Book Summary | Tata's Leadership Experiment : The Story of the Tata Administrative Service

 

Book Name: Tata's Leadership Experiment : The Story of the Tata Administrative Service

Author: Mukund Rajan, Sonu Bhasin, Bharat Wakhlu

Publisher: HarperBusiness

 

Tata’s is one of the leading, most trusted, and respected brands globally. Tatas were the first industrialist who brought many social changes before it became law or statutory compliance requirement in India. When a new employee joins the Tata Group company, it is a custom during the induction to handover few books authored by R M Lal, related to the Tata founders.

 

The authors of this books are cadres of Tata Administrative Service, who held top positions in various Tata Group companies. The authors narrate the origins of formation of TAS, under the leadership of JRD Tata. This in similar lines of having IAS cadre of India, when the concept of having management cadre was not yet developed in Indian Industry. Jokingly TAS were also branded as Tata’s Adopted Sons. The authors have captured few anecdotes of the TAS officers, the entire interview process, the directors spending time in selecting these candidates, put them in ease during the interview and selection process, shows the rich and robust process that the group had adopted and overall enhancement of the processes under the successive chairman of Tata Group. One of the most important insights about the selection process is not just the EQ or IQ, its all about how the candidate fit into the groups ethos and value system and coach to become the future leaders. The wide exposure in group companies before finalizing for a group company with very challenging role is very fascinating.

 

The books also capture the cultural change and strategy under JRD, Ratan Tata, Cyrus and back to Ratan Tata. Gives a good understanding of how the TATA group has evolved and how each chairman used the TAS cadre for strengthening the future leadership within the group. The release of code of conduct (Tata Code of Conduct) and organization improvement model for holistic assessment of performance of the company using TBEM (Tata Business Excellence Model) for unification of the group providing a new thrust on Quality. Commemoration of JDR-QV (JRD Tata – Quality Value) award for recognizing and awarding the company on the holistic score of the assessment on the overall performance on JRD’s birthday.

 

The book provides an inside story on how TAS officers were provided the empowerment and entrepreneurship attitude resulting into formation and successful new companies such as Titan etc.

 

The authors have provided a very balanced opinion on the controversies surrounded during the period of Ratan Tata related to Singapore Airlines, Tata tea, Corus, Tata Finance, Singur and Tata Nano, Niira Radia etc.

 

The authors have also mentioned some of the group level programs on Sustainability, Innovations, Digitalization. Evaluation of tata companies for divestment using the “RESPect” model, predicted on Returns, Excellence, Scale and Prospect to determine whether a company was delivering the expected returns; whether it was globally competitive or at lead in India champion in business; whether scale justified its existence in the group portfolio; and whether it had potential for future growth is enlightening.

 

The author also analysis the success of the TAS cadre occupying the corner seat of the larger and medium size companies within Tata Group and competencies of TAS officers who serve as torchbearers of the values of the Tata Group and as the ‘gyroscopes’ who would ensure that the human side of business – the compassion, Tata way – was ever in focus.

 

Recommendation:

A balanced book on the Tatas Leadership cadre and how it can adopt to the future. Must read of any management trainee or Tata enthusiast.

Summary | Limitless: The Power of Unlocking Your True Potential

 

Book Name: Limitless: The Power of Unlocking Your True Potential

Author: Radhika Gupta

Limitless: The power of Unlocking your True Potential is unusual, is a story of an intelligent and ambitious woman who had to deal with challenging the norm and setting up a successful business. In the book, the author touches her journey from an undergraduate student at UPenn, to establishing her own asset management company and then acquisition.

 

Key takeaways from the book – Limitless:

 1.     Rejection:

·         At some point, each of us will face rejection of some kind.  When ambition is involved, rejection is almost inevitable. Rejection hurts: it is humiliating. When it is continuous, it crushes the self-esteem and throws into a vicious cycle of self-doubt When we face rejection of any kind, ask self how much the incident – which feels like the end of the world here and now – will matter in five years. If you think about it, not that much. Zoom out. What feels like a big blot today will be a small dot tomorrow.

·         Handling failure is an important lesson to master, because even the hard work variable only goes so far.

·         While there is nothing wrong with having an option A, it is important to remember that in life we always have option Bs and they aren’t usually compromises. 

·         Touch criticism from the right people is a friend request we should not ignore. Touch feedback is not necessarily a sign that we are incompetent or disliked; it is often a statement that indicates we have a long way to go and that some people are ready to invest their time to help us get there.

 2.     Careers:

·         Careers are a combination of choices and chances. 

·         Do not feel pressured to find the right opportunity take the opportunities you have and make them right ones for you. No matter how big a brand you work for, how glamorous your industry or how big your corner office, risk always exists

·         When we look at successful professionals we admire, we often forget that they are also a result of smart risk-taking.

·         A meaningful journey will put you through meaningful difficulties.

·         Traditional hierarchy is obsolete, all of us are simply playing out our roles, and we will bring something unique to our jobs

 3.     Change:

·         Change is a reality and moving forward is a necessity. At times, changes are the result of conscious actions on our part, and at time it is force on us by altered life situation and the passage of time. 

·         A guaranteed way to fail is to focus on the problems in your current environment and compare them to the positives of the past.

·         Adaptability starts by owning your new surroundings and doing so with a generous dose of optimism and humility

 4.     Relationship

·         Honesty is the easiest way to mend tricky relationships, not just with bosses, but also with colleagues and peers.

·         Dialogue is the best path to both understanding and mending relationships, without dialogue, misgivings fester.

·         When the ego is out of the equation, you will express yourself more openly and fearlessly.

·         Asking touch questions, especially publicly, builds a safer and more open workplace and countering someone’s point of view leads to productive arguments, which only help the organization.

·         Standing for something different is a good way to stand out.

·         Education is the best investment you will make in the first 20 years of your life; a meaningful set of relationship is the best investment you will make in the next 20.

 

 5.     Networking:

·         Don’t wait a network to come by; build a network among the people around you. Remember, you never know where life takes anyone.

·         Effective networking reminds me of dividends. If you invest in relationships silently and consistently, without expecting great returns, you never know when it will bring a special dividend your way.

 

 

Summary | The Purpose Driven Life

Book Title : The Purpose Driven Life - WHAT ON EARTH AM I HERE FOR ?

Author : Rick Warren  

Blessed are those who trust in the Lord…They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and they go right on producing delicious fruit. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.

 Life is a test and a trust, and the more God gives you, the more responsible he expects you to be. God especially enjoys watching you use the talents and abilities he has given you. God intentionally gifted us differently for his enjoyment. He has made some to be athletic and some to be analytical. You may be gifted at mechanics or mathematics or music or a thousand other skills. All these abilities can bring a smile to God’s face. The Bible says, “He has shaped each person in turn; now he watches everything we do. There are three barriers that block our total surrender to God: fear, pride, and confusion. The Bible says, “Surrender yourself to the Lord, and wait patiently for him. You don’t surrender to Christ, you surrender to chaos.” 

 Pain is the fuel of passion—it energizes us with an intensity to change that we don’t normally possess. The Bible says, “God has reserved a priceless inheritance for his children. It is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. ” This means that your eternal inheritance is priceless, pure, permanent, and protected. No one can take it from you; it can’t be destroyed by war, a poor economy, or a natural disaster. This eternal inheritance, not retirement, is what you should be looking forward to and working for. Paul says, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. ” Retirement is a short-sighted goal. 

Our greatest lessons come out of pain, and the Bible says God keeps a record of our tears. Whenever problems occur, remember that God uses them to fulfil all five purposes in your life: Problems force you to focus on God, draw you closer to others in fellowship, build Christlike character, provide you with a ministry, and give you a testimony. 

 Spiritual maturity is neither instant nor automatic; it is a gradual, progressive development that will take the rest of your life. 

 God uses problems to draw you closer to himself. The Bible says, “The Lord is close to the broken-hearted; he rescues those who are crushed in spirit.” Every problem is a character-building opportunity, and the more difficult it is, the greater the potential for building spiritual muscle and moral fiber. Paul said, “We know that these troubles produce patience. And patience produces character.” Whenever God gives us an assignment, he always equips us with what we need to accomplish it. This custom combination of capabilities is called your SHAPE: Spiritual gifts Heart Abilities Personality Experience.

 Remember, the greatest things in life are not things. Meaning is far more important than money.  The richest man in the world once said, A simple life in the fear-of-God is better than a rich life with a ton of headaches.

 It is obvious that God loves variety—just look around! He created each of us with a unique combination of personality traits.God made introverts and extroverts. He made people who love routine and those who love variety. He made some people “thinkers” and others “feelers.” Some people work best when given an individual assignment while others work better with a team. The Bible says, “God works through different people in different ways, but it is the same God who achieves his purpose through them all. ”

 Thousands of books have been written on leadership, but few on servanthood. Everyone wants to lead; no one wants to be a servant. We would rather be generals than privates. 

 There are two kinds of people: Kingdom Builders and Wealth Builders. Both are gifted at making a business grow, making deals or sales, and making a profit. Wealth Builders continue to amass wealth for themselves no matter how much they make, but Kingdom Builders change the rules of the game. They still try to make as much money as they can, but they do it in order to give it away. They use the wealth to fund God’s church and its mission in the world. 

 God loves to use weak people. Everyone has weaknesses. In fact, you have a bundle of flaws and imperfections: physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual. You may also have uncontrollable circumstances that weaken you, such as financial or relational limitations. The more important issue is what you do with these. Usually we deny our weaknesses, defend them, excuse them, hide them, and resent them. This prevents God from using them the way he desires. God has a different perspective on your weaknesses. He says, “My thoughts and my ways are higher than yours,” so he often acts in ways that are the exact opposite of what we expect. We think that God only wants to use our strengths, but he also wants to use our weaknesses for his glory. All God’s giants were weak people. Moses’ weakness was his temper. It caused him to murder an Egyptian, strike the rock he was supposed to speak to, and break the tablets of the Ten Commandments. Yet God transformed Moses into “the humblest man on earth.” Gideon’s weakness was low self-esteem and deep insecurities, but God transformed him into a “mighty man of valour. ” Abraham’s weakness was fear. Not once, but twice, he claimed his wife was his sister to protect himself. But God transformed Abraham into “the father of those who have faith. “Impulsive, weak-willed Peter became “a rock, ” the adulterer David became “a man after my own heart,” and John, one of the arrogant “Sons of Thunder,” became the “Apostle of Love. “God specializes in turning weaknesses into strengths. He wants to take your greatest weakness and transform it

 When Gideon recruited an army of 32,000 to fight the Midianites, God whittled it down to just 300, making the odds 450 to 1 as they went out to fight 135,000 enemy troops. It appeared to be a recipe for disaster, but God did it so Israel would know it was God’s power, not their own strength, that saved them. 

Sometimes, God turns a strength into a weakness in order to use us even more. Jacob was a manipulator who spent his life scheming and then running from the consequences. One night he wrestled with God and said, I’m not letting go until you bless me. God said, All right, but then he grabbed Jacob’s thigh and dislocated his hip. What is the significance of that? God touched Jacob’s strength (the thigh muscle is the strongest in the body) and turned it into a weakness. From that day forward, Jacob walked with a limp so he could never run away again. It forced him to lean on God whether he liked it or not. If you want God to bless you and use you greatly, you must be willing to walk with a limp the rest of your life, because God uses weak people. 

Every problem is purpose-driven. In the middle of a painful experience, the psalmist wrote, “Write down for the coming generation what the LORD has done, so that people not yet born will praise him. ” You owe it to future generations to preserve the testimony of how God helped you fulfill his purposes on earth. It is a witness that will continue to speak long after you’re in heaven. “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. ”

There are three barriers that block our total surrender to God: fear, pride, and confusion.  The Bible says, “Surrender yourself to the Lord, and wait patiently for him. You don’t surrender to Christ, you surrender to chaos.” 

 It is obvious that God loves variety—just look around! He created each of us with a unique combination of personality traits. God made introverts and extroverts. He made people who love routine and those who love variety. He made some people “thinkers” and others “feelers.” Some people work best when given an individual assignment while others work better with a team. The Bible says, “God works through different people in different ways, but it is the same God who achieves his purpose through them all. ”

 

Summary | Do Epic Shit

Book Title : Do Epic Shit

Author : Ankur Warikoo

One of the common emotion that is seen, when we or others make mistake is “Oh ! Shit”. The tonality and loudness might depend upon the gravity of the mistake. In the book, Do Epic Shit, the author narrates the journey of failures he had in his life. He also reflects on the lessons he has learned the hard way, help us be to be aware of those situations.  

 Success:

How we think of our problems is how the world will think of our problems. If we exaggerate our problems, so will the world. If we are happy despite our problems, the world will help us get happier. While we (almost always) don’t choose our problems, we can always choose how to respond. When we rule ourselves, we can never be ruled by our problems. The biggest misconception people have is that they are the odd one out and everyone else is sorted!

Success means different things to different people. You have to give your definition of success and stay true to that. Don’t let the world define your rules for success and failure. Success is a relationship you have with yourself.

Luck happens to those who make things happen. Every day and every moment is an opportunity for you to let your actions decide your luck. Luck is the result of your hard work. Neither success nor failure matters. What matters is what you become through that process.

Ninety-nine per cent of people want to be led. They want to be told what to do, and then they will go on to do their best. They want to be led. Not managed.

Don’t measure how valuable you are by the way you are treated. The world is going to treat you how it wishes to treat you. You don’t control that. You only get to choose who you listen to. If you measure your worth by those who don’t treat you well, you are choosing to do so. There is someone out there who values you. Starting with your own self. Whatever you are feeling today will fade away. That thing you imagine is the worst thing ever? When it happens, it will feel like that. You will get up every day and it will be the first thing you will think of. Until one day, when it won’t be! No matter how happy you are, how sad you are, you are not going to remember how happy or sad you were tomorrow. Our emotions and feelings are temporary. We think of them as permanent. What you think is the worst thing in your life isn’t the worst thing.

As you grow professionally, it is not what you know but how you deal with people that determines our success.

 Habits:

Curiosity has created more opportunities than hard work ever will.

Targets are the enemy of habits. Don’t set targets. Set habits! Setting targets instead of habits makes us forget the kind of person we want to become.

Habits hire us forever and take us higher, whereas targets tame us and leave us clueless after we achieve them.

Reading books will not make you smart. Watching motivational videos will not make you driven. Writing will not make your thoughts clearer. We are not shaped by these things. We are shaped by the stories we tell ourselves. Reading books isn’t the answer. The answer is what we take away from them. Writing isn’t the answer to clarity. The answer lies in whether we write to get more at peace or whether we write to seek validation. Motivational videos certainly aren’t the answer (even though I make a bunch every week). The video we turn our life into after watching those videos is the answer. Nothing changes until we change what lives between our two ears. We know others through their actions. We know ourselves through our thoughts.

Saying no to everything else and sleeping on time – is the greatest secret sauce of self-love.

Happiness is simply a result of slaying your comfort, so you always stay comfortable staying out of your comfort zone. No step is small, as long as it is headed in the direction of where we want to go.

Follow the right set of people on social media and you’ll see more opportunities. You become like the people you spend the most time with- both online and offline.

 Awareness :

Most of the decisions in life are not made because of confidence in the decision. They were made because of awareness of the situations.

Being aware and mindful of every action you take is a vital skill. Although it’s simple, most people don’t exercise it.

Emotional debt has killed more people than financial debt ever will. The debt of never saying ‘I love you’ to your parents. The debt of never apologizing to the friend who was always there for you. The debt of never living for your happiness, because you were busy pleasing others. Money goes and comes. We might be in a position to pay those debts off one day. However, the emotional debt that piles on, will continue to kill us within every single day we live! 

The real problem was never the real problem. The real problem was the compound interest of complaining.

 Entrepreneurship:

Capability is rarely the question mark in life. It is always the intent. No one lacks talent. People are best at what they do. Or they know how to figure it out. What people lack is intent. Lack of intent because they don’t like the leader. Lack of intent because they are not driven. Lack of intent because they don’t care. Lack of intent because they are not acknowledged. Lack of intent because they work for a person not for a larger good. When people are driven to bring their right intent to the table, they are the first ones to surprise themselves with their capabilities.

Entrepreneurship is not a profession, it’s a state of mind.

Money:

Money buys freedom. Freedom is a privilege. That freedom helps you make wiser choices.

Relationship:

Holding a grudge against someone requires a lot of effort. Think of all the wasted time spent being mad at someone. Someone broke you into pieces. And now you have decided to trade your peace for seeking revenge. When we hold a grudge against someone, we do the same thing they did to us: hurt us. They hurt us once. We hurt ourselves 100x by repeating it in our head.

Every problem in this world can be traced back to a point of miscommunication.

Ego is a bubble. Instead of bursting it and seeing what all lies outside, we invest most of our energy protecting it.

Summary | Outlast: How ESG Can Benefit Your Business

Outlast: How ESG Can Benefit Your Business 

Author : Mukund Rajan  

Data is shaping the new world. Organizations are mining internal data for predicting and enhancing operational efficacy. In the digital age, the data is used to understand the behavior and influence customers. Use of data as enabled organizations to create value for shareholders. These technical advances have changed the way humans produce and consume natural resources resulting in stakeholders demand on business accountability for their social and environmental impacts. Further, regulation on environment, social and governance (ESG) issues have heightened to protect rights of citizens and the environment. In recent years, sustainability reporting has become a very important part, which combines financial and non-financial parameters.

Outlast: How ESG Can benefit your business, is about how Environmental factors, Social factors, Governance factors shape up the current and future business model using used cases in Indian context, covered in seven chapters. Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) has become critical to organizations for creating long term value to stakeholders. Environmental parameters enable organizations to focus on operations to reduce or optimize the natural resource. Social parameters enable organizations to enhance engagement and inclusiveness with employees, and society in general. Governance enables organizations to enhance performance that is transparent, fair for overall stakeholder value creation.

Many companies, yet to recognize the need to address these multidimensional challenges that needs to be addressed as regulatory compliance. Embracing ESG agenda to build resilience and competitive advantage is the requirement. With SEBI and MCA embarking transparency reporting on financial and non-financial parameters, this book comes handy.

Summary | Stories at Work: Unlock the Secret to Business Storytelling

 

Author : Indranil Chakraborty

It is engaging to hear the story of school dropout becoming a entrepreneur. The journey of opening a small store, overcoming challenges, and innovating new products with anticipating customer requirements is heartening.  That’s the story of PC Musthafa  iD Fresh Food is engaging. His narration of business story is filled with emotions connecting the heart of listeners while delivering the story.  The power of stories helps in connect, engage, gain insights and inspire and Effective leaders are good story tellers.  Thus, stories help in explain critical, complex messages in a simple way inspiring action.

Stories at Work - is structured into three parts, first part is on creating the need on why and how to build your story bank. The second part of the book explains the various story patterns and how stories can be used to build rapport and credibility. The final part of the book is putting them all together touching upon values to be understood, understanding complex human stories, storytelling with data, etc.

The five essentials’ elements of a story are –
1. Start with a time marker, or a place marker

2. About something happening
3. If you hear names/dialogues, it is a story
4. Something unanticipated happens
5. A relevance statement: why am I telling you this story?

Four situations in business where we start our story telling journey are

1.       When we are building a rapport with people we hope to work with – clients, team members and stakeholders

2.      When we explain change – this could range from new vision, mission to transformation agenda to a small change in a administrative process

3.      When we are trying to get people to change their minds and when we are trying to handle objections or mental blocks

4.      When we are looking at sharing best practices, knowledge or success.

 

Story collection can also be used using Cynefin framework adopting a structure of  Probe, Sense and Respond.

The Fearless Organization - Creating Psychological Safety in the workplace for Learning, Innovation and Growth

The Fearless organization – creating Phycological safety in the workplace for learning, innovation and Growth

Author- Amy C Edmondson

In the organization, employees always waited for the much-anticipated event – Townhall Meeting. It was one of the event where free and frank exchange of conversations would happen. Most of the questions that was raised in the townhalls was very relevant to both employee experience as well as for the organization growth, the method adopted to raise was through Slips without names – anonymous. The leadership refused to respond to these questions, reasoning that employees do not have trust and questions will be responded only, when they are asked directly.  Few gathered strengths and raised their concerns, after a month there was a gossip that the employee was transferred. Next townhall, there was silence and even though leadership requested to raise the questions, the hall filled with people, but all were silent. Might be the fear of raising the question / concern will hit the ego and get reprimanded.  Fear in the organization, even to raise the needs.  A culture of silence is a dangerous culture.

The fearless organization is one where interpersonal fear is minimised, allowing a freer flow of knowledge. It’s an environment where a person feels able to express their views on something openly and honestly without fear of recrimination, abuse, putdown or humiliation. Google study on team effectiveness – Project Aristotle observed that the psychological safety was the key factor that led to high performing teams. Teaming is the art of communicating and coordinating with people across boundaries of all kinds – expertise, status and distance. This was supported by four other features:

1.       Clear goals

2.      Dependable colleagues

3.      Personally meaningful work

4.      Belief that the work has impact

 

Psychological safety is not about being nice. It’s about being able to speak the truth. And it’s okay to disagree. Psychological safety is crucial source of value creation in organization operating in a complex, changing environment.  Fearless organization is not only a better place for employees, it is also a place where innovation, growth and performance take hold.

Psychological safety is essential for communicating, collaborating, experimenting and ensuring the well being of others in a wide variety of teams and organizational settings. Lack of psychological safety can create an illusion of success that eventually turns into serious business failures.

Today’s leaders must be willing to take on the of of driving fear out of the organization to create a condition of learning, innovation and growth. Leaders need to take two vital steps to achieve fearless organization

1.       Build phycological safety to spur learning and avoid preventable failures by

a.      Setting stage

b.      Inviting participation

                                                              i.      Situational Humility

                                                           ii.      Proactive Inquiry

                                                         iii.      Designing structures for input

c.      Responding productively by Focused Event Analysis (FEA)

                                                              i.      Express Appreciation

d.     Destigmatize Failure

                                                              i.      Reframing the failure

e.      Motivating the efforts

 2.      Set high standards and inspire and enable people to reach them.

Book Summary | Tata stories: 40 Timeless Tales to Inspire You

 Book : Tatastories: 40 Timeless Tales to Inspire You

Author: Harish Bhat 

One of the advantage of working with the Tata Group is access to know more about the group, their philosophy, belief and the stories that are inspiring and thought provoking ! 40 Tata stories, The author's has curated beautiful inspiring, stories from the house of Tata’s. These stories share the humbleness of Tatas from then to now...

 

Some surprises from these are ………..

Okay Tata – Quality : Many of us while traveling notice a peculiar writing at the back of the trucks, normally we recall – “Sound Horn Please” and If it is a Tata Truck, then obviously you will find the label “OK TATA”.  Many of us might have observed this, but over the time we might have ignored this as it is common in most of the Tata Trucks.  The author provides that anecdote on why these trucks have OK marked on these and the reason.  Reflecting back this would bring the simile back on the face as it is just application of Common Sense for improving Quality of the Product.  

 

On Time: Many of us might have experienced the delay in boarding the flights and had bad experience, how about reading an anecdote on people of Geneva setting their watches to the time at the air India flight flew over their city ! – amazing isn’t it ?

 

Competency & Capability : India had working knowledge and expertise for the development of the nuclear energy in the future before the first atomic bomb exploded in 1945 – Incredible Right

 

Influence: The story of Super Computer “Eka” – truly remarkable and Would be surprise that an offer of entire crate of kingfisher beer would lend help in solving the problem !!

 

Tata Memorial Hospitals: Dorabji Tata and Lady Meherbai Tata, whose generous benevolence helped build Tata Memorial Cancer hospital, TIFR and TISS, and many more projects started and supported by the trust.

Generating Employment : establishment of Tata Silk Farm

Okhai – creativity of Saurashtra tribal to the fashion ramps of Milan

Workman Safety, Slimmest Watch in the universe, Tata Scholars, Tata and the Olympics,

 Binding line : If you cannot make it great, at least preserve it. Do not let things slide. Go on doing our work and increasing it, but it you cannot, do not lose what we have already done

Book Summary | The Age of Agile - Stephen Denning

 

Book: The Age of Agile: How smart companies are transforming the way work gets Done

Author: Stephen Denning

 

One of the popular words in today’s corporate world in any discussion is Agile. It may be on the culture of work, the projects that we drive. Today organizations are connecting everything and everywhere, all the time. They can deliver instant, intimate frictionless value on a large scale. They are creating a world in which people, insights and money interact quickly, easily, and cheaply. In software development, there is no option but to purse Agile Management.  The shift is nonnegotiable. If management won’t support Agile Management, the best developers go elsewhere.

 And since the software is eating the world and become more central aspect of every business model, the pressure for changing from within the organization is never ending.

Agile Management is about working smarter than harder. Agile is about understanding and interacting with the world with a different mindset. Business success in the twenty-first century increasingly depends on becoming quick as the rapid shifting and unpredictable context in which organization operate. Becoming an agile organization is an increasingly urgent necessity for companies in today’s digital economy. The principle of Agile management is empowering small teams, that will add value to the customers through bottom-up innovations. There are many case studies and research, that Innovations generated by agile teams had fuel growth. Innovations that happen from the top-down trends to be orderly but dumb. Innovation that happens from that happens from the bottom-up trends to be chaotic but smart. Agile means embracing fundamentally different assumptions. In organizations that have embraced agile management, self-organizing teams are continuously providing new value for customers. When Agile is done right, the teams are working within a business model in which organization is generating value for the organization itself as well as customers.  Agile is about generating more value from less work. The driver of sustained success is the Agile Mindset.

Three Core characteristics of Agile

1.    The law of small teams

Agile practitioners share a mindset that work should in principle be done in a small autonomous, cross-functional teams working in short cycles on relatively small tasks and getting continuously feedback from the ultimate customer or end-user. 

 

2.       The law of the customer

Agile practitioners are obsessed with delivering value to customers. The firm adjust everything – goals, values, principles, processes, systems, practices, data structures, incentives, - to generate continuous new value for customers and ruthlessly eliminates anything that does not contribute. The law of the customer is a single message, delivered consistently, every day all the time. Agile teams take initiatives on their own and interact with other agile teams to solve common problems.

 

Agile Small team – Common Practices

1.       Work in small batches

2.       Small cross functional teams

3.       Limited wok in process in agile management, teams learn to focus on an amount of work that can be brought to completion in each short cycle.

4.       Autonomous teams

5.       Getting to “Done”

6.       Work without interruption

7.       Daily standups

8.       Radically transparency

9.       Customer feedback each cycle

10.   Retrospective reviews

 

Rule of the customer – Practices by Agile teams.

§  Target

§  Constantly experiment

§  Partner with start-ups

§  Increase product malleability (turn a physical product into a digital product)

§  Focus

§  Innovate in short stages

§  Evaluate

§  Be willing to disappoint

§  Deliver value faster

§  Customize

 

3.       The law of the network

Agile practitioners view the organization as a fluid and transparent network of players that are contributing towards a common goal of delighting customers. A network is a group or system of interconnected people or things. An organizational network is a set of teams that interact with and collaborate with other teams with the same connectivity. A network model of organization is key to making the whole organization agile.

 

Assumptions of Networking:

1.       Network has a compelling goal

2.       The network comprises small groups

3.       The groups have an action orientation

4.       The network is the sum of the small groups

5.       The network legal framework stays in the background

Reviews - Continuously Monitor Progress to drive business:

Every month the program manager reports out on metrics of the accounts, measuring different aspects of the service. The group is learning to become a data informed business.  Done is having the right measures. The teams see this data and monitor it, both when they are testing it and as soon s it goes live. They use the metrics to drive the business forward.

 

Four components of a market creating value proposition: Need, Approach, Benefits per costs, and Competition (NABC).

The four Management Traps

1.       Maximizing shareholder value

Shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world. Shareholder value is a result not a strategy. Short-term profits should be aligned with an increase in the long-term value of a company.

2.       The trap of buy back of shares.

Market leadership can translate directly to higher revenue, higher profitability, greater capital velocity and correspondingly stronger returns on invested capital.  

3.       Cost oriented economics trap.

Cutting costs could lead to a permanent loss of expertise. – Dell case study an interesting eye-opener.

4.       The trap of backward-looking strategy.

Transformative ideas are ideas that change our frame of refences.  Agile Management offers a financial critique of current management. Shareholder value thinking is a trap that inexorably leads to a preoccupation with the short term and ultimately destroys shareholder value.  The emerging age thus offers the possibility of a great awakening – a foreshadowing of a transformation in the way our organizations and our society functions. The emerging age offers a promising path forward. It’s the work of many minds, hearts and hands.        

The difference between winners and losers is not the matter of access to technology or big data. Both the successful and unsuccessful firms generally have access to same technology and data, which are now largely commodities.  The difference lies in a different way of running the organization that deploys technology and data more nimbly.

Bottom-line:

The central theme of this book – the corporations must radically reinvent how they are organized and led and embrace a new management paradigm. A principal role of the top is to identify and support champions throughout the organization.  

I would recommend reading the case study of how Microsoft deployed Agile and then read the chapters for easy navigation and connect on the principles.