Maneuvering Monday

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Marie and Mark are interviewing for the CFO position, and Marie learns from the employees in the Finance department that they are not wishing for a specialist manager, but a leader to represent them in the management team. Natalie suggests the VP of Sales, Jaque, which disappoints Mark. Jason returns to Zebra Apps, and Paul bakes cinnamon buns for an extended HR breakfast. Joseph makes assumptions about Marie's health, and Erik suggests that Marie takes a break from her job in HR to become a full-time coach in the Engineering department.

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In the second part of chapter 4, we are lucky to get hands-on advice from queer millennial expat leader Laurence Paquette who works as Vice President of Marketing for the large renewable energy company Vestas.

The story episode is full of drama, and the conflict avoidance reaches a new high when Zebra Apps' management fails at setting boundaries when it comes to physical aggression. And suddenly, everybody is calling everybody on a Sunday.

We talk about how to be a female leader. How you can assert credibility and authority while being friendly and fun. And finding your own way to lead without trying to fit into a certain (navy suite and tie) mold. We do not apply theoretical frameworks, but discuss based on our own collective experiences how Marie can maneuver through the different layers of workplace dynamics, leadership issues, software development challenges and personal relationships.

Laurence is authentic and inspiring, and we encourage you all to check out her website for more tips and tricks to navigate corporate life: Millennial neurodivergent leader and mother | LaurencePaquette.com.

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Marie gets closer to Jenni and starts to understand the pressure she is facing from Natalie. Shaine accepts a pay cut to make up for the salary disparity, but it is too late to avoid mass mutiny. After a dramatic incident in the office, Marie is sent home on sick leave. During her time off, Marie is approached by the previous employee, UX Designer Jason, who wants to re-join Zebra Apps because he believes there is hope after Marie has started working on the retention issue. VP of Sales Jaque manages to get Marie back to the office to fix ASLO's quality issues and save Zebra Apps from financial demise.

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In the first commentary episode of chapter 4, we are lucky to have "post transformation dude" Joe Auslander in the studio to share his great perspectives from his work which he describes as 'physical therapy of the delivery world and organizational transformation'.

We talk about how to avoid getting lost in trying to fix 'people problems', how holding people accountable is not about staring at them with a mean face, and the actual value of whiteboards compared to virtual tools. We discuss "backlog literacy", the idea that backlog management is not just about planning your work, but about communicating, and the ability to tell a story through your work, listen and interact based on this. Listen to learn more about what kind of environment can promote self-organizing teams, and whether there really is such a thing as dysfunction.

Models & Frameworks

• Joe's "Give them rope"-model
• The concept of 'Agile hot-rocking'
• Backlog literacy
• Virtual whiteboard tool Miro
• Ivanna's meditation app: Insight Timer

Pssst: Would you love to learn more from Joe? Joe is a co-host at the podcast Joekub where he talks to his friend Jakub about 'agile, life and monkeys'.

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Mark, Marie and Paul spend a full day offsite to share and celebrate failures, with the purpose of starting to solve their department’s dysfunctions. Marie and Paul learn that Mark has been fighting Natalie to focus on culture since he started in Zebra Apps. Mark also admits that he has not been doing his job as a leader and investing in the HR department as a team. Paul agrees to join Marie’s arranged HR breakfasts if he gets to bake cinnamon buns. 

Marie joins the Engineering department’s stand up meeting only to learn that it is no longer a physical meeting with a whiteboard and post-its, but taking place virtually. Marie learns  that the Engineering department is having serious quality issues with their star product ASLO.

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In the last commentary episode of chapter 3, we talk to global business leader Vivek Menon about the challenges Marie faces as this chapter comes to an end.

Based on many years of leadership experience, Vivek shares his thoughts on the topics of the episode, which all revolve around organizational dysfunction. We talk about equal pay for equal work, professionally educated versus self-taught employees, and intelligent jerks. We talk about lack of accountability, and what role the gender of the VP of Engineering plays (or doesn’t play).

Models and frameworks

• Five dysfunctions of a team by Patrick Lencioni
• Silver spoons and scrappers 
• Levels of resistance
• Stages of conflict

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The identity of the corporate rebel is revealed. Will he get away with it?

Marie aggressively confronts Paul about the salary disparities in the engineering department. Later, she learns from Mark that Paul is under a lot of pressure because of a legal dispute with the ex-CFO Frank.

Marie and her team facilitates a townhall meeting where the employees in Zebra Apps  work through the company values and what they mean. During the meeting, one of the  engineers from Willie’s department makes a scene and leaves the room. The CTO Jenni admits to Marie that the engineering department is dysfunctional and asks Marie to “fix her team”.

Thank you to Katie Christensen for reading this episode.

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Is purpose your boss? In the second commentary episode of chapter 3, we have an interesting talk with Marc-Peter Pijper about holocracy, purpose, how to succeed and learn together as a team, equal pay for equal work, motivation, and not least the many metaphors of Marie's story.

Is the pile of junk in the basement a metaphor for all the problems of the company - and Marie's way of dealing with them? Learn how Marc-Peter thinks Zebra Apps could benefit from using their basement as a space to enable the organization to flourish. We also discuss what would happen if we skip traditional performance bonuses and reward people for their loyalty instead, and how to successfully approach the changes needed in Zebra Apps by starting small and experimenting with self-organization on the team-level.

Frameworks and concepts

• Holocracy
• Self-managing vs. self-organizing teams
• Self-determination theory
• Autonomy, mastery and purpose

Curious to learn more about these topics? Marc-Peter is a columnist for Corporate Rebels, and you can find all his columns  here.

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Going to get the cinnamon buns from the pile of junk in the basement, Marie finds a hidden sugar stash and meets the datacenter technician Willie. During lunch hour in the canteen that day, a dramatic happening occurs, involving sugar and a banner falling from the stairwell.

Marie and Erik learn from Shaine, who was recently headhunted from ConvoSystems, that he has told Willie about his salary in Zebra Apps, which is twice the amount that Willie gets paid. Marie confronts Mark about the salary difference, and Mark indicates that this is not a problem because Willie is loyal to Zebra Apps.

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In this first commentary episode of chapter 3, we are delighted to talk to Rob England and Dr. Cherry Vu, partners in life and in their company Teal Unicorn. Together as a team, they transform organizations to New Ways of Working and Managing by being 'midwifes to the solution' for their customers (listen to the episode to find out what we mean).

Hear real-life examples from Teal Unicorn about how other companies have introduced rituals to cope with and learn from failure. Why is it a problem that there is a lack of psychological safety in Zebra Apps? How could Marie and her peers benefit from the good old marriage counsel 'X, Y, X formula' for feedback? And where would Cherry and Rob start if they had to help Zebra Apps investigate and solve their retention issue?

Visit https://tealunicorn.com/ to get Cherry's facilitation and Big Room Planning (Teal Planning) tips and tricks, as well as a lot more great content for making work better in organizations

Frameworks and concepts

• Humble Consulting by Edgar Schein
• Open Space Technology
• The Phoenix Project by Gene Kim

Pssst: Cherry and Rob write books in English and in Vietnamese about New Ways of Working, Open Management, and even how these ideas illuminate raising a family. Find a full list here: https://tealunicorn.com/books/

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