30 Days

The 30 days following OST-2 represent an important checkpoint in the progress of the organization.

These 30 days are also an important opportunity for further growth in the organization’s capacity to learn, adapt, and improve.

For this reason, it is good idea to give the organization a little time to integrate the entire experience of 100 days that started and ended in Open Space.

By OST-2, they understand Open Space. They have been through it once before, about 100 days ago.

Ask questions after OST-2:

  • Have champions for the Agile process-change emerged?
  • Can you identify them by name?
  • How rapidly is the organization handling the input found inside the Proceedings from OST-2?
  • What kind of actions is the organization taking after OST-2, without being directly prompted by the Coach?
  • What is happening in terms of people, plans, and policies as a result of the 100-day OSA program?
  • Is the organization making substantial changes?
  • What are the results of the initial 100-day experiments with Agile practices?
  • Have the teams learned to tailor their practices?
  • Is the organization starting to focus more intently on the portfolio and program (planning) aspects of IT work?

During the 30 days after OST-2, as the Coach, it is a good idea to “go away” for 30 days. By now the organization is probably OK with this, since you have not been coaching there each and every day.

So: why not vacate for 30 days and create a small vacuum? Doing so might tend to encourage the organization to get busy without help from an external authority (the Coach) telling them what they “should” do.

In OSA, it is recommended that the coach “become scarce” for about 30 days after OST-2. The hypothesis is that the organization has in fact “leveled up” substantially as a result of the OSA program – and will start acting that way – if that external authority called “Coach” leaves them alone long enough for this to happen naturally, and without prompting.