Today, we explain that when you learn a new skill - whether it's playing the piano, kitesurfing across a lake, or negotiating with others inside and outside your agile team - it's vital to practise to develop your abilities. Don't jump onto the double black diamond run the first time you hit the slopes; instead, find a coach and watch her carefully as she goes down the mountain first. You'll learn to act in unintuitive ways and discover new possibilities you wouldn't have thought of. The same is true of learning to have the difficult conversations you need to improve your agile team - you can listen to us all you want, but you'll need to try (and fail!) to really master the methods. We get started on some methods for effective practise, including the use of a feeling chart, with more to follow in the next episode.

Join us in London on 19 March for our talk on "Sprinting In Place: The Cost of Missing Leadership Conversations"!

SHOW LINKS:

- Jeffrey's blog post on the piano analogy: https://blog.jeffreyfredrick.com/2015/06/07/the-piano-analogy-some-practice-required/ 

- London Organisational Learning meetup: https://www.meetup.com/London-Action-Science-Meetup/ 

- NVC 4-part process: https://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/aboutnvc/4partprocess.htm

- NVC feelings inventory: https://www.cnvc.org/training/resource/feelings-inventory

- Our SkillsMatter talk on 19 March: https://skillsmatter.com/meetups/11800-leadership-matters

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The Value of Learning to Talk

Troubleshooting Agile is a problem-solving session for agile teams. Jeffrey Fredrick and Douglas Squirrel look at common problems agile teams face and provide practical, immediately useful advice for getting back on track.