Healing Broken Trust
From AgileOpenNorthwest
Summary at opening ceremonies: We talk about legacy code and code debt. Often in similar situations there are legacy trust issues and people debt. How do we recognize those situations and what do we do about them? I want your stories.
Session Convener: Kim Wallmark
Contents |
Players in Trust Issues
- team <-> team
- team <-> management
- team <-> customers
- individual <-> individual
- factions within a team
- geographic divisions (the office in this state <-> the office in that state)
- individual <-> rest of team
- team <-> product owner
We also discussed symmetry and asymmetry. Sometimes both sides have the same complaint of the other side; sometimes each side has a complementary issue with the other; sometimes one side isn't aware of the problem.
Specific Consequences
- A never talked to B again
- long-running trust issues between teams even after original people had left (legacy trust issues, sometimes over decades)
Helpful Actions
- person on team B agrees with team A's position and builds bridge
- respond to rejection with brainstorming request
- merge feuding teams and split along different lines
- connect as people, not as labels/roles (i.e., Pat and Chris and Robin, not dev and QA and marketing)
- communication and responding to others
- transparency (there was some discussion of whether this is a good thing in all cases, which I unfortunately did not record)
- face-to-face interaction
- proposed face-to-face script:
- work through shared frustration
- "I'm sorry I messed up" + absolution
- negotiation
- work through negative emotions together
- collective success, not individual
- reminding people of good intentions (can also backfire)
- a third party sometimes helps
- in a situation where there was a lack of trust between a platform team and product teams who used the platform, they benefited from platform team members sitting with the relevant product teams when working on APIs for those product teams. API was judged to be done only when product feature using that API was done
- find a way to have a shared goal or common enemy
- create relationships that are more important than animosity
Misc.
- respect is like trust
- lack of trust is often an accurate analysis of history
- the book Non-Violent Communication was recommended
- matrix management conflicts with team formation
- "we" is a very important concept
- conflicting priorities can lead to trust issues
- different types of trust:
- you won't hurt me
- I know what you'll do
- background societal assumptions, like "you will not shoot me in this conference room"
- lack of trust is often perceived as a moral judgment, but sometimes not: I don't trust you to do surgery on me
- ego/ambition can be a problem
- need to be able to apologize, admit fault, help rival, and so forth
- plan around lack of trust?
- everyone is self-serving, and that's okay
- thinking there's a hidden agenda hurts trust
- if I don't understand you, I may think you have a hidden agenda
