Everyone seems to be going on and on about agile leadership and how important it is to a business, but what is it all about? Why should you implement it in your organization? Why do you need to have an agile leader leading your team?
Keep reading to learn everything you need to know.
What is Agile Leadership?
Agile leadership is all about creating and nurturing a culture in which learning and experimentation are both embraced. It’s about collaborating with employees, regardless of their levels in the organization, and finding common values that create more significant goals for a business.
Agile leaders inspire others. They communicate appealing visions that motivate organizations and continuously look for ways to work better through feedback. Agile leadership is all about being inclusive, supporting others, being open to new ideas and innovations, and supporting creativity.
Agile leaders have the ability to cultivate the right mindsets and create cultures based on collaboration. They are not just coaches, but listeners as well. Agile leadership is not just about the tools, methodologies, and practices used. It’s about the ability of the leader to look at the business from a system perspective, understand what’s happening, embrace it, and become a part of it.
Agile leadership is about trust, collaboration, decentralization, flexibility, continuous adaptation, teamwork, and cooperation. The business world has shifted from static management to strategic management, and now we are dealing with dynamic management. This is the management that needs agile leaders who are flexible enough to deal with modern business challenges.
What Does It Mean to Be An Agile Leader?
Agile leadership and great leadership are two different things. It’s no longer enough to be a great leader. Great leaders need to develop new skills and approaches in order to transform into agile leaders.
Agile Leaders Need to Be Transparent
Most leaders will agree that transparency is highly important in an organization. But, what that means is that they need to know what the teams are doing all the time. Agile leadership, on the other hand, means that transparency needs to start from the leaders themselves in their work. They need to share information about what they are working on, the broader goals of the company, and their priorities, which, in essence, should guide the team.
Agile Leaders Are Present to Gain Insights
An agile leader should be present. Even though it’s imperative to be strategic, it even more important to be effective at the moment. When leaders are present, they have a greater awareness of the things going on and have the ability to address the right challenges facing their teams. Agile leaders do not just listen but ask in-depth questions that help them gain insight, which in turn helps them make the right decisions, helping the business move forward. Agile leaders are Democratic leaders
What does it mean to be a democratic leader? By definition, a democratic leader means participative leadership. Democratic leaders offer individuals of the lower hierarchy in the business the opportunity to share power in decision making. These leaders emphasize collaboration and shared responsibility among all members of their team.
Democratic leadership is all about instilling mutual respect among all the people involved, which creates an environment for candid and open conversations. Democratic leadership has a massive impact on employee engagement, and it increases overall participation and overall productivity.
Agile Leaders Provide Feedback
One of the most significant tenets of agile leadership is feedback. Great leaders don’t just give feedback, but they also encourage and empower their team members to do the same. They show their team members how to receive feedback as well.
As an agile leader, you would be required to help your team stay in touch with your organization. This way, they’ll receive feedback from not just the company but customers as well. You would be the coach and the mentor to the team you lead.
Agile Leaders Inspire Creativity and Innovation
Agile is not just a way of working, but a way of being as well. If an agile leader wants to foster an agile culture in the business, they will not only establish automation methods or develop project planning. They will also inspire innovation and creativity in their employees and enable them to be contributing members of the organization.
Agile Leaders Move Fast
Agile leadership is all about moving quickly because speed is vital in business operations. When a business moves fast to solve a certain problem, create a certain product or responds to certain needs, the business always wins. To be agile, actions need to be led by aspiration. When the whole team knows what they are working towards, they become more creative and inspired to achieve the goals and accomplish the vision.
Additionally, agile leaders adapt to situations quickly, regardless of what comes along. Challenges come by the day, and yesterday’s solutions may not solve tomorrow’s issues. As an agile leader, you should not always rely on your experience to resolve issues, but be open to new solutions and adapt easily.
Agile Leadership Is About Celebrating Others
Agile leaders empower employees and support them by providing recognition and celebration for what they achieve. As a leader, you need to share the spotlight with the team. Ensure they receive positive press for their efforts, and it’ll motivate them to achieve more.
Agile Leaders Measure Performance
Agile leaders cannot do without monitoring, measuring, and managing. They need to not just track measurements, but also empower their teams to measure their results. Apart from velocity, they should be able to track and measure projects, meeting time, team trust, customer satisfaction, among others. With all this information, everyone knows how well the team is doing.
Agile Leadership Is About Connecting With Customers
Agile methodologies involve customers, and leaders need to facilitate this process. As an agile leader, you must set expectations with customers and provide opportunities where they can be present. Customers are an essential part of the business, and it’s only natural to involve them.
Agile Leaders Get out of the Way and Develop Team Members
As an agile leader, you should ensure your team is well informed when it comes to business strategies and the context surrounding their work. They also get out of the way and empower employees to solve problems on their own.
Of course, the team must have the capabilities to solve issues, so the leader needs to provide opportunities that allow them to develop. This can be done through formal or embedded learning, including job rotation and shadowing.
There is so much more you can learn about agile leadership — check out this blog post.
Agile Leadership is the Key to Scaling Agility
Agile leaders are the key to scaling agility in the business. They play an essential role in framing the right goals. What most businesses lack are strong and supportive agile leaders that’ll help build high-performing teams.
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