Start Small: Implement incremental changes to demonstrate effectiveness and build momentum.
• Listen Actively: Prioritize understanding the team's needs and concerns before proposing solutions.

This episode offers valuable insights for Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches aiming to lead effective change initiatives by fostering collaborative and trusting team environments.

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Stay Tuned:
Tomorrow’s episode, "Success Thursday," will explore defining success for the Scrum Master role, including tips on measuring progress and fostering continuous improvement. Don't miss it!

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For more actionable advice and inspiring conversations, subscribe to the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast on Stitcher or iTunes, and share it with fellow Scrum Masters to enhance their agile practices.

Transcript

[Vasco Duart]

Hi, I'm your host, Vasco Duart. Welcome to the Scrum Master Toolbox podcast where we share tips and tricks from Scrum Masters around the world. Every day, we bring you inspiring answers to important questions that all Scrum Masters.

Face day after day. Hello, everybody. Welcome to our Wednesday the Leading Change episode, this week with Alena Zapanovic. Hey, Alyona. Welcome back.

[Alena Zapanovic]

Hello, Vascom.

[Vasco Duart]

So change is of course, something we have to deal with all the time, and therefore we need to kind of learn the tricks of the trade, as it were, to be able to help change along and to become change leaders ourselves. So let's hear one of those stories. Alena, tell us a story of a change process you were involved with and walk us through the steps step by step. And as you go through those, highlight for us the tools, the tips, the tricks, and the techniques you learned back then that you still apply today.

[Alena Zapanovic]

It's one of my favorite quotes. Nothing is permanent except change. To me, it's a reminder that change is a constant and without it, we can't grow or improve. However, what I've learned is that change cannot be forced. When you try to push change, it often meets with huge resistance. And instead of making progress, people spend their energy resisting it. And that effort could actually be used in a more productive ways. One experience that stands out for me was when I was part of the program process improvement initiative, and there was a lot of resistance, resistance from my team. And at first I thought it was just a natural pushback, but then I realized that I was pushing it too hard. I was trying to enforce the change without fully understanding the team's concerns or involving them in the process.

[Vasco Duart]

Can you tell us how did that happen in practice? I imagine that you had the first few interactions with the team and they say, maybe this is not a good idea, or it was never done like that. Whatever the statement was. And you felt, okay, this is what I expected. So this is kind of normal pushback. But at some point you realize that, okay, this is not about pushing back, this is something else. How did you get to that realization?

[Alena Zapanovic]

Well, we can use best practices and we can think that, well, if it worked somewhere else, maybe it's a universal size and one size fits all and you can just try to force it and to put it upon your team and explain them in different ways how it worked with some other companies, some other products, and that is not necessarily true. If you do this before you discuss with the team and ask them and understand why they act in a certain way, what do they want, how do they want to work? But you immediately start with creating rules yourself without involving them. Well, in this case the pushback is natural.

[Vasco Duart]

So when you said, when you start creating rules yourself without involving them. So I guess you realize at the point that, wait a minute, what I'm doing is I'm telling them what to do, but I'm not really listening to them. Right. So when you got to that kind of realization, how did you then bring them on board? How did you then start involving the team in moving forward? Because at that point there's already resistant. So it might not be easy for them to step away from that resistance and engage with collaborative change. Right?

[Alena Zapanovic]

It wasn't easy. It was difficult because I already took the wrong steps, I can say. But I started listening to them and evolving them in co creating the change, the, the improvements and to together to design the new processes. And it became an opportunity for us to collaborate rather than something that felt forced upon them. And from that point I've developed a few techniques is to listen first and act later before even proposing any changes. To start to listen to the team to understand the pain points and their motivation and concerns. The second one would be co create solutions involve the team. This not only reduces the resistance, but also gives them the ownership. And that is really important. And not to change to start with small increments of change instead of one big. And to celebrate wins. When the team sees the positive outcomes of the changes they helped create, it motivates them to continue pushing for improvement. And I've learned that people are much more willing to embrace change when they feel they are part of the process. It's a choice. And by giving them the freedom to choose how they evolve, we can help them grow without forcing it.

[Vasco Duart]

One of the things that is really important is to create that space for co creation of change. How do you these days, how do you do that? Of course, listening is part of it, but how do you in practice involve them? Like how do you start that co creation process with the teams that you work with?

[Alena Zapanovic]

Well, I think it's all about building trust. And in the end it's all about building trust. Because yes, people should not be, I can't say afraid, but sometimes it's not afraid to speak up, sometimes it's not willing to speak up. Because nothing ever changes even if I say what I think. And if you trust your team, if you trust that if you voice your opinion, something will actually happen. And that is transparency. We use transparency. We celebrate the wins. We see that it Made a difference for us.

[Vasco Duart]

Absolutely. And the reward that comes from actually being part of the change. When people actually participate, when they actually engage, of course you need the trust first, as you said. But when they actually participate, when. When they engage and they see that, it's really happening, as we said. And I think that that can be a powerful catalyst for much faster and much more impactful change. So I was thinking, as you were describing, that, I mean, we can start with something very small. And the way I usually like to get started is first ask them for a problem they want to solve and then show them in practice how do we go about doing that? Could be within the retrospective, of course, that would make sense, but it can be something much simpler, like just, oh, we wanted to talk to the product owner, but the product owner wasn't available. Okay, let's think about how do we involve the product owner, right? Like, what are we missing and need? And then how do we reach out to the product owner? Because now I'm also helping the team to help the product owner change. And that's a way in which we can model the behavior that we want the team to take. Right. Because then we are part of that change as participants, not as leaders in the change as well. So I really like that approach that you define. Kind of start with trust and then bring them along. And then what I would add to that is always start with a problem that they want to solve, even though the long term change might be something completely different.

[Alena Zapanovic]

Yes.

[Vasco Duart]

Thank you for sharing that story, Alyona.

[Alena Zapanovic]

Thank you very much.

[Vasco Duart]

Leading change is one of the core skills we must acquire, but it is only one of the steps towards our success as Scrum Masters. Tomorrow on Success Thursday, we will talk about how to define success for the Scrum Master role. We'll cover tips on how to measure your way to that position and most importantly, how to develop that. Focus on continuous improvement that is as important for Scrum Masters as it is for teams. See you tomorrow. I really hope you liked our show. And if you did, why not rate this podcast on Stitcher or itunes? Share this podcast and let other Scrum Masters know about this valuable resource for their work. Remember that sharing is caring.