At the agile2010 conference, I had the luck to attend the Lyssa Adkins talk on Silent Coaching. There is not much written about it yet, (most Google results are regarding a ice skating teaching tool), however I feel that is all about to change.
The concept is that our voice gets the way of the true value within, it especially prevents introverts from sharing on a level playing field with extroverts, and as a coach its our job to ensure each and every team member gets the opportunity to give their great ideas to the group.
“It only takes one extrovert to destroy a team of introverts”
The format of the experience was that we were asked as a group (per table, and we have 7 people on our table) to write up as many user stories as possible in 10 minutes. In order to gain control of the room again, Lyssa used the contagious raised hand technique ( as soon as you see someones hand up, you shut up and put up 
), a really effective way of controlling a room with minimum effort.
Within that 10 minute session, our table managed to generate a grand total of 7. Lyssa then requested a count review per table, and the number of user stories generated ranged from 2 – 14.
The next 10 minute session was performed as individuals with no talking. Our table generated 42 user stories, round the room each table generated from 34-56 stories, a significant improvement no matter how you measure it. There were obvious duplicates and edge stories (aka radical or extreme stories) but we all agreed that identifying and removing the duplicates would be a simple exercise and that the edge stories, could well have a kernel of a great idea, and could act as a stimulant for conversation that could yield more stories.
The next session was more collaborative, with each person on the table writing one part of the user story, and then passing it to the person on their left to write the next section. So for example, I would write the first part, ‘ as a mother’ , I then passed it to my left, and I inherited the one from the right, so now I had a user story starting with ‘as a nun’. I found this particular technique really useful and getting people to think freely and get funky with their thinking..success! Again we did a tally, we got 27, and the room had 23-33 per table. The interesting part here, was that Lyssa stopped asking the tables for their results, and let us self organize in our announcement of our results, if there was a clash, we have to say it again, a great silent technique and fun at the same time.
The last user story session was similar to the last, however this time we started with the last part of the user story, ‘so that I can….’ then again we pass it to our left, and we do the first part , as a user, then the middle part, so that …. . Again really unique results.
For me , it was not about saying one way is better then the others, but that together the results are better by using varied techniques then just one, it seems to give people permission to think outside the box. We certainly got some stories we would never have come up had we not ‘shut up’.
We then moved onto silent mind mapping, this one really surprised me at just how effective it was as leveling the playing field from peoples egos and personalities. Its pretty much as it sounds, we had a limited number of pens, 2 for 7 of us, and we swarmed around a large sheet of paper on the wall, and took turns in mind mapping the site functions.
I had the pleasure of an email exchange with Lyssa recently, and she informed me that she has coined the term, “silent coaching” but experienced a lot of the techniques from Tobias Mayer classes.
Facilitation techniques used:
- Silent coaching
- Mind Maps
- silent and shared User Stories
- Raised hand room control
