The Lean-Agile Leadership is a type of framework that is responsible for properly implementing Lean & Agile practices in a large organization. It's primarily made for organizations that tend to have a fairly high percentage of complex challenges and where the perspective/context alters frequently. Hence, to be resilient, such companies have to make quick decisions when it comes to innovation and operation strategies. 

The Lean-Agile Leadership can also be implemented for organizations that have a high percentage of knowledge work and there's a need for sustainable commercial stability along with nurturing long-term relations with customers, staff, and suppliers. It should be remembered that organizations that adopt the Lean-Agile Leadership strategy will have a network of teams rather than a traditional hierarchy of control & command structure. 

Why is Lean-Agile leadership essential?

The managers, executives, and other leaders in an organization will always be held responsible for the success, adoption, and enhancement of the Lean-Agile development as well as qualities that lead to business agility. They have the authority to continuously change & improve the systems that control how an organization operates. 

Furthermore, the organization leaders are also responsible for creating a proper environment for individuals to work in, so that high-performing Agile teams can thrive, flourish and create value for the business. Hence, the need for Leaner ways of operating & thinking among leaders is crucial for team members to get encouragement and obtain proper coaching from the leaders. 

It should be known that transforming an organization into a Lean enterprise isn’t an easy task. It all starts with the leaders motivating & inspiring better ways of working within the organization. They will be responsible for setting the stage/example by continuously engaging, coaching, and empowering teams as well as individuals so that they can all reach their full potential via Lean and Agile practices & principles.

Hence, knowledge won't simply be enough because Lean-Agile leaders should do much more than just support the transformation. The idea here is to actively lead the change by guiding & participating in the activities required to understand and thereby constantly optimize the flow of value throughout the organization. 

Some of the functions of Lean-Agile leaders are:

1. Organizing individuals & teams around creating value.

2. Identifying queues as well as any excess work-in-progress.

3. Always focus on eliminating delays & waste.

4. Try to eliminate procedures & policies that are demotivating to the organization’s employees.

5. Motivate as well as inspire others.

6. Create a proper culture of relentless improvement.

7. Offer the perfect opportunity for teams to improve themselves.

Thus, by implementing the Lean-Agile leadership framework, an organization can reap the above-mentioned benefits. 

What are the 3 dimensions of Lean-Agile leadership?

In case you’re wondering ‘what are the 3 dimensions of Lean-Agile leadership?’, then they are as follows:

1. Leading by example

Leaders of an organization gain authority for modeling the much-needed behaviors for others to follow, thereby inspiring them to include the leader's qualities in their development journey.

2. Mindset & principles

By properly coagulating the Lean-Agile way of working into the decisions, beliefs, actions, and responses of the organization’s employees, leaders can model the expected norm throughout the entire company.

3. Leading change

Leaders should lead the transformation process rather than just simply supporting the same. A proper environment for work should be created for the same along with preparing the employees properly & providing them with the required resources so that the desired outcomes can be obtained.

Differences between traditional and Lean-Agile leadership

Usually, traditional leadership focuses on democratic, autocratic, and paternalistic leadership for managing & directing the team. On the other hand, Lean-Agile leadership utilizes transformational, situational, and servant leadership-type approaches. 

Hence, it can be concluded that Lean-Agile leadership allows for more flexibility instead of following a rigid structure where trying new processes or things is allowed. With the help of flexibility in the work environment, there will be a net inflow of ideas and the experimentation will be supported by creativity. Furthermore, there will be clear communication as well as a sense of satisfaction. It should be understood that both of the aforementioned types of leadership roles utilize different skills & characteristics. 

As of the current day, Lean-Agile leadership is based on multiple principles which help in enabling leaders & managers to develop the Agile transformation. Some of the crucial principles that are followed in the Lean-Agile leadership framework are:

1. Proper inspiration & motivation

Human beings are like chameleons – they try to develop and adopt skills that they see in their leaders or seniors. Thus, Lean-Agile leaders should always lead their teams by example, so that the team members can develop similar skills to that of the leaders. The leaders must inspire their team by first showcasing their qualities. 

2. Ideal thinking prowess

With the help of quality thinking, meaningful actions coupled with innovative ideas can help towards problem-solving measures. Thus, the Lean-Agile leadership framework offers the flexibility to find new & innovative procedures for problems. 

3. Offer constructive & continuous feedback

It should be noted that Agile leadership helps in enabling leaders to develop proper skills in offering constructive feedback. Constructive feedback makes the feedback meaningful and therefore provides a guided path as to how improvements should be made. Such a process empowers the employees of an organization and therefore allows them to creatively obtain the desired outcome. 

4. Utilisation of emotions

Human beings have different emotions. The key here is to understand those various emotions within the team and inspire them through empathy & constructive feedback. Agile leaders are responsible for helping the team to develop proper skills so that they will be able to manage their own emotions and thus bring positivity to the workplace while also making the correct decisions. 

5. Creating a collaborative environment

A single person within an organization cannot perform all the tasks, which is why collaboration & teamwork is needed. Both of the aforementioned qualities are responsible for creating the perfect efficiency within the workplace. Team members that work in collaboration with each other will be more likely to achieve success in their journey. 

6. Creativity

The good thing about Lean-Agile leadership is that – it never underestimates the place from where creativity & innovation can arrive. Agile leaders always tend to be broad-minded and they work to keep the organization's goal in perspective. Agile leaders also support & allow innovative ideas from any person within the organization irrespective of the designation or cadre.

Advantages of Lean-Agile leadership

The primary benefit that can be achieved from a Lean-Agile leadership framework is the sustainable growth of the business. Other merits include:

1. Creation of human relationships within teams and thereby valuing them.

2. Better mindfulness as well as responsiveness at each level.

3. Creates an environment of continuous learning.

4. Creates confidence within the team members.

5. Difficulties become easier to tackle with a responsible, organization, and autonomous culture within the organization.

There's no denying that Agile environments tend to work the best for companies because professionals are allowed to contribute, grow and work together. Hence, the first step towards success is to develop Lean-Agile leadership at every level of the organization.

The framework of the Lean-Agile leadership

1. The team

In Lean-Agile leadership, teams are used as the operating unit, wherever possible. The teams are cross-functional, self-organizing, and will be able to deliver the services/products as per the main backlog. They will be designed with internal coherence, so that they can operate on their own, almost like a small business. 

The concept of team is taken from the classic scrum team, which can also be generalized to be called the ‘circle’. Circles are always expected to operate using constant feedback, by planning, reviewing, and retrospecting. Circles should also make their work as transparent as possible. 

It should be noted that circles will have relationships with other circles, therefore defining the way how they interact. Moreover, circles can also be scaled up or down based on the main backlog and the work that is to be done. 

2. The roles

In the Lean-Agile leadership framework, the major roles include the SO or the Strategy Owner, who is equivalent to the product owner in the scrum. And then there is the OO or Operations Owner, who is equivalent to a scrum master in the scrum. Finally, there's the self-organizing, cross-functional team.

3. The artifacts

In Lean-Agile leadership, the following set of artifacts can be assumed:

• Circle manifest

• Main backlog

• Tactical backlog

• Improvement backlog

• Relationship Manifest   

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Conclusion

At the end of the heyday, it can be easily concluded that Agile leadership is a major component in properly managing teams, inside an organization. Professionals who have Agile leadership skills will always be preferred by companies and will be chosen for authoritative positions as well. 

And the good news is that – the values & principles related to Lean-Agile Leadership are relatively easy-to-learn & few. Hence, it makes sense for interested individuals to hop onto the SAFe Lean-Agile Leadership certification without any second thoughts.