Transparency
Much is said about the importance of transparency in agile teams. Still, I want to extend it to its extent throughout the organization. The culture of openness is excellent for organizations because it builds trust among everyone and allows everyone to feel more ownership of their work and the value they serve. I want to explore the close link between transparency and agile in this post.
Transparency holds organizations and the individuals within them accountable for the value they add and their processes and interactions to achieve it. While this may seem like a simple practice, the giant elephant in the room stops everything for fundamental transformation. Away from Fake Agile.
An agile company can respond to market changes and pivot when necessary. Agile at an organizational level is summed up to that… Strengthen teams, break down silos and get out of the way any dependency or impediment you have when increasing a value, which is constantly changing.
One of the values that helps an organization embrace this mindset is transparency. At a basic level, transparency means everyone involved in the value enhancement system knows everything. As a value, it drives the understanding that these people are also more productive when they know what is happening and have access to the information they need.
It also helps establish trust with customers by showing them that you are open about who you are, how you do business, and of course, that you listen to them constantly so that, thanks to their feedback, you always give them more and better value.
The key to embracing transparency as a value is to make sure everyone in the organization knows the value they serve, what’s important about that value, and why it’s essential. In addition, they must know how their work influences to achieve it and what can be done to achieve it more and better every day.
How do you get a culture that allows and accepts transparency in organizations?
The most important thing is to establish a set of core values and ensure that they are present in all aspects of your company’s purpose. What value do we serve? Does this value change? How do we always increment it? How often? Does everyone in the company know everything about the value and the processes and interactions to achieve it?
The key is to ensure that those values are reflected in the organization’s culture, which should embrace transparency at all levels. Everyone must agree and work for the same goals. The company must also be open and honest with its teams and people when sharing information about that value. So it is clear that transparency is a cultural issue.
You can’t just hire someone or buy software that makes your organization transparent. Transparency is achieved by practicing it, from bottom to top, from top to bottom, and from right to left and from left to right… All members of an organization must practice transparency.
Leaders need to be open to the reasons behind decisions and changes, including difficult or unpopular ones. It is also essential that each person freely share information within their teams and between departments when it is available.
To practice transparency, you have to create an environment where people feel safe sharing information with others. That’s why culture is so influential: If people don’t feel comfortable being open with each other and their bosses, it will be tough to share information proactively. And the leader or leader should be the living example.
I recently saw an organization embrace a non-transparent culture when agile silos were fostered due to agile coaches forming sides to serve the value of their center of excellence. And, as you can guess, the leader (Head of Agile) did nothing to help them.
I will also tell you about another experience, where for not being transparent, two leaders of an organization fought passively and also directly in their sessions, each one on their own to defend the value of their teams, instead of working together as one and the most interesting, were the people who helped others to understand the change (Change Management Manager vs. Head of Agile).
Agile leaders are necessary, but also transparent leaders. This means being open and honest with every decision we make and ensuring everyone knows everything about that decision. It’s easy to be okay when things are going well, but not so easy when things are a little more complicated. A transparent leader keeps all team members informed about him, even if there is a fight with another area about who gets what and for what. A good leader communicates openly and often, allowing for a more productive work environment and helping their team practice the same thing: transparency.
Agile and Transparency?
Agile is the ability to react quickly and effectively to changes in the environment, which is especially important in today’s market, where trends can flare and fade in a few weeks. Transparency is the idea that, culturally, every person working in these organizations can know the value they serve, their role, their responsibilities, the impact of their decisions, and how they can improve everything.
Agile without transverse transparency = Fake Agile.
