#160 | Beyond Labels: Reimagining How We Get Things Done with Lenka Pincot & Sandy Mamoli

What if the real power lies not in choosing a side—but in mastering both? We explore how blending agile and traditional project management is redefining success across industries.

In this thought-provoking episode, I’m joined by Lenka Pinka, Chief of Staff to the CEO at Project Management Institute, and Sandy Mamoli, Agile Coach, former Olympian, and Agile Alliance board member, to unpack one of the most persistent tensions in the world of work: agile vs. traditional project management.

But what if this debate is outdated—and even unhelpful?

Together, Lenka and Sandy challenge the false binary and advocate for a more nuanced, collaborative approach. Drawing from their global experience across industries and methodologies, they explain how today’s most successful organizations don’t choose sides—they blend practices fluidly based on context, outcomes, and evolving needs.

This conversation is full of compelling insights for both project professionals and agile practitioners. From fears of “agile dilution” to misconceptions about governance, we explore how shared values and a focus on delivery can bridge methodological divides. As Sandy puts it, the new PMI–Agile Alliance partnership is like "two fully whole, independent people who together create something magical."

Whether you see yourself as a traditional project manager, a scrum master, or somewhere in between, this episode will reshape how you think about frameworks, governance, and the future of work. If you're ready to move past methodology wars and start focusing on what really drives success, this is your episode. Listen now, and join the conversation on how we can build better ways of working—together.

In this episode, we discuss:

0:00 Introduction and Guest Backgrounds
10:41 PMI and Agile Alliance Partnerships
18:11 Community Reactions and Concerns

27:19 Product Management and Project Convergence
39:38 Governance in Agile Environments

Transcript

Introduction and Guest Backgrounds

Fatimah Abbouchi 0:00

You're listening to Agile Ideas, the podcast hosted by Fatimah Abbouchi. For anyone listening out there not having a good day, please know there is help out there. Hi everyone and welcome back to another episode of Agile Ideas. I'm CEO, at AMO, mental Health Ambassador and your host on today's podcast. We have both a returning guest and also a secondary guest who is also going to be on the podcast today, and she and my original guest have come together to talk about a very important subject and we'll get into all of that. But first let me introduce you to both Lenka Pincot, who is the Chief of Staff, and a returning guest Chief of Staff to the CEO of the Project Management Institute and a global executive leader. Lenka oversees the Transformation Management Office, enterprise Program Management CEO, and Board Communications and the thought leadership teams in the global not-for-profit organisation. Her role is to define and drive the organisation's strategic initiatives, ensure seamless execution of new strategies and enhance PMI organisational agility and foster a culture of innovation and excellence across all levels. Lenka brings extensive international experience and a proven track record in setting and executing strategic vision, digital and agile transformation leadership, cultural shifts and enhancing organisational agility. Lenka holds a Master of Science in Computer Sciences, software Engineering, from Charles University and has earned a Digital Excellence Diploma from IMD Business School of Switzerland and completed the European Women in Boards C-Level program. She also has a number of certifications that are internationally recognised.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:52

Joining Lenka today is also Sandy Mamoli. Sandy is one of New Zealand's leading agile coaches. A force of positive energy and a former Olympic athlete, she works with leaders and teams, guiding them towards high performance with an approach that is hands-on, no-nonsense and steeped in agile. She's also the co-author of Creating Great Teams how Self-Selection Lets People Excel. Sandy is a sought-after presenter and international keynote speaker, as well as a member of the Global Agile Alliance Board. She has a master's degree in artificial intelligence, is a high-achieving, goal-driven person who also perhaps unsurprisingly really into CrossFit. So please join me in welcoming Sandy and Lenka to the show. Sandy and Lenka, welcome to the show.

Lenka Pincot 2:42

Oh, thanks for having us.

Sandy Mamoli 2:44

Yeah, hello. Thank you and thanks for having us here.

Fatimah Abbouchi 2:47

It's a pleasure. I was saying earlier, Lenka returned guests, so thank you for a second time, which will be great and Sandy's first time meeting each other. But from what I've read about your background and bio, some really fascinating things in there, and one of them really caught my attention. So I'm going to start with you. Former Olympic athlete, tell me more.

Sandy Mamoli 3:09

It's in a sport that you probably have never heard about, because it is really big in Europe and Latin America and it's called Handball. And in case you're thinking that little thing where you're playing the playground in Australia and New Zealand, it's not it. So we're talking, uh, Handball. It's uh been Olympics since the 70s. It's uh the second largest sports in um in Central and Northern Europe and um, basically, I think, Football, Soccer on land. I spent my entire youth playing Handball and then went to the 92 Olympics and it's a long time ago but it was fun.

Fatimah Abbouchi 3:50

I mean don't downplay it. No matter what the sport, you made it into the Olympics. I certainly can't say I've done that, Lenka, any crazy, ridiculous stories like that.

Lenka Pincot 3:59

No, no, no, I think nothing can beat it and I mean wow, pretty remarkable.

Fatimah Abbouchi 4:07

So you know, just carrying on from that excellent start, Sandy, tell us a little bit about your background. For those that you know don't know your work and what you do, tell us a little bit about what your work is and what your background is, give us a couple of minutes overview about yourself.

Sandy Mamoli 4:23

Sure, so I'm basically ancient, because I'm in my third or fourth career right now. I started out being a professional Handball player and going to the Olympics and then, at the age of about 25, I realised I had to grow up if I did not want to end up in a low-level job and I actually wanted to use my brain for the rest of my life. So I went to uni and started computational linguistics, which is a sub-field of artificial intelligence, and delved into the world of MIN and DBA and I worked in Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Stockholm. I lived in Copenhagen for a really long time and then moved to New Zealand and because I had been working agile since 2003, I thought it was completely normal this is how work was done. Moved to New Zealand and got the shock of my life going 'oh my god' what are people doing?

Sandy Mamoli 5:28

I don't want to work in this way. And I hadn't realised that I'd been living in a bubble like it was absolutely not normal that I was in a bubble in Amsterdam and Copenhagen. So it was not normal working that way. But what I realised was two things one, I wanted to keep working that way so started to create my own pockets, and the other thing I realised that I was probably an average developer, but for a tech person, I was pretty good at talking to people, and so I started coaching, started influencers, started building my own pockets, and, and at the beginning they were a team and then they crashed into all the organisational boundaries that I had no idea about, and so I had to learn about how that worked, and by after a few years, my pockets of playgrounds grew to the size of organisation of trade, me or several thousand people, and in the process of this I also started a company, because it's quite lonely doing this by myself.

Sandy Mamoli 6:28

I wanted to have some friends, so I started a company, and I've been involved in the Agile community since 2003. I started Agile Valley in New Zealand, which is a meetup group with over a thousand people, and it's been going for 18 years now. And at some point I looked more internationally and got the chance to join the board of the Agile Alliance in like about a year and a half ago, and here we are.

Fatimah Abbouchi 6:55

Amazing. What a career, and I'm especially interested in the relationship of Agile ways of working in corporate and how that relates to teamwork, and so we'll get into that as well. But thank you for starting us off, Lenka, when we last time spoke, you talked a little bit about your background, but for those that weren't fortunate to listen to that episode, tell me a little bit about what you've been up to lately, and in particular, since you and Sandy have connected, I'm curious to know, from an Agile perspective, was there anything that really stood out for you? That was a differing of opinions.

Lenka Pincot 7:32

Well, I don't think we had many opportunities to come to any differences in our opinions yet, but we just started to work together very recently, ever since Agile Alliance entered this, let's say, next level of the strategic partnership with PMI, with the Project Management Institute. So what am I up to lately? So I keep working at the Project Management Institute. I work in the role of the Chief of Staff to the CEO and keep running my teams and we talked about that last time with Fatimah when we talked about PMOs, because one of my teams is our enterprise project management office, our transformation management office, and I keep working with our thought leadership team and communications. So not so many changes on my end when it comes to my job or work. But what is really exciting is that now I have the opportunity to be the PMI representative on the Agile Alliance Board of Directors, and that's something that is really awesome, I would say, because for me it's an opportunity to go back to Agile, to be closer and work with people like Sandy.

Fatimah Abbouchi 8:46

And so, thinking about everything that you've read your bio, you're doing a lot at the moment and you've done a lot, so just adding this additional role is, you know, just a piece of cake by the sounds of it. What was the sort of the thinking behind this new partnership between PMI and Agile Alliance? Why now Lenka from a PMI perspective?

Lenka Pincot 9:08

Well. So I'm realizing that this is probably not well known, but Agile Alliance and Project Management Institute were in a strategic partnership for already a couple of years. Because there is a thing and we should probably talk about it project management as a discipline is not set in stone. It keeps evolving because it's a discipline, it's a function that needs to support organisation in their strategies and needs to go hand in hand with the development and evolution of organisation and industries and the business landscape.

Lenka Pincot 9:43

So project management as we knew it, let's say, 50 years ago, is very different from what we have right now. So the convergence and, let's say, blending of different approaches was happening already for several years. So then, at a certain point of time, project Management Institute and Agile Alliance worked together and created PMI Agile Practice Guide, and content of that practice guide is the cornerstone for our PMI ACP certification Agile Certified Practitioner. So we worked together already for several years. But now there was a time where we saw that there are more opportunities, we can help each other more, and so we entered this another level of strategic partnership, and since then we've worked even closer together.

PMI and Agile Alliance Partnership

Fatimah Abbouchi 10:31

And Sandy, was there anything from your perspective that you wanted to add in terms of the relationship now and evolving that further beyond what you've had over the last few years?

Sandy Mamoli 10:45

Yeah, I want to take what Linka was saying and compare it to we've been engaged for a really long time and we were quite happily being engaged, and then now we've decided to marry and, like any marriage, there is, like it's, two fully whole people, two fully independent people who together can create a magic that is more than just the sum of its parts. And, um, my hopes are that, uh, we, uh, we will find differences of opinions, because that will give a spark that will enrich all of us. And, um, I, yeah, and I think that's actually all I wanted to add to what Lincoln was saying, because I wholeheartedly agree and I couldn't have told it better.

Fatimah Abbouchi 11:28

And then so you both. You mentioned the word spark. It's a good segue. There was a lot of excitement and a lot of concern. I was coming off maternity leave and I just remember a flurry of comments and posts and people giving their two cents without actually probably asking you both the questions or understanding what it means. Or, to your point, there has been like agile's been infused in the PMI for a long time. I recall doing the, you know, agile practitioner training and all of these other things. There's been a lot of that. People have probably even not known or not taken the time to find out. So what do you both think is the either concern or the excitement? You've probably spoken to a lot of people, so maybe from both angles, what are you seeing or hearing in that space?

Lenka Pincot 12:14

Yeah, so I'm happy to start. So you know, when it comes to the project management global community, these guys they are really. They are over the moon. They are very excited because lots of them actually work in agile environment for some time and they really appreciate it, because some of them and I don't recall Fatimah, we talked about that as well.

Lenka Pincot 12:38

I remember that I talked about that on several other podcasts when I made that move from project management to agile way of working, I was attacked, if I may say that, on this podcast, you know, I faced a lot of anger, a lot of pushback, kind of like what are you doing here? How dare you enter our space? And I was like wow, like what's going on, like like why there are so many different opinions and what's what's such a big deal if someone works certain way and then someone works different way? So I kept thinking about it a lot and I think that the thing is with the agile movement that it's not only about ways of working and you know we use these boards instead of these charts, whatever that's. That's on the point but a part of that movement is a big cultural movement and I think that the worry is that this cultural movement will be neglected.

Lenka Pincot 13:32

That's the interpretation that I have, because I also saw on social media a lot of reactions that might not be as positive as reactions from our community, but in our community people are basically saying this like this like hey, guys, we are here to deliver, so let's just just let us work. Okay, we don't want to be part of these fights. Like for us, we just choose the method, that method that works for us. If we have a problem in front of us, let us choose the way we we work on that. We want to deliver and we don't want to be part of um, you know these disputes and being told that you are bad because you are a project manager.

Fatimah Abbouchi 14:09

Sandy, did you want to add anything?

Sandy Mamoli 14:11

Yeah, I think we are seeing concerns too, and first of all, I want to say that there's a lot of opinions out there and people are reacting, and I think that's a positive thing because that means people care. If we have absolutely zero reaction, that will probably be the worst thing, and I think that's a positive thing because that means people care. If we have absolutely zero reaction, that will probably be the worst thing. So it is important to people and I think that is really good. And from an Agile perspective, what we see in the Agile community is concerns that Agile will be destroyed, that we'll all be be project management, that will all be very process-oriented, that we will forget about the values and the principles and it will be all about process. It will be all about certifications. Is the Agile Alliance going to issue certifications now and part of it? I can answer straight away we won't issue certifications as the Agile Alliance, but I also do share the concerns that, yes, will it move us into a direction that's too process focused? And I hope not, and it's definitely a risk. But anything we do there is a risk.

Sandy Mamoli 15:17

And saying that, I also think that it brings this huge opportunity, because times have changed and we now are facing different problems and the world of work is totally changing, and I think that it's only together with different perspectives and different ends of the spectrum of predictable versus adaptive that we can look at problems and solve them together. So I think it's going to move everything forward and I hope that people who have concerns will buy into that vision and understand the vision and make it work Because concerns are not just there to be ignored and hope that other people make sure the risks don't eventuate. That's up to all of us, whether in the Agile community or in the project management community. It's something that we need to make sure the risks don't eventuate. That's up to all of us, whether in the agile community or in the project management community. It's something that we need to make sure doesn't happen and we need to make sure that we can grab the opportunity that we now have.

Fatimah Abbouchi 16:15

I think that's really good points. One thing I do want to commend you both on is the openness and transparency in which you've communicated what you're doing and admitting that there are things that are unknown, and now just calling out that there are risks. I think that's really a really positive thing, and one of the things that I do tend to like about a lot of the things I'm seeing in this space is the openness to receive feedback and literally take that feedback on board and assess it and see whether it changes anything that you're doing. So I think that's really positive. From a lot of the commentary I mean, I wrote an article about it and I got some feedback and comments it seems to be there's two, just sort of two focus areas in terms of people. Those are obviously really excited and those are a bit challenged by what's happening.

Fatimah Abbouchi 17:00

I feel like for the traditional project management you know world where I grew up 20 years ago, coming into this space, which was following the guidance of PMI, you've got that sort of protective nature protect project management at all costs and then, on the other side of it, you've got the agile purists that are, you know, as you said, Sandy that are referencing something that you know was great at a point in time, but not willing to go past that.

Fatimah Abbouchi 17:24

Or look at adaptability and evolving and that. So I think you've got a bit of a challenge there. But I guess one of the biggest opportunities and I'm keen to know how you're going to do more about this is project management itself is still an unknown for a lot of those that aren't involved in projects day to day in organisations Think of those that are in operational teams and then you add the sort of agile layer on top which, for a lot of people, they don't understand either. So how will we be bridging the gap in the knowledge of both project management and then agile? Like what's some thinking that you're doing in that space?

Community Reactions and Concerns

Lenka Pincot 17:59

Yeah. So this is a great debate because I think that, fatima, you're absolutely right, we should move away from these debates that there is one way of working and other way of working. And is it better? Isn't it better that there's not the right question, like we need to be able to choose the right way of working for the right situation that we have out of us. But then what is the vision?

Lenka Pincot 18:18

So, if you look at the work that the project management institute is doing recently, so in 2024, when we released our new purpose to maximize project success, to elevate our world, we also worked on a very large research that is, to understand what actually is project success and how we can increase the probability of project success. And when we say project success, we mean it holistically. I know that there is like a linguistic challenge how do you include everything under one word? Because when we say project, we mean all these initiatives, whether they are delivered purely. You know, like I have a plan and I work on it, or I have a program and I have some agile teams helping me achieve the objectives for the program, or I have even a small portfolio, et cetera. So we call it project success just for the lack of a better word and we work on the broader vision for the profession. That, again, is agnostic. So in that broader vision that we have and that we pursue, it's not about a particular method, it's more about continuum of different ways of working. And then, in this vision, it should not matter anymore what you do on a detail level.

Lenka Pincot 19:31

The vision is why are we actually doing it and how do we increase that project success and why do we even want to increase it? So why? Because, when you look around all the change, all the uncertainty, we need to be able to embrace it. organisation are successful when they are able to. We need to be able to embrace it. organisation are successful when they are able to transform, when they are able to embrace that continuous change and perpetual transformation. And for that they need projects. And if I say projects agile teams, you know all these teams that help them to deliver on their strategy. And our broader vision is to drive the profession through that transformation so that people can increase success of these initiatives. That's the vision on which we want to work, together with Agile Alliance and also other organisation who want to be part of that.

Fatimah Abbouchi 20:18

I think that that opens up opportunities as well. Obviously, there's some industries that Agile maybe doesn't play in, even though it's versatile enough that it can be. Do you find, Sandy thinking about it from an adoption perspective and from an educational perspective that maybe Agile can spread to more industries that maybe project management traditionally plays in? That Agile seems to be at odds with?

Sandy Mamoli 20:42

I would certainly hope to. I hope that is the case when it's appropriate. I don't think we should just be agile for agile's sake. So some of the industries I think can learn a lot from agile and some of the practices and some of the the principles will be be applicable, and I think that will be absolutely great. And I think a lot of them are still missing out because they might not have been exposed to agile in the past, and I hope that is of them are still missing out because they might not have been exposed to agile in the past, and I hope that is something that we can help with and bridge that gap. At the same time we are.

Sandy Mamoli 21:13

There are also industries where agile should probably not be used or their context where agile is the wrong choice, but I do think that everyone, whichever industry, should be familiar with both philosophers, both concepts and practices and guidelines in both areas, so we can just choose whatever is appropriate for a context, for a culture, and sometimes we can also, as a one person, switch back and forth. I'm perfectly capable to work in uh, in a traditional project environment sometimes, and other times in a 100% agile environment and anything in between. So I think I would love for people to be a lot less uptight about this and just see it as there's lots of good stuff, and if we can figure out which good stuff to use when, then we all win.

Fatimah Abbouchi 22:06

And then so, thinking about both of what you've said, how do we measure success? How do you know? What are your KPIs or measurements to say we're on the right track and we're doing the right thing? What sort of measures have you got in place or that you're intending on putting in place?

Lenka Pincot 22:21

Well, so we first of all, what is very important for us is the response from our community.

Lenka Pincot 22:28

That's very important the response from our project professionals, from Agile professionals, and we are monitoring these responses in various ways.

Lenka Pincot 22:37

Basically, what we are following is not only if people are happy about something that we do like. We saw a lot of people being happy about this strategic partnership and integration of PMI and Agile Alliance, but that's not the end. What we want is to contribute to the profession and help people to be more successful in their jobs and in their careers. So this is something that I would definitely call as one of the measure of success. And then, because we work together on listing several very specific initiatives of our collaboration, then indeed we will be measuring success of these particular initiatives. So, just to give you a better idea, what are we talking about? We are planning to do some research initiatives together when we look deeper in topics such as enterprise agility or product management. We are also investing in topics such as AI artificial intelligence and its impact on agile ways of working and then these initiatives will be translated in learning courses, some content, discussions, webinars, events, reports and for these we can again measure the feedback and see if people find it useful and if it's moving them somewhere.

Fatimah Abbouchi 23:54

I think it's really interesting. You mentioned AI and product management. Product management is not something that normally, I guess, is more visible, so that's going to be a really interesting shift, I think, to see the PMI talking more about that. Sandy, how do you manage the perception that Agile Alliance might lose its independent voice by being part of, or under or in partnership with, pmi, which I'm sure some people probably are thinking?

Sandy Mamoli 24:26

Yes, I think in those cases, it's less about managing perception as making it a reality, so making sure that we do not lose our independence because we haven't. We're still following the same mission and we're still at the same purpose and we are just part of PMI now and we still have the same board that gives direction, with just one addition, which is Linker, and I think that's a great addition. So, instead of managing just a perception, I think we uh make sure that this is reality and uh that we do really good work, that we are follow those initiatives that Lenka just mentioned, which should benefit everyone, and not forget our roots and our ambition, which is to help people be agile and explore agile ways of working and values and principles, and I think we can stick to that and, as long as we are honest about it, do this we are going to. The perception will follow reality.

Fatimah Abbouchi 25:31

Lenka, did you want to add anything from your perspective?

Lenka Pincot 25:35

Yeah, you know, I was thinking when I was preparing for this podcast. I was thinking what could be a for this podcast. I was thinking what could be a good analogy to explain the?

Sandy Mamoli 25:41

whole.

Lenka Pincot 25:41

Thing and I apologize, I couldn't come with anything better than thinking about food, so I'm happy with that. So imagine so, when you look at all these and I call it purposefully delivery practices, you have a lot of different ingredients, because you know, like we are recently we are really trying to push back on that word when someone is saying traditional project management, because we are trying to encourage people. Look at the history a little bit like things are changing. What even is traditional project management? I don't believe it exists anymore and we don't know what that even is. Traditional project management I don't believe it exists anymore and we don't know what what that even is like. I personally, I'm in business for around 25 years. Uh, when we were working on projects 25 years ago, it was so different than than what we have today, so okay, so so back to the dish analogy. So imagine, imagine that for any practice that you apply, it's an ingredient, right, so it's an ingredient, and if you eat it on its own, it's good, it's delicious, like, imagine, I don't know, salad leaves and chicken and cherry tomatoes, right, so you can still have this delicious chicken and delicious cherry tomato and you will be totally happy. But what we are trying to create is a dish.

Product Management and Project Convergence

Lenka Pincot 26:58

When we put these things together and putting them together, it does not mean blending them and losing them. You can perfectly put a cherry tomato next to chicken, next to salad leaf. It's a delicious dish. You don't need to compromise them. They still as they are, but then together they form something bigger. And that bigger for us is that vision for the project profession, the broader vision that is there to help organisation to create impact for societies by allowing and training and growing and elevating all these professionals, to giving them practices and tools so that they can do the best they can when they are facing a challenge initiative to deliver. So this is what we're trying to achieve. So all these, these debates, like I don't know, is agile going to be compromised? No, of course not, because why there's? No, no one wants that right. What we want is just to take these pieces and build something bigger, greater.

Sandy Mamoli 27:55

Yes, and I also think that our job now is PMI and Agile Alliance is to guide people to create a delicious dish and not now add jam and a donut to the chicken and the tomatoes and the avocado, because that'd be disgusting. So I hope that they mix the right ingredients for their context and their tastes and I think our job is to guide them and their tastes, and I think our job is to guide them.

Lenka Pincot 28:20

Yeah, and I will give you I'm so sorry, I will give you a specific example so that we don't talk only about dishes and chicken and cherries, tomatoes, but the thing is, but also people probably do not know that much. So in our own home, at the Project Management Institute, when we deliver, when we work on something and, for instance, take this PMI by AI initiative, so that is an initiative that has a lot of impact on our community, a lot of outputs. We are very transparent. This initiative is very visible Now how this initiative is actually executed. So, in our own world, in our enterprise project portfolio, pmi by AI is one item on our enterprise project portfolio list and that item is a little portfolio on its own because we have some parts of this.

Lenka Pincot 29:06

Initiatives are literally little projects. Sometimes we call them work streams. Then we have agile teams that are working on our AI offerings and then we have colleagues that run established processes, functions that contribute to PMI by AI outcome. This is how we manage things and very originally, when we were launching PMI by AI, it was more a project because we need to build these agile teams. We didn't have that team. When we were starting with PMI by AI, we needed to build some processes and functions and as this initiative evolves, then we adjust our ways of working, which we consider perfectly normal.

Fatimah Abbouchi 29:51

I really like the food analogy, and I don't know, because it's 7.30 PM, dinner time for me and I haven't had it yet, so I'm going to stay on that for one second. I just want to circle back. You both spoke about um, the ingredients and then, Sandy, you talked about the, the final dish. What you both didn't say, which I appreciate and I think we should really recall um, this moment we didn't you didn't either of you talk about. We're going to give you the recipe to get to the end result, and I think this is the true essence when we think about project management and Agile and all of these things is we can tell you what ingredients are going to work and we can tell you what maybe doesn't, based on feedback, but you're not giving anyone the recipe, which is really the essence of figuring out what works for you and crossing over Agile and project management, as people are used to having it, I think, is completely normal. It's exactly what I'm seeing in 20, 30 companies over the last 10 years, and I think that we should just not forget that. So I just wanted to touch on that.

Fatimah Abbouchi 30:49

But one of the things that come to my mind that I wrote about recently in that article is no one owns Agile. I mean, agile Alliance is doing some great work. There's other organisation out there leading charge with project management and Agile and no one owns Agile. No one owns project management. But I think, going back to the community, it's helping to guide the community based on this thought, leadership and best practice and all of that. So I think what's really going to be important, going back to the earlier point, is making sure that whatever it is that your team is doing Lenka, you just gave a really good example that everyone's on the same page with what it is that you're doing, whether it's this way or that way. So I think that's probably the education piece that maybe is missing. That's kind of what I'm seeing. Would you agree that that's a significant gap for organisation and teams?

Lenka Pincot 31:40

Yeah, yeah, I would agree with that and I like the way you said that no one is giving anyone a recipe, because there is no single recipe. What we need to provide are examples, peer-to-peer learning, bringing up experts from our community, people who can talk about their real experience, share their examples, different practice guides, learning opportunities for people who want to start from the beginning or want to advance all of it. But then, after all, you always need to assess your current situation, see what is special, what is unique, what is the same, where you can learn from previous experiences and then go and try and then be ready to adjust.

Sandy Mamoli 32:25

And sometimes you do need recipes, and what I think what we should do is guide people to figure out are you in a context where you're trying to bake a cake or in a context where you are making a delicious stew?

Sandy Mamoli 32:41

And, depending on that, if you're baking well, I hope you will go out and find a recipe, because you need to be exact, you need to plan a lot up front and you can't just open the oven in the middle of the baking procedure and add sugar. It's too late. Or are you making a stew stew, in which case you should find ways to sense and respond and adapt and go oh, it needs a bit more salt, that needs a bit of a herb or whatever it is, and helping people, knowing which situation they're in so they can choose should I find a recipe or should I work in a different way? So which methods and ingredients should I choose? And I think it's a fun place for us to be in and I think we could be really helpful there, and I love that nobody owns agile and that nobody owns projects or products, and I think it's it's a field like cooking or medicine Nobody owns it. There are just many good and a few bad practices.

Fatimah Abbouchi 33:45

Yes, 100%, and we try to weed those bad practices out by sharing some of this thought leadership for sure. So we've talked briefly. Ai came up, product management I'm curious about both from your perspective. But when we think about product management, I'm keen to know maybe Lenka with you initially what, if anything, with the you know, thinking about the terminology of product management, what sort of, what are some of the things that PMI is looking at doing in this space? Or is that going to start to evolve more now that Agile Alliance, which probably has greater emphasis on that space? So tell me a bit more about that.

Lenka Pincot 34:25

Yeah. So when I was talking about this broader topic of project success and our purpose and broadening the vision for the profession, we were also looking at topics that should be part of that broader vision of the profession, and product management is on that list. We call them content platforms. Content platforms in a sense that some topics that should spark discussion, should spark thought leadership, etc. So we started to look into product management already one year or two years back, when we were first trying to understand what is the difference between product project. Actually, we see a lot of things in common. We see a lot of touch points, we see a lot of overlaps. So last year we launched a smaller research just to understand how big is this overlap and how these two professions need to connect with each other. Because there is a thing that, again, like, every project delivers something or might deliver something a little bit different, but in many cases you create something that is supposed to be operationalized and becomes a product. So there is a very clear touch point and when, a when you are finishing your project, you need to be sure that that product is well set for its own success. So that's, that's one very obvious touch point. But then on, uh in a very um.

Lenka Pincot 35:50

When we change the angle, when we look at the, the whole uh movement of agile transformations, we come to a different view on product management. So that's the product management that I work in when I work in financial institutions and helping organisation to be more agile. So part of our job was to form these product teams that were developing digitalized products, which means things or processes or tools that were before delivered via in-person interactions and then, thanks to digital transformation, became fully digital, and I believe that this is the angle where agile practices play a really crucial role. And again, in one organisation, you need to be able to create an environment where you have projects and these agile product development teams collaborating, working together, being able to synchronize, being able to align themselves, because, after all, none of these projects or agile teams exist in vacuum. They operate in certain environment, they serve customers, they operate on some infrastructure that is below, and it all needs to work in sync.

Fatimah Abbouchi 36:58

So so these are the topics that we would like to explore more and definitely work on them with agile alliance I like the differentiation um that you just articulated, with project leading to product versus product, standalone and then sort of the different organisation. I've definitely seen both um working in different ways as well. Um, Sandy, from, from your perspective, what are your thoughts on product management and bringing that into the fray?

Sandy Mamoli 37:24

We've been working with product management for quite a while in the Agile Alliance and we have an initiative that's focused on product development and we're looking into principles and practices. And we're looking into principles and practices the part where we haven't been so good at so far is doing the research that we haven't done, and that's where I have a really big hope that marriage with the PMI is going to come to really great fruition and that we can together figure out some research. And yeah, for me, for me, it's one of the two most interesting things happening at the moment, and one is product and project under one hood, and the other one is reimagining it, reimagining agile, which is looking at wicked problems and figuring out all the things that none of us could figure out on their own so far. Figuring them out together.

Fatimah Abbouchi 38:27

Project and product in the one hood is going to be something that's no doubt going to cause some more angst and concern and some excitement, and I'm sure of it, because, again, product management is. You know, the product management community is quite protective of product management and they see themselves as different to projects, and there's a little bit of that debate. What do you think, Sandy? What do you think people get wrong when it comes to product management? Like, what are the most common misconceptions for product management that you think people get wrong?

Sandy Mamoli 38:59

I actually want to start with the other way around, like because it might be recency bias, but it's the belief that projects are always not agile. Like I've run agile projects, I've been on agile projects and I think projects can be either or, and many projects are agile. There's a renaissance in agile project management that I'm seeing at the moment and I think that's great and in terms of, yeah, back to product. What was the question again about product?

Governance in Agile Environments

Fatimah Abbouchi 39:32

What do you think people get wrong when it comes to product management? Either misconceptions or myths about product management in general.

Sandy Mamoli 39:39

Yes, I might have forgotten the question because it's 9pm here and I'm a bit tired.

Fatimah Abbouchi 39:46

You're thinking about chicken?

Sandy Mamoli 39:48

Yes, let's stop this, because I might forget the question again.

Fatimah Abbouchi 39:57

Product management is yeah, definitely, um, it's becoming. I'm seeing it. I don't know if you're both seeing the trend of product management becoming talked about more, uh, more familiarity, more groups, talking about more community, more positions, more roles. So I think marrying the relationship between product and project um, similarly, reimagining Agile, I think, is really important. How do you perceive reimagining Agile if we're not all on the same page with what Agile is to begin with? And I know that's a tricky question, but I'm keen to get your thoughts.

Sandy Mamoli 40:34

I think that is exactly one of the questions I would like to work through. I think that is exactly one of the questions I would like to work through, because reimagining agile is not a group of people coming up with the answers and going da-da, now everyone, we have solved it. This is taking a project community, a product community and an agile community and figuring that out together. That being said and I don't think it's going to be that hard to define agile- said no one sorry, what was that like?

Fatimah Abbouchi 41:09

what did?

Lenka Pincot 41:09

you think, yeah, I, I wanted to. So, uh, for full disclosure, I also have nine about am, because I'm, I'm in europe, so I probably in a better shape, but that's why I'm sipping this cup of coffee. But I just wanted to go back to that project product, a job. And then she said, fatima, when you said, oh, that might also cause this reaction, because these professions are protective of themselves. So at this moment, I always want to say, like, can we take a step back and maybe, like, reimagine this protectiveness? Because when we are visiting different organisation and I just came back from some trips from India and China, and we always visit some organisation that are at the front, front, forefront, the front of innovation, sorry for the typo you know innovators and organisation that are growing, they are successful, they have typically thousands of project professionals.

Lenka Pincot 42:07

I'm purposefully talking slowly because I really want to bring attention to that difficulty how to express so many ways of working under one word, right? So they say project professionals, they have thousands of them. And we ask them okay, and what are the ways of working that they use, that they apply? And the answer is always so quick and they say, oh, typically 50% project measurement practices, 50% agile and no one seems to have an issue with that. And then we ask them well, so, but how do you decide? And then again the answer is very straightforward no one's thinking about it. And they say well, it's very easy. We work for our customers, we need to deliver. And then we see what do we need to deliver? Sometimes we know up front, so then we can go and we have the luxury of planning. Sometimes we do not know, so then we start working in an interactive way and we experiment until we, until we find the right answer.

Lenka Pincot 43:00

Then we meet with people who run project management offices. Again we say project management office, but you know very well that it can be xmo. It can be, you know, people call it differently, but there's some team that helps all these professionals to work together again, align around these portfolios of initiatives, and then all of that. And again we talk about organisation that are very successful in their field and that these organisation are successful in innovation. So, and that's why I said let's take a step back, because I think that it's not at all about being protective of my profession and saying this is the right way to do things and you know, whatever, but it's really about thinking why are we, even in these professions, what is our purpose, what is our role in helping these organisation to be successful, innovate, increase value for their customers? And then you know, leaders of these organisation, c-suite. They don't want these professionals to fight and say I don't want to work with you because you use different method.

Lenka Pincot 44:01

No they want them to work together. And again back to that broader vision of the profession the profession is here for a reason. So how do we make people in this profession more successful so that they can deliver greater value for their organisation and for society? Because a lot of these professionals work in NGOs and other types of organisation, not always for-profit organisation.

Fatimah Abbouchi 44:26

Sandy, I think you've probably got a thing or two to say, just based on the fact that you've had that experiences in the ways of working across those different environments. What's your thoughts across those different environments? What's?

Sandy Mamoli 44:38

your thoughts. Building on that, I would even go more radical and I think there's a vision. This is a field of how we collaborate to get shit done, and then I'm not even sure this is a profession. I think this is a field and within that field there are people who drive outcomes, and I think we are shooting ourselves an own goal by defining all those roles, because it is confusing, we're hiding behind labels and instead of going depending on the context and the persons, this is a collection of skills that people bring to the table and they then deliver great work and deliver good stuff by bringing those skills to the table and working in teams and where they supplement each other. So I think I would actually and I know this is an HR nightmare and it's really hard to hire people blah, blah, blah, but I would wish we could do away with the roles of project manager, product manager, agile, whatever, and just hire people as collections of skills who can contribute to a greater vision or goal.

Fatimah Abbouchi 45:53

It's so interesting you say that because in a number of organisation I've either worked with or seen over the last 10 years or so, they they have this concept called persistent teams and they're just rolling teams that actually generally, generally are. There isn't really role titles or so to speak, it's just like delivery resources or testing teams or development teams and things like that. So they've kind of done away with that in those organized. Have you seen that as well?

Sandy Mamoli 46:17

Yes, and like I've seen it, especially because my background is agile small teams and they are cross-disciplinary, and something I personally love is self-selection. To then give people not prescribing any roles within those teams, but just going. This is the purpose of this team and those are roughly the goals. And now, everyone in this department, how would you form those teams? Where would you put yourself to contribute the most? And people have enough people self-select into teams to deliver something good. So, uh, yes, I agree with you and well as usual. I really like pushing those things and I think that people react well to the autonomy to be allowed to do so.

Fatimah Abbouchi 47:05

So I'm going to throw one out there that I think I know a lot of those in the Agile community will challenge me on and, alinka, you and I spoke about this the concept of Agile in governance or governance in Agile. The concept of agile in governance or governance in agile what are we so? I guess a lot of agile teams tend to say that there's no need for governance. We're all self, not only self-selecting, but we're self-governing, we can drive ourselves and all these sort of things, but in reality it's not the case. What's your view, Sandy, in terms of what you're seeing from a governance in an agile environment? What works, what doesn't work?

Sandy Mamoli 47:43

I think anyone who thinks that you just have a team of people and they sort everything out and you don't need governance and you don't need constraints, I think they are just deluded, and in any bigger organisation, that is going to go wrong and that's naive and doesn't work. So we do need some governance, and I think with governance we do need to. First of all, we need a very clear vision so people know what they're doing and why they're doing something, that there's a purpose, there are constraints, there are guardrails, and so those are things we do, those are things we don't do, and within those guardrails or those constraints, people have freedom and autonomy and don't need to be micromanaged. Coming back to governance, there, I think, then, governance doing it right, needs a lot less detailed data, but more aggregated data to keep an eye on the big picture.

Sandy Mamoli 48:39

And I think where, very often, I have seen especially PMOs go wrong is when they don't really and I think this is because they don't really understand the work and what people are capable of that they focus on the tiny stuff, a bit like everyone understands $20, but nobody understands $100 million. So they focus on the tiny stuff instead of really questioning why do we need information. What is the information we need and what are we using it for and how else can we get it? And I think that there has been a communications breakdown between teams and um, pmos, um, because one site saying we need all those things, and they're saying, nah, uh, this is just causing us admin and we don't have time to work, so basically bugger off. And instead of fixing this and understanding each other's needs, we have just gone far from each other. And I think it is absolutely and I've seen it and I've done it it is absolutely possible to have a conversation and do the things that help both parties, and they both have justified needs because they have different jobs and roles.

Fatimah Abbouchi 49:47

And it's not that hard, as long as you keep the dialogue going yeah, the dialogue is the most critical aspect, even to just get alignment in how you're going to work. It's just agreeing and I think, as part of a lot of those sort of agile ways of working, the themes is around understanding and getting alignment with that dialogue at the beginning and at the outset, which is critical. So I can't stress that enough as well. Lenka, you have in your organisation and in your team those that do cross over agile governance and what I would say is traditional governance. So more structured top down. How are you balancing between the two in your organisation?

Lenka Pincot 50:29

Yeah. So actually I love this topic because I think there's a lot of misunderstanding and misconception and also a bad rap for the word governance, because when people say governance, I think it evokes this rigid, inflexible kind of like a bad thing. But I look at governance differently. So governance is there to help you make the right decisions. That's the whole purpose of it. And even when it comes to agile teams, I believe some governance is needed there. S is needed for any team. So I give you an example.

Lenka Pincot 51:00

So when I worked in banking, we were developing mobile apps. We have agile teams for that. We were developing mobile apps. We have agile teams for that. Now, these apps, you know, there are like tens and tens up to hundreds of people working on something that makes it way to the customer. Now you want to ensure that customer experience is properly managed and that customer doesn't have a different experience if he enters a work that was delivered by different team of developers. Just imagine that, right, you take your mobile phone then like, oh, this was developed by Fatimah. Oh, this was developed by Sandy. I can see her handwriting there. Like so, of course, not right.

Lenka Pincot 51:37

So then governance, for instance, is that if you're working on some feature, you need to discuss it with experts on this user experience so that you can provide a user experience to your customer that is unified across these touch points. That is part of the governance. And the governance is then who makes the decision if we make it this way or that way. Again, it's not about power. It's about knowing what's best for your customer and who are the right people to give you that guidance. This is all part of the governance.

Final Thoughts and Call to Action

Lenka Pincot 52:07

So what I'm seeing in my practice is that when governance is lacking, people often run into frustrations because they try to make these right decisions but sometimes do not work with the right teams or something. Then it leads to rework frustration, you know. So I fully agree that people should be empowered, but what I'm always trying to bring attention is that this empowerment, the freedom that we give people to empower them, it has to go hand in hand with supporting their maturity to be able to handle that freedom right. And that's not always a straight path. Sometimes, you know, we give a little bit more freedom and then people are still stuck a little bit because they lack some information, some experience, something. So we need to support that by learning, by mentoring, by coaching and then again like, help them for greater empowerment. It's essentially a management, a people management job to achieve that empowerment. But governance is part of it. But governance it's not a bad thing if done properly.

Fatimah Abbouchi 53:13

Yeah, 100%. I like to say it's not when you're thinking about agile and governance in an agile environment. It's not about the what, because at the end of the day, you still need data, you need reporting, you need decisions, you need risks. That doesn't change.

Fatimah Abbouchi 53:26

It's the how, and I think getting understanding on that how and alignment at the beginning of any initiative is important. So I'm glad. I'm glad we're aligned on on the thinking around governance and agile. I think that's a really big one that comes up and seems to be consistently debated and challenged. So hopefully people listening can take some guidance from this conversation today. We are normal almost out of time, ladies. I can't believe it's almost been an hour. It goes way too fast, unfortunately. As we wrap up today, first of all I just want to say thank you to you both because I think coming together and having this conversation and going through some of these questions were community questions that had been flagged to me so I had the chance to ask some of them for those people. But as we wrap up, is there anything else that you'd like to share with our listeners, a call to action, a piece of advice or a question to ponder today? I might start with you, Sandy.

Sandy Mamoli 54:22

I would love to say to people that we all learn and we are most productive and we have the most fun if we just stay open and we stay curious and we try everything and explore as much as we possibly can and don't take ourselves too seriously, and that's my advice to everybody, including myself said it like an expert, Lenka.

Lenka Pincot 54:51

Sunny, I love the way you are so nicely like people-oriented. I feel myself like okay, what is the result?

Fatimah Abbouchi 54:59

So what I Good balance Ladies. This is amazing, it's exactly what we want.

Lenka Pincot 55:07

What I would say is this I definitely enjoy all of these debates and for me, it's always very important to bring people back to that thinking like look at the broader vision, like, why are we doing this? We want to make projects, everything that encompasses that. We want to make them more successful because if we do that, then we can create more value for people out there, for societies, everything that encompasses that. We want to make them more successful because if we do that, then we can create more value for people out there, for societies, for organisation, all of it. And I would say, like again, focus on the dish, not on the single ingredient. These ingredients, they are there.

Fatimah Abbouchi 55:44

They are part of the dish, but let's focus on that broader vision and what a wonderfully rewarding career it is to be involved in agile, in projects, in products, and just being part of that I think is is such an opportunity and, um, yeah, I think the, the, the career that you both have had, is commendable. Um, it's exciting to see this partnership, um sort of evolving. There was some really good um debate about what it's going to look like. I think you've answered a lot of the questions that people are probably answering and, um, I welcome, um, yeah, welcome the. The what's next for? For the, both of you and and the two organisation. So thank you both for your time today thank you for having us.

Sandy Mamoli 56:20

And uh, what's next for me is definitely go to the kitchen make a chicken dish chicken and cherry tomatoes.

Fatimah Abbouchi 56:27

I'm right, right there with you. 8 pm sounds good. Thank you, ladies, have a good day. Thank you, bye, bye. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. Please share this with someone or rate it if you enjoyed it. Don't forget to follow us on social media and to stay up to date with all things Agile Ideas, go to our website, wwwagilemanagementoffice. com. I hope you've been able to learn, feel or be inspired today. Until next time, what's your Agile Idea?