Women in Agile West Midlands conference

thinking agility and rethinking cause. Um this event was born out of um an agenda to include women in a specifically uh where women can come together to collaborate network brainstorm on how we can manage our wellbeing in the tech space. So um today I'm not focusing on the agile framework or agile practices. Yes, we agree that agile is about strength, about standups, about rituals, but today we are focusing on the people. And one of the agile frameworks is um people over progress. And today we are trying to answer that question. Are we really doing that? Are we really starting with people over progress? And also says individuals at the heart of it. Um things at the heart of it which is what agility is all about. At the heart of agility we have people we have indiv individuals not always about the nature not always about the standards about people behind the work that a is all about. So today um that is why we've gathered here and thank you for coming thank you for the curiosity. So a little about myself is that I'm an engineer on board 6 plus emission certification engineer as well as a sport scrum master for my team um in Java Land Rover Limited. So I've been able to collaborate with um individuals in agile in my workplace. I've been able to start up a canvas board um start up um a strong board and also organized certain master classes for my team. Um so aside that I'm keeping that aside. I'm focusing on how um Esther Young has been able to manage um to be in the tech space and how I've been able to navigate it and um everything that comes with it, the imposter syndrome, uh the um wanting to belong, the vulnerability that comes with it being in a tech space as a woman specifically. And today we have um speakers um amazing speakers that will be coming aboard and certain of condors that we need to bring out and that's what agility basically it's about it's about evolving along the way it's not about perfection of course we all aim for perfection but I like to say that it's a um you know when we think of the human aspect and how humanity has evolved over time we think way before now people aspire to be able to I mean that was aspiration that was their definition of perfection but at the time you know right now we're still thinking evolution we're still thinking progress and the point is at what point are human beings ever going to reach that peak when we go like so you know it's about agility for me is not just about aspirations it's about actually managing expectations and when I say managing expectation I'm like what's our role as are scrum masters half the time when I talk to people who are not in tech they don't even know what scrumers are they project managers are and the point is they don't even understand agility the question is do we need to call them with that does it affect me that's the question that I ask because at the end of the day who needs to know do I need to know all the terms of my body before it functions or as a doctor. Does a doctor need to bother me with those um with those technical or should I say professional terms? I'm not interested. All I care about is I walk in it solves my problem. So when we talk about scrum and we talk about um processes and we talk about our ceremonies, the question becomes are we being bogged down unnecessary by terminologies and do we need to refocus on what delivery In this case, you know, um there's usually tech. Okay. So, why do companies exist? Why do businesses exist? And why do we um as human beings exist? Most times it's because you want to deliver value, isn't it? So, um you take a business for instance, if someone's dream about fulfilling or answering a call, you know, because they think it is something that's going to answer problem. So, whether it starts from the small or the other, you know, so if we're looking at the microcosm or we're looking at the big picture, the point is we still need to start somewhere. And that's what agility is about. So maybe that's what I'm trying to explain here because agility who cares the point is how does it solve your problem? And this is what I'm trying to say. So first of all, agility says you don't have to b yourself. The whole picture you can in small chunks. You don't have to understand the whole world. Just start making impact from the next person to you. Start making impact from the little and that's what it is. So we do things in small chunks and we do things um you know with the hope of you know so we pick up lowhanging fruits and deliver and aim which we call MVPs products and aim to make people happy because at the end of the day we are here for the people it's not just about us and so when we talk about wellbeing we're not just being selfish in fact strong masters are seven leaders which means We're not just here to come and um we are not project managers. We don't command um people or we don't tell people you have to do this. We advise people. We guide people. We train people and then we also empower them to make decisions the best decisions. And I must say this brings me to my big question of the day and it's that what do scrum masters actually do? The real impediment most silent. They're cultural, they're structural, they're technical, they're systemic. And most times it's not something that goes on board because this is the issues we face as prime ministers. You have wonderful ideas, you know, you have a team full of people with technical skills and wonderful ideas. How do you sync this? You know, because the human nature, everybody's got ego, like it or not, it's a fact and something you have to deal with. Even though you need to focus on the goal and this is what we refer to as spring goals or we talk about ethics which are like quoted goals you know that we want to achieve. The point is all these goals and always breaking it down into chunks like we call them strengths and backlogs whatever terminology we use. The point is that we're trying to achieve a goal at the end and the point is you're dealing with human beings and I must say that in my role um you can call me middle man. I found out that the most difficult people to work with are leaders because you're not dealing with people who are asking for instruction. You're dealing with people who have ideas and they have their own um how do I call it preconception of how something should be delivered. So now the point is how do we surount your concept of delivery and this person's concept of delivery. So sometimes it's merging engineering. So this engineering guy you cannot dispute his argument and it's the fact he has reasons for concern and you also have to deal with this financial guy. Yeah. And you know the point is everybody's coming with cogent reasons. So how do we as scrers how as leaders model that it's not about flexing muscles. It's not about throwing jagon that nobody understands. There was a I looked at one video and I redid it. It was about um um it was a skit about interviewing, you know, there was an interview someone was interviewing Title and Candy. I thought it was very funny. Someone shared it with me. But the point is um you don't have to think it's funny but tu and ki you know that's people from the south is the southern part of Nigeria mostly southern part of Nigeria and um you know is widely spoken amongst people like that anyway point is t and asked um would you marry someone that brings age to how can I marry someone that brings age to um and they do all sorts of crap and you know and you know they get up in the morning and you know they you know if you so that conversation ended candy would you marry someone that H2 said what a never how can I marry someone that H2O that person if you live in the same house with them they can bring something on your head and land it on your head suddenly all sort of mishaps are going to happen to you if you marry someone that drinks H2O. Then the person goes like, "What is H2O?" Taiwan goes like, "Ho is one um wonderful, you know, goes like he said is something like um what do I call it? Some drink, some ritual drink." I said, "Okay, fine." Asking what is he? Sorry. What's come on? >> Yeah, you can keep trans. >> Okay. So, the bottom line is that H they did not even understand what A2 H2O was. At this point, you're going to say, "Yeah, they're very ignorant." But the point is the communicator, why did you not signify and say water? >> Why did you put H2O in that's one and then the other question becomes um yeah H2O you ask yourself what's the big deal everybody should know H2 but I must say not everybody ask a 2year-old if they understand what is so you know for me I'm like I think apart from all these technicalities the most important thing is ensuring first of all that your audience before you start creating all these wonderful and all these write offs that make you look like grand terms because I promise you tech is full of people that are brilliant and brilliant people like feeling very important unfortunately so you know it's pocketing the vehicle and ensuring that the most important thing is achieved which is communication because without communication there's no we are not getting anywhere and so you know this is what we need to establish as masters we need to keep what I like saying when I started in um um Jaguar Lang one of the things I noticed was um there were loads of cyos so it's not peculiar to jug I'm just using it as my experience is automotive so basically and you know engineering engineering is fast so you're talking I I'm not going to go into all the blocks that you want to think about but you know you find this person they're all in the same They're using all these technical sense. I mean even for people someone took notes a note and having a meeting with PJ and JJ and I asked is PJ pajamas. The point is I know but the point is it's it's as basic as that. Can we try to communicate instead of you know can we smash the sandwich? I love the word smashing by the way. It's one of my it's one of my go Because life is a pun after all. You need to learn to take yourself seriously but as well you need to laugh because what's what's life? I mean if we all chase everything we're chasing after all who's going to own it after all and this is what priority is about. It's saying to people you are important. This is what scrum masters are trying to say. We're not just focusing on the delivery of the product because actually years that product is going to be out of fashion. Sorry to say, but that's a fact. People are no longer being may no longer be interested. But how have you impacted the people along the way? How have you um because yeah most times we kind of focus on our end goal foretting that the people without people you can't achieve anything. People are the center of everything we do and We repp prioritize people's wellbeing and understand that our wellbeing too is crucial to this you know and realize that life is a balance you know when I when I think of balance I think of juggling you know so you're juggling this and juggling that how do you master that skill without any bottom line is that life is a race but guys like Um is it um this poet said he said what is this like if not of care you have no time to stand and sit and that's what it is for most of us we're rushing through life forgetting to stand to admire even when I go and walk with some people they're just eager to you know give back another um you know accolade to say yes I climb snow I climb this and that should that be the purpose of should getting the next um should I say acclamation be your goal or should we remember that life is a journey that is meant to be enjoyed not and so even if we apply this to everything not just work but you know to everything in life then you know what I've also found out with the teams because as a scrum master you know like I said we are breaking silos >> we're breaking glasses The issue with glasses I usually ask people is that it's not just breaking the glass right um if you are black like me sorry to say chocolate sweet about it someone said if you're chocolate like me someone said she's chocolate so let me invite that yeah if you're chocolate like me there are things that we have to confront which means it's not all your ideas that will be taken naturally not all our ideas are good but My point is how do we continue as people not just of color not just of gender not just with whatever identity you may come with you know because of course being a person of color comes with its challenges and um you know like I said it's like smashing blessings and when the issue with smashing blessings which is what I love to ask many times by the time you have the What if the glass sticks on your neck? So the point is we are better together. We are better not just doing things on our own. I love mother. She said that I alone cannot change the world but I can start a rep that you start. It's like lighting a touch. Let's say for instance there's darkness in our world naturally you know because many of us have all this question why does this happen? Why can't my company do this? question. Why can't people do this? But the question, you know, the answer is that it's a form of darkness. How do we as individuals shed light? How do we see ourselves in the skin of things with ceilings which are barriers that need to be broken? Are we going to be on our own? I don't think that's what I think it's about carrying everybody along. Yeah, it may take a long time. Yes, it's like a to The race, the proverb of the race, the story of the race of the between the hair and the toes. The the hair you can say was focused on achieving the next thing title. He was focused on just getting it done. Whereas the tortoise carried all his house with him in that sense. So are we asked to be hair or tortoises in this race called life in this race called agility because at the end of the day we sprint for go. So we should my thing is I believe it's a rem affects the other person. It's not just a strength. It's putting it in perspective to understand that you do your bit as best as you can and hand over to the next generation whoever and whatever that comes as so yes agile isn't a ritual it's a relationship and I'm not saying that I can't do everything but I'm here as well to be authentic to be bold to be candid and to yes I'm a little I'm very but a little cheeky you know and it's just about winning ceremonies. It's about smashing invisible barriers so that we can be smashing strong. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> That was an amazing lecture from Tony Gold and you agree with me that she has been able to break down what um agility is all about. And um for me my take away is um how we should ensure that people in the tech space should break down the technicalities and the um jones and technologies of um um of the tech space. Try as much as possible to make sure that the language you're using the receiver understands it. And the goal of the communication should be that the receiver understands it instead of trying to use the technical uh knowledges which only you understand but your audience does not understand what they said you're passing on as well as also um being authentic being bold and being candid as women in tech spaces one more take away from me is that we should ensure that as along the way we should try to Enjoy your life. Try to enjoy your work. It's not about always smashing goals. Enjoy the means. Enjoy the journey. Not just the destination, not just the Oh, I've smashed this. Yeah. While smashing goal is important. Um attaining heights is important. Enjoy the process while enjoy the process. Enjoy the failures. the part that is not easy as is not as nice as you would want it to be. Enjoy it. Uh because at the end of the day, all of those bits of it make up the goal that you striving for. And as well as she trying to make us understand that agility is more like breaking your work bit by bit and also prioritizing the wellbe of the people carrying this task. And that will bring me to the introduction of our next speaker who is a policy strategy, a wellness communication specialist uh with a mental health law master's degree. So raise up and listen to an amazing speech which Queen Esen will be bringing up. [Applause] It's actually very exciting to be here. I'm super excited to be speaking on the human side of agility which is reclaiming wellbeing in tech. Now I just want to start off with a short story. Imagine Mona. Mona is a software developer. She's juggling various tasks. You can see sorry my Yeah, you can see it on my slide. She's juggling various ts. Can see her struggling with context switching between meetings, code reviews and team dynamics. With agile is made to be effective in delivering her attacks. And so even makes for more flexibility. You can see that for Mona, it sometimes means being always on. She's always on. You can see how she's on. She's often exhausted, not just by work, but the emotional load of keeping harmony and staying visible. The message here is that agile was meant to help, but in some cases or more often than not for many women, it has also burnout, self-doubt, fatigue. Statistics show that 68% of women in tech face burn out and 41% of them consider leaving the industry within two years. And that that now brings me to the next slide which is the promise agile gave to us all and the reality that we are all facing agility. Now you can see the vision. This is a very smooth and then you can see the reality of itself and this this is one that we need to actually now begin to think and consider what is the reality and what is the promise the promise is the sustainable pace that's agility for you but the reality is that sometimes there are constant urgency and then you also have people over process but In the reality of it all, it's really ceremonies. Other times it it says to you embracing change and obviously yes this it has brought change and not just change it has brought flexibility has brought effectiveness. But on the other on the other hand of it is change fat. So as you all know with every positive effect there's also a negative effect. So it's sort of like they in two they at a What we need to do is to be able to create that balance and that's why we are having this conversation today. The hidden cost of this is that there's emotional labor to keep teams together. Ideas are being overlooked in meetings. Why? Because of that release ceremony because of that change party because of that constant urgency. So this is the cost of the promise for agility and when we your when we to place agility over the well-being of the humans that we are working with. >> There's also that pressure to maintain excellence at work and home and we are dealing with women here. We we we must have it in mind that women have is also is there a unique thing for women that other than having to work have your home to manage. If you're married and you have kids, there are kids there at home. As a woman, you you you go through periods and that period come with mood swings. Men don't have to go through those things and some somehow it has become normal because it's something you experience every month, but it's not normal. So when you put in all of these effects and all of these biological change and situations for a woman, then you know that there's a lot more that's required of her because she needs to be efficient at work and she needs to take care of her own health and then her wellbe. And that now takes me to just being able to emphasize more that agel should evolve with people. It should evolve with it people with its people not to overrun them. >> Women have more work to do to get the best from agile and it's because of this examples that I've given because they go through more things than they realize. You need to acknowledge that while while agile is for efficiency but it's not without its shortcomings and being a woman means you have to be more intentional about your wellbe. So wellbeing is important. Wellbeing is your human side and it has to be at a balance because your job is as important as your wellbeing. If your wellbeing is impacted then how can you be productive? It's the human that gets the job done. Not the job doesn't work itself out. The human has and for the human to do it has to be well cared for. Now I'll just go ahead to talk about I'm going to the next slide which is burnout triggers. That's what happens the mental the mental health toil of not caring for your wellbe and that's one you can see how is you can see what's happening to her cognitive overload from constant prioritizing you can see at times at work she goes through imposter syndrome due to public metrics that's that's more like seeing the data indicators are visible to others example like website traffic there are suppressed voices in retrospective The real impact is that some women can feel isolated on head and over exhausted. The message here is that behind every sprint metrics is a human mind and there is there is need to care for that mind. And when I say sprint metric, I just want to make it clear that it's sort of like when you're talking about sprint here, it's like division of labor. Breaking down task into manageable bits so you can actually get it to completion and It's also like it's one that helps you with giving periodic updates to get an early feedback. So I because I I had I had to take a moment to to explain sprint because it might be a bit of a juggle for somebody else who is not in the tech space. So sprint works in a way I will just try to explain it in a way that imagine a house if you want to build a house you have to cut things out into bits you know you start you can't if somebody says I want a house you don't just bring the house and say I've built the house as you start off with the foundation the flooring everything else you need to show them and let them know so that's how spring works breaking down t and then you finish it and then you get to completion so I'll now get on to the next bit of my presentation And that would be the a human centered adult ship. That's what we need. I'm going to talk about a human centered adult shift. You can see how people are sat together here. Malara is ser and they working together as a community as one. That's a simple shift. We need to now begin to think what can we do to help bring that sense of teamwork. Not team in the world but team in practice. How can we bring that teamwork to reality? Replacing status check with emotional checkins. And when I say this, not not emotional checkins to tick the box, but the genuine way you check in on colleague the way that you show that you're able to review your sprint. So for example, Mara comes to you and and tells you mentions to you how she's being affected. impeded or something is happening in her life that is just giving her a lot of stresses. You don't listen to her but then say, "Oh, yes, I see you're going through this, but you know, we need to get the job done." No, you can adjust the task. You can rep prioritize because how wellbeing is as important as the job you're trying to get done. And that's what I mean by real checkins, replacing check status checkins with emotional checkins, being practical. And it's not also a that you use it against them in the future. Oh, because you complain about something or you made a report about not being well and then it's being used against you in the future. No, that would just be a ticking the box thing, not the practice the practical side of it in that sense. Cuz if as as a leader you you use your team's wellbe against them in the future, now the confidence to express themselves will no longer be there. people suffer but they won't they won't see and then you have people showing it at work but then the productivity isn't at optimal. So would you rather have people showing up and not getting the job done or would you rather have people who are well enough to get the job done to productivity. So these are things you want to consider. So some emotional checkins can be done can be done as a checklist item but that's not what we want here. We want it to really be a humanist item. humanist item is that you really care, you listen and when your employees can trust you to care for their wellbeing, then they will trust you enough to even go beyond to get the job done for you. And then again, the next thing I'm going to talk about here is a human centered agile shift requires you to have an honest challenge session in additional to planning session. When I say honest challenge session, it's in a way that for you to be able to achieve priority at work. You know, you need to be able to allow your employees to be able to challenge decisions. They should be able to speak for and against decisions with confidence cuz in doing that it helps with prioritizing. Imagine that there are unnecessary meetings that are being put in calendars and because of how rigid the system is, your employees cannot exactly say to you this meeting might not I might not need to to attend this meeting. So and so person can attend what I can use is take this time back to achieve so and so. If you cannot if your employees do not have that hand to question to speak for then that agile shoot isn't there. It's a rigid system. So we need to be able to have honest challenge sessions in additional to planning sessions to achieve work priority. The next thing I would say here will be you need to have proper proper support system as you go as you try to encourage as you're growing in work you need to have a proper support system. So a lot of people there there's always this same when people say oh I went through this person has to go through it because you broke your leg when you pass through there it does not mean you have to give that barrier that that made you break your leg for someone else to break. But there are ways to change because you may not support it does not mean you shouldn't support somebody else. You can you can change the narrative and that is in supporting someone else. When you work as a team, you achieve more result than working in silos. The former had already said that and I'm just portraing that that point. So it's so for you to work as a team you need to support. You need to show support to your colleagues. Your colleagues have to empowered in terms of how you work in your team. You have to start thinking about there's really a point of this to provide appropriate landing power and work to encourage others to come into come into the system as you have been there. Are you mentoring somebody else to get here? Are you helping someone? A new colleague has just started working. How are you helping them? How are you showing them how to on board? How you showing them where they need to go? If you go to a new country, it's unfamiliar to you. You need someone to tell you where certain things are. Why do we use Google map? Nobody knows it all. You know it now because you have experienced it. So because you've experienced that, you now know it. Then you need some you need to show somebody else how to get there. That was how you were taught. And even if you were not taught, break that chain, break that cycle. That is what agility also needs. The next point I will raise here is we need to c celebrate wellness wins not just deliveries. We need someone to hold their hands and people need their hands to be held as well. The job needs needs to be done and people need to survive to get the job done. So we have to celebrate the wellness of people as to celebrate the deliverables that they bring into the company. And then capacity building is very important. Why? Investing money in building yourself helps you to achieve result effectively. You can't sit in one position and think that you will do better than you were two years ago. The world is evolving. Change is a constant. So capacity building is part of what helps for agility to be achieved in its effective way. And I say that to say when your your capacity is increased is built is built up what then happens to you is that you take time back. You're more efficient. getting things done. For example, before we had Google, there were other we had Google and other search engines at the time. I know there were talks here and there about people becoming lazy. Oh, we need to get to the library. We need to do things with but now Google is what we used to search and the same way with AI. AI is here. A lot of people are saying AI is taking our job. But AI helps you make for effectiveness, efficiency. It helps you save time, the time you have used in going through something over and over again. AI makes it easy. It finds fits your work. But then you're the one behind that tool. Whatever you put into AI is what is refine and give it back to you. But how can you put something into the AI tools if you are not even your capacity is not built enough to understand the language and how things work. So it's very important for you to pay attention to building yourself growing leaders should do well to invest in training retraining training training your your your teammates subscribe to AI platform and let you optimize it for example topic has a full course on how to optimize cloud AI cloud plus AI using chat for code scaffold when building a software it's important to have a scaffold. So is that structure the code that you're working on like you need to all of these things I'm speaking about you need to build yourself up to get to use it everything works with support you don't just build a house there's a support system that keeps it growing and it's that support that takes you to the highest level so if you're building your capacity you're meant to be more effective and then you're taking time back and of the world. Otherwise, you can spend one one five hours trying to complete one time because you want to do it by yourself and that also connects to team work cuz as you build your capacity, you're more effective to work with your team. But when you sit there, you're not working on yourself. You're not growing. Then you become redundant. We hear redundancy here and there. This is what it really means. when you're not building your capacity. The the last point is you the the the last point I'll make here is I'll just give a scenario. Imagine company B introduced optional video. The result is that% more women participated and then the message here is that tiny tweaks to process can unlock big emotional safety and that's all I've been saying in speaking about the human center agile shift. My last slide will be that your sprint starts here. We have listened to an amazing presentation on how we can prioritize our wellbeing. Now what are we going to do when we leave here? What are we taking back with us? It's just to say a about people, not mental health drives performance. That's your wellness. If you're not working hard, if if you're if you're not taking care of your wellness, your mental health, then you cannot perform with efficiency. Women in tech don't need to. The system must evolve. So my call to action for everyone here would be block one no meeting day this week. And when I say block one no meeting day this week, I want to practicalize it. And so I would want you all to stand up on your feet. So we're going to try a dance to connect to what I'm I'm about to do here. I don't know if anybody has heard this song before, but you just join me. All you need to do is you do this. You do this and then you knock. [Music] >> You're not available. [Music] is saying you're not available for meetings. You are not available. So that's what I meant by block no meeting days like there there are days where you have no meeting for that week. Try to amplify a female colleague's idea. Add team wellbeing to your next plan. So to conclude here I would say true agility isn't about moving fast. is about moving together sustainably with everyone's voice heard and valued. [Applause] Wow, that was a fantastic speech. I'm unavailable once in a week. Prioritizing yourself, prioritizing your wellbeing. You would agree with me that that presentation was 100% amazing. Let's start from it's well packed. Um this the breakground the structure of this presentation is well presented. I mean I've not being in agile space I've not been able to visualize oh what's the vision and what's the reality and pain has been helping to like give us a picture and that's one thing I've been able to also dwell on looking at the presentation the visual representation of her speech and of what she has come to present to us what's the vision what's the reality and that is a replica of what we go through as women, juggling several things, trying to meet up our goals, um our hormones and all of those things um affecting us as well. And she has been able to make us understand that we need to prioritize our body. I mean, you saw the statistics, you saw the statistics of women in tech who pass through all of these uh uh issues. So, you're not alone. It's just us to try to like make that change, incorporate every point she has given to us and we will be on our way to keep managing our wedding as women making sure that we acknowledge that our mental health drives performance and we need to guard our mental health. We need to make sure that we prioritize it as much as possible as well as u trying to give us the human center of agility. You would agree with me that um when it comes to agility we try to focus on the strength and all of that but she has been able to like break it down. So for people here that are not aware of what strength is all about, you have seen what strength is all about, the breakdown, what you need to do to survive in the tech space, the agile shift, moving to the human center of agility, prioritize yourself. Uh uh um block out a week when you would Everybody knows that this is the day when you think back to yourself. and all of that. And one last thing is about building capacity. You see how she has been able to like give us a take on building our capacity. Um try as much as we can to develop ourselves so that you also give back to the team because if you're not developing yourself, you're not building your capacity, you're not uh um um investing into yourself, into your personality development, professional development, how long will they be able to support your team? So all of these things, all of these points just tailors it into what we've come here, the human side of agility. Now we've been able to retain agility. We've been able to rethink us. We've been able to rethink women and how we forge ahead in the professional space wherever we find ourselves. And that brings us to the end of the session. Thank you so much for attending.