How to Coach Yourself and Others Happiness Is No Accident | Page 102

In general, this method requires a great deal of creativity and open-mindedness. This is one that
works particularly well on people who are obstacles: convert them into friends of the team!
For example if the team needs approval of an expert who is not part of the team, this can cause
extra work preparing documentation for this person and long delays while the expert revises the
documents. If the expert becomes part of the team, then they are well-informed of the work being
done and can give approval with very little overhead.
If done well, this can be a very long-lasting method of dealing with an obstacle. Make sure that the
transformation is true and that it takes hold... and beware that the obstacle doesn't revert back to its
old nature.
Counteract
Find an activity that negates the effects of the obstacle by boosting effectiveness in another area.

As a coach or Process Facilitator, this is what we spend our time in early in a team's adoption of
Agile Work: we get them to work in the same room, use iterations and adaptive planning, we focus
them on delivering work valued by the stakeholders as defined by the Product Owner. All these
things are enhancing the team's ability to get work done without actually directly dealing with any
obstacles.
Watch out for barriers avoided this way to come back and bite you later on.

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