Raju had joined a large company in its India operations as a director. Raju’s manager, the India operations head had told Raju that he was getting to build a challenging division.
A colleague of his Gagan was incubating this unit along with his primary unit. Gagan had transferred the reporting of the team members to Raju. Raju still relied on Gagan for a few people who provided some part-time help. Naga was a manager in Gagan’s team who was spending 20% of his time in Raju’s team. After a few months, Naga was transferred full-time to Raju. He was surprised at the sudden availability of Naga full-time.
Raju found that Naga was a long timer in the company and had expressed his desire to retire from the company. That was his commitment to the company.
The company was going through some turbulence and there were layoffs happening in the USA. Raju found from the long-timers that there has been no lay-offs in India in the past. This time they were nervously expecting that the layoffs would have to be done here. The story in the grapevine – people who had a low-rating could be impacted.
Raju realized that Naga was a manager with a low rating (Pre-dating his arrival!). He felt Gagan had deftly moved Naga to report to Raju now to avoid handling the possible unpleasant situation.
Raju in a casual discussion with Naga found that Naga had no Linked-In profile, had not updated his resume for the last 12 years!
There was still no official communication about the layoff in India. However, Raju perceived it is highly likely to happen.
What all are the possible dilemma that Raju is facing?
Suggested Solution
The solution is smaller than the context!! [This CHOW is based on real-world experience with some small variation]
How does Raju get Naga prepared for the possible eventuality of a layoff, when Naga has not even created a resume? On the other hand, any such tipping of the hand prematurely could create more confusion, especially if the layoff does not happen.
Should Raju tell his manager that he does not want Naga and hand him back to Gagan? After all the usage was only 20% at this point, and the problem was known to the earlier manager. Will Raju’s manager now look at Raju as chickening out of the problem? {Agreed he was not the creator, but will he be perceived as not being able to manage the situation.]
2 Responses
Velocity of each individual iteration will be a different figure. There are many ways velocity gets impacted. Apart from planned absence (planned leave, training etc.) and holidays, there could be unplanned absences caused by illness, personal emergency etc. which impact velocity. User stories that do not get completed in an iteration get moved to next iteration. This brings down the velocity of the iteration where the story was started and bumps up the velocity of the iteration where it got completed. This being the situation, good practice is to take an average of last five or six iterations as the velocity of the team. Team stability is another factor that impacts velocity. Teams that have higher churn will see higher volatility in velocity. Other factors such as change in technology, adoption of new tools, increase in automation, will also impact velocity either positively or negatively! However, if team is stable and has reached “performing stage” steady rise in average velocity will be seen over a period of time till any of the factors mentioned above comes into play and impacts it.
Thanks Milind, fully agree with your comment.
Finally, irrespective of the increasing trend in velocity, there is improvement for sure. This cannot be missed, if observed. One of the intent of my blog is to encourage this observation, by taking a mildly provocative stand.