Agile mentoring. Breakthrough or not?

Thank you Durban! What a great Instruct event well supported by the local community this week. Software Architect and speaker, Chris Tite, delivered a challenging expose of his journey into applying agile techniques to mentoring employees at Kaleidocode's training centre on November, 20th 2019.

As Chris explains it, we manage the outcome of our software projects using Agile principles and techniques like time boxed cycles, shorter feedback cycles and small defined outcomes… so why don’t we apply these techniques to staff growth?

Staff grow at different rates, they have unique needs and differing circumstances, so why do we impose a one-size-fits-all approach to staff development? Furthermore, why do we subject our teams to a sterile and delayed feedback KPO / KPI approach in the tech industry, an industry that is growing and experiencing rapid change?

These are all questions that puzzled him.

Five years ago Chris started mentoring team members using an agile approach which was refined over time and with each iteration, it is now an accepted and valued practice on all my teams. This is his story.

During his talk he unpacked:

• The agile mentoring approach and the mentoring life cycle
• The different personas he has adopted in agile mentoring
• The different people patterns he has adopted in agile mentoring
• The tools he uses to manage the process
• The career framework he applies
• Lessons  learned.

He shared his thoughts on a fresh approach to mentoring team members which ultimately results in;

• Higher job satisfaction and less burn-out among employees
• More confident teams
• Less learning on active projects, and more focused learning outcomes
• Higher staff retention.

The catering was top notch and the attendees had a fantastic time.