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Steije de Lat in four key themes, is it possible?

‘How to do twice as much in half the time’. It is these words on the cover of a book by Jeff Sutherland that introduced Steije de Lat to the phenomenon of Agile working years ago.
Eight years on, thanks in part to hundreds of supervised trainings and trajectories, Steije has also gained many experiences. Time to stand still. To reflect. To summarize. Who is Steije de Lat and can we summarize his story as a professional in four key themes? The answer to that question is a resounding “yes.

Pragmatism

Someone who can be characterized as a no-nonsense doer. An Agile enthusiast, and not an Agile dogmatist. Down-to-earth, realistic and focused on practical effect. A description that resonates with Steije: “I do not stare blindly at the books, but rather look at what is present in the specific organization. That way I can connect to it in practice,” Steije explains. In recent years he has provided many in-company coaching programs.

There he also became acquainted with his own pitfall: “Out of enthusiasm, I sometimes wanted to do and tell too much myself, whereas people learn more effectively by doing it directly.”

Results Orientation

Steije makes an active effort to achieve goals and results. Looking back briefly at the results that have stuck with him, he talks about his role as Agile transition supervisor at ABN Amro: “Here you did not have to expect long stories from me about the theory and, for example, scaling mechanisms. We mainly wanted to ensure that ABN colleagues in the Netherlands started working much better with developers abroad. And that worked out well.” The success story of the new way of working within banking is aptly summarized by Steije in an Agile triangle: higher quality, more focus and less rework.

Creating structure

Guiding an Agile transition means creating structure. The clearer (and more tangible) the steps to be taken in a transition are, the more colleagues carry the space to use their knowledge and skills within this standard.

Take Agile Portfolio Management for example: if you want to make improvements here, it is important that you start defining together what the desired “Agile governance is. Nice and vague, right?

Steije says: “Being able to describe the concept is important; being able to make it small and tangible is even more so. As a transition coach, Steije organizes a quarterly cadence with management the first time himself in order to set up a standard structure (agenda, preparation), and then converts this into a small and simple script that can be implemented by people in the line organization.

Changeability

“Change only succeeds if you address both hard and soft.” What does Steije mean by this? The hard side is formed by things like data, business processes, roles and responsibilities. And the soft side of an organization consists of values and norms, culture, relationships, ways of dealing and behavior.

“If I want to create change in an organization, I almost always have to challenge the processes and structures: What process do we follow? And who has what role and responsibility? But that’s only half the puzzle.” By this, Steije is referring to the fact that the soft side requires a different approach, based on questions such as: How do people work together? How do you empower them? And how do you create initiative-rich teams?