- Introduction
- Purpose of This Book
- Who Should Read This Book
- How This Book Is Organized
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Purpose of This Book
Leaders have a tough challenge: While they strive to create greater team engagement and ownership, their organization’s culture usually rewards compliance and fault-prevention instead of creativity, self-organization, and autonomy. And they live in an unforgiving spotlight and cannot rely on trial and error, our natural means of learning new things. Lacking mentors who can show them the way, they have few places to turn.
Our goal is to describe the journey of typical leaders in an organization as they face the challenge of changing their own organization while also changing themselves. The journeys they take are far from perfect; expect them to experiment, make mistakes, learn, and to adapt. While the journey in this book is fictionalized, the stories are all based on real situations the authors have either lived or witnessed. And while the stories don’t deal with every possible situation you might encounter, they include the most common ones that nearly every leader faces.
Every agile leader’s journey is different; each takes a different path, and each faces different challenges. Yet each shares a singular goal: to help their organization achieve resilience and flexibility while seeking success in a changing and challenging world. In this book, we share, in various forms, our own experiences on our own journeys. While we can’t claim to be the wise people to whom Basho referred, by sharing our experiences, we hope to give you ideas, approaches, and techniques that will help you on your own journey. But you will have to find your own way, and find what works for you and your organization.
By the end of this book, we hope that you will take a different approach to the leadership challenges that you face. While we can’t tell you what to do, the scenarios described in the book will help you to find your own way to help your organization to adapt and improve.