Coach Dan's Blog

  "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn." Alvin Toffler Continuious Improvement means continuious learning. It means undderstanding that just because something worked yesterday, doesn't mean it will work tomorrow. It means that everything should be on the table to reevaluate and reassess. A growth mindset in necessary to continuiously improve. When was the last time you challenged your thinking, and learned something new?

  📖 "Any fool can know. The point is to understand." - Albert Einstein The siren call to action can be impossible to ignore. In fact, the pressure to "do" can be so great, that we'll look at data- make an assumption and then act without ever looking back. Albert Einstein seemed to be warning us not to confuse knowledge (data) with understanding... something worthy of exploring. I got curious and tried a CHATGPT prompt. (Data vs. information vs. insight vs. understanding.) I was presented with following response- 💻 Data –Raw, unprocessed facts or figures without context. 💻 Information –Data that has been organized, structured, or contextualized to make it meaningful. 💻 Insight –A meaningful interpretation or discovery derived from information, often leading to action. 💻 Understanding –A deep, holistic grasp of patterns, causes, and implications that allows for better decision-making. 💻 Each level builds upon the previous one, moving from raw data to action...

  📖 “How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” ― Anne Frank What are you waiting for? ✔️ Reflect ✔️ Set a goal ✔️ Make a small change ✔️ Repeat You don't have to swing for the fences every day. Small experiments bring about small changes that add up over time. What's stopping you?

  📖 “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” ― Marcus Aurelius   It's easy to be so confident in a direction or a belief, that we forget to reflect. Challenge yourself to reflect and identify bias in your own thinking. You may be surprised about what you find. We all win together.

I was having a random conversation with another coach last week, and we had a bit of a shared 'ah ha' moment. We, as champions of agility, say the word "agile" (as though it were a destination, or a goal,) way more than we should. Perhaps WE, as coaches, scrum masters, and champions, need to challenge our own use of the language a bit. Instead of saying... 🚫 We're changing to be (or heaven forbid, do) agile. maybe we should be saying... ✅ We want to respond to change WITH agility. ✅ We want to solve problems WITH agility. ✅ We want to achieve outcomes WITH agility. ✅ We aim to work WITH agility. Isn't our goal really to respond to change, solve problems and achieve outcomes? And isn't it all the better to do those things with agility? When we challenge ourselves to use our words differently, we can shift the focus away from frameworks and mindsets... and toward APPLYING those frameworks and mindsets toward ACHIEVING something. What words do you use ...

  “Do not give them a candle to light the way, teach them how to make fire instead. That is the meaning of enlightenment.” ― Kamand Kojouri   It's a fine line- balancing between helping your partners achieve a goal, and teaching them the skills (and building the experience) necessary to achieve their goals over and over and over again.   ⛔ "Just tell us what to do, and we will do it." ⛔ "Provide us the steps or the checklist." ⛔ "How do you want us to do this?"   This language is common, and it suggests to me that the team (regardless of level) has been conditioned to not take risks. To me it means they have learned through experience that their safest course of action is to have someone else solve the problem and instead just do as told.     In other words, they are doing exactly what they have been trained (and incen ted) to do.   Sure- some problems need to be solved right now! There can be an immediate benefit ...

  💡 Quick challenge for today - Assess how you listen. We all know that it's better to "listen to understand" rather than "listen to respond." I would suspect that most of us also think that we do a good job of listening to understand. But do we? Assess yourself today - Set your alarm and schedule yourself 5 minutes today, and actively reflect... ❔ Did I listen to understand today? ❔ Was I quick to respond, or did I pause to reflect before I answered questions? ❔ Did I repeat back what I heard to validate I understood what the sender intended? ❔ In reviewing every meeting on my calendar, what new thing did I learn with each interaction? Changing our habits can be hard. What are you doing today to become a better listener?