Coach Dan's Blog

  I was recently asked by someone I met, "Isn't a coach really just a trainer?" My response was quick - "While a coach sometimes trains on new skills or knowledge, they also facilitate, mentor and challenge teams to improve the way they work." Looking back, I would grade myself a "C-" on that answer. I WISH I had said... "A great coach works with you to achieve your goals. They bring experiences, perspectives and tools to help you and your team accelerate performance. It's not always about faster... but it IS about better! A great coach helps you and the team identify ways to improve and then challenges you address them WHILE working to achieve the teams goals. They know that there are many different ways to make improvements, and have a "toolbox" of processes, frameworks and techniques to help identify and make them. That said, they don't just want to teach you a skill (or framework, or process) - they want you to use your skill...

The way an organization operates is a reflection on the beliefs and values of the leader. If you want to improve the way your organization creates value, start with taking a hard look at yourself. The best-laid change management plan will help you move boxes around your org chart, but making meaningful improvements within an organization first requires intentional mindset and behavior shifts across the leadership team. Where have you seen leaders change their mindset before an org change? What were the results?

There are no shortcuts to transformational improvements - but starting with small changes today can lead to big results in the future! Long term, meaningful improvements come from small, thoughtful experiments today. ✔️ Remind yourself - what's your long term goal? ✔️ Ask yourself - what's one small thing I can accomplish today to bring that goal closer? ✔️ Reflect - what did I learn from my small change? Commit to trying one small thing differently, then assess the results - You will get closer to your goal every day.  

Painting a new process overtop of the same organizational structure will not result in the meaningful improvements you're hoping for. Successful transformation leaders reorganize their people to improve effectiveness, efficiency and engagement. Just look at the data! ·  McKinsey found that organizations that adopted cross-functional, agile teams were able to improve decision-making speed by as much as 40%, compared to traditional hierarchical structures. ·  Stanford University found that an organization’s time to market decreased by 30% after implementing cross-functional teams in an agile setup. ·  Forrester Research indicates that cross-functional teams in product development (especially those aligned around customer needs and business outcomes) can lead to 20-30% faster time to market compared to traditional, siloed teams. ·  HBR published research that found that cross-functional teams led to a 25% improvement in team effic...

Painting your current organization with a “new” framework doesn’t address the challenges in the structure. Installing a new framework without rethinking team composition won’t get you far! Recreating teams to be cross-functional and focused on a common outcome is the first step to truly unleashing your organization’s potential. Agile Transformations without Organizational Re-design misses the mark almost every time!

We throw the word “agile” around a lot.  I thought it might be a good idea to get back to the basics, so we can move forward with a shared understanding on it really means. Let’s start with the word agile.   (Can we all agree that dictonary.com is a good source of pure definition?   Good!) agile [ aj-uhl, -ahyl ] adjective ·    Quick and well-coordinated in movement ·    Active; lively ·    Marked by an ability to think quickly, mentally acute or aware ·    Noting or relating to a philosophy of product development and production intended to create and distribute batches of working products in a short period of time with subsequent batches planned in a cyclical schedule of improvement, production, and distribution noun ·    Sometimes Agile - an iterative and collaborative philosophy of rapid product development and production Ok.   That’s a great place to start because it reinforces something reall...

If y'all have been paying attention, I often refer to our transformations, or any change really, as a journey. I like that word because it involves the idea of something that takes time and is full of possibilities. Something that could be exciting and full of adventure. It's a little bit mysterious because of the distance and time involved. Anyone who has traveled much at all knows that, even with the most perfectly charted course, the unexpected can, and often does, happen. You can let it derail you, or you can embrace the challenge and take what you can from the experience. The word "journey" to me says there are things to learn and see and experience along the way, and those things along the way can be just as exciting and valuable as reaching the destination! On any journey, there will be forks in the road, and we have to decide which direction we're going to go. Today, I'm sharing with you all that I've decided on a path that takes me away from...

I hear those words a lot.  "Hi!  My name is ... I report to ..."  I may have missed the part of orientation that taught us that standard introduction.  It's what we say when we meet someone new, or start working with a new team. Sometimes to me it feels like a security blanket of sorts.  Or a justification as to why that person showed up to a certain meeting.  Regardless of why it happens, it happens.  A lot.  To me, that phrase has become a symbol of why we as a company, still have a way to go with our transformation. At the risk of repeating myself over and over... I'd like to refresh us all on the "why" of this transformation we are all working on. Our customers matter.  They count on us to help them achieve their financial goals.  Without them, and their continued use of our services, we wouldn't have a company (and consequently jobs, which means we would not be a part of so-and-so's organization!)  Our customers matter so much ...