“How do I become an agile coach?”

“How do I become an agile coach?” This is one of the most asked questions recently. Not surprising, “agile” is the new toy of business world and “agile coach“ title looks fancy. Without understanding of “why agile” and “how agile”, people are looking for short-cuts of some positions like Scrum Master, Product Owner and Agile Coach.

What would be the possible short-cuts for being an agile coach? Lets look at the assumptions:

• If I have a certification, I can be an agile coach
• If I know coding, I can be an agile coach
• If I know Scrum, I can be an agile coach.
• ….

I can expand this list of assumptions. I agree that some of these assumptions can be considered at some point of course but these are not the vital assumptions/questions for being an agile coach.

There are 4 main questions that I ask myself every single day and I believe these would be helpful if you are at the very beginning of your journey or about to hire an agile coach.

“Where should I start?”

Before searching any certification program or applying any agile coaching position, ask yourself these questions and find 2–3 colleagues/friends who can make an objective evaluation and face where you are according to answers you get. (Good news! None of them are related to Scrum or Kanban!)

Am I a “real” lifelong learner?

Most of us answer this question, Yes! But in reality being a lifelong learner is more though than you think. It is not just about attending trainings, reading books and articles. It is more about taking lessons from disappointment, desperation, failure… I mean real cases which are the biggest part of your learning journey and organization’s too. If you are capable of mapping what is not working and possible next steps to bounce back, then your organization can do it too. As an agile coach if you want to grow your organization, first grow yourself.

How resilient am I?

This is a control question for the first question. You might define yourself as a lifelong learner, you are great at taking lessons from different cases. OK BUT… How is your adaptation level? Most of the time lessons are clear for everyone but knowing how to move on is different story. How many time have you killed an idea? How long is your failure list? Have you ever been disappointed by your team?

Am I great communicator?

Agile coaching means that you are an advocate for agile mindset. And the hardest part of this is the adaptation of this mindset by organization. In change management, a clear communication on why, what and how is the most valuable capability you must have. This communication needs to be with all members of the organization from CEO to development teams. You have to be comfortable with express yourself openly and share “why” part in a simple way. If you have worked closely with a leadership team before or manage organization wide initiatives, these experiences definitely make your work easier.

How much variety does my professional experience have?

Mentoring is one of the important stances in agile coaching and how good you are is directly proportional to your business experience. Agility is based on two main abilities: transforming user/market information into insights and using them in response to market movements. Diverse experiences like product, CX, data, strategy gives you more advantage when you mentor your organization in agile product development. Both start-up and corporate experience help you to understand different behaviour patterns in change management.

Lessons to NEVER FORGET from my journey

I am asking myself these 4 questions every single day to check where I am, especially the last one to remember my never forget lessons when I was in different positions in different organizational cultures. These lessons help me to empathize with the whole organization, foresee possible challenges team might face, and not to stuck frameworks without understanding the real needs of business.

My product management experience taught me:

• Whatever you do, first set your concrete goals and ensure the team’s commitment to these goals.
• To prioritize actions, you need to work closely with internal stakeholders, especially C-levels. Every communication must serve the product, don’t lose your focus. Feed these communications by real customer needs.

My management consultancy experience taught me:

• Strategy is everything. It is FOCUS. It’s where you will play, how you will compete and why you will win. If you feel an ambiguity related to strategy, force whoever is responsible to define a clear picture for everyone.

Change management experience in a big global company taught me:

• Agile is for small teams. But still it can help for better business results. Don’t focus on all parts of the organization, prioritize where you play. Create your dream team for the change. Choose your battle wisely!

Agile Coaching experience in a start-up taught me:

• Forget everything that you know! Each organization is unique, there is no short-cut to build something unique. It takes blood, sweat and tears!
• Push forward all efforts to product. If you don’t have a strong product team, you are nothing.

Journey is still going on. If you have any never forget lesson from your agile coaching experience or previous roles, please leave your comments :) Cheers to new lessons✌🏼