#143 – When Asked to Coach

In Strip 135, we suggest that we, as Agile Coaches, should start focusing on the relevant disciplines not directly related to Scrum in order to truly improve organizations. The potentially most impactful and valuable of these disciplines is, in our eyes, Professional Coaching, which the International Coaching Federation describes as the process of “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential”.

In the context of an agile transformation or acceleration, this translates to Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches (and related roles, such as Release Train Engineers and “Agile Leaders”) being capable of helping individuals and teams overcome different types of challenges in being or becoming agile by unlocking their own potential, rather than relying on the agile role’s expertise. E.g., if a Manager has difficulties fully empowering a Product Owner because she doesn’t trust that he is capable, the Agile Coach will coach the Manager to identify why that is ñ≤and come up with ways to build trust with the PO so the empowerment can happen later.