Presenting the Complete Lean Change Method

Transforming your organization to agile is hard. Too many lean and agile change initiatives fail

Many traditional "Big C Consulting" change management methods rely on upfront design, fixed plans, and disruptive overhauls that result in change resistance and can decrease organizational performance. Many organizations have challenges in getting existing agile improvement methods, such as Kanban and Scrum, to work as prescribed.

A Startup Is a Really Good Metaphor for Agile Change Initiatives

Lean Change is a change management method that provides change agents with a dynamic planning and execution framework. Lean Change is based on the metaphor that any agile change initiative can be thought of as a startup. Borrowing many principles and techniques from the Lean Startup method, change agents are able to keep the change plan and model relevant by incorporating the latest learnings obtained from on the ground adoption.

Lean Change integrates the "Kotter 8 steps of change" with validated learning to provide change agents with a systematic approach to mitigating common risks encountered during agile/lean transformation; including resistance to change, correctness of change, and sustainability of change.










All aspects of the Lean Change method are designed to be cocreative, enabling change agents, change recipients and other change stakeholders to negotiate their way through a communally owned solution. All change participants learn their way to a successful change outcome.

Lean Change Is Now Ready As a Consumable Method

I have posted a large number of articles around Lean Change,  all of these articles tie together in an overall story that I hope to publish one-day. I have put together a quick table of contents, hyperlinking to the relevant articles where they exist. As always please feel free to provide some feedback.

Chapter 1: the Case for Lean Change

1. Why Today's Technology Organizations Need to Change
2. Challenges with Current Organizational Change Methods
3. Presenting the Lean Change Method

Chapter 2: Getting Started with the Change Canvas 

1. a Short History of the Canvas 
2. the Change Canvas in Action-a Story of Danny the Developer
3. Using a Canvas to Represent a Minimum Viable Change 
4. Guidelines and Practices When Using the Change Canvas

Chapter 3: Advanced Change Canvas Topics

1. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Urgency and Change Recipient Sections
2. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Vision and Target State Sections
3. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Actions and Success Criteria Sections
4. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Benefits and Commitment Sections
5. Using Plug-Ins to Explore the Communications Section
6. a Catalog of Reusable Agile Change Patterns

Chapter 4: the Validated Change Lifecycle

1. Validated Change Lifecycle Using Kotter, Leanstartup and Kanban
2. State 1: Agree on the Urgency of Change
3. State 2: Negotiate the Change
4. State 3: Validate Adoption
5. State 4: Verify Performance
6. Realizing a Change Canvas through the Validated Change Lifecycle
7. Instantiating the Lifecycle Effectively Using Information Radiators

Chapter 5: Walking through the Validated Change Lifecycle with a Comprehensive Example

1. State 1: Agree on the Urgency of Change
2. State 2: Negotiate the Change
3. State 3: Validated Adoption
4. State 4: Verify Performance

Chapter 6: Using a Transformation Canvas for Enterprise Change

1. Understanding Why We Need an Organizational Transformation Canvas
2. Applying the Change Canvas to Transformations
3. Mitigating Change Risk through Traversing the Canvas
4. Prioritizing Different Minimum Viable Changes Based on Risks on the Organizational Transformation Canvas

Chapter 7: a Cadence Model for Workshops, Meetings and Review Sessions When Running Lean Change at Scale

1. Overall Cadence Model
2. Change Agent Daily Standup
3. Change Recipients Improvement Update
4. Stakeholder/Sponsor Update
5. Change Agent Planning
6. MVC Canvas Refresh
7. Transformation Canvas Refresh
8. MVC Backlog Replenishment
9. Metrics Update