A Tale of Two Agile World Series

About

The Agile Manifesto came out in 2001. Today, it seems that everyone is on the Agile bandwagon, making it fairly common in many workplaces. Still, whether a company is already established with Agile or just starting on their Agile journey, resistance to Agile, abounds. How is that manifested in such organisations? Where are the sources of the opposition? Do they come from People? Executives? Middle management? Individuals? All of the above? Or do they come from departments such as Engineering? HR? Programme Management? Everywhere?

Introducing “A Tale of Two Agile Worlds”:

In Episodes 1-3, we’ll look at senior management’s resistance from both the UK’s and the US’s perspectives. In Episodes 4-6, we’ll look at middle management’s, team’s and individual’s resistance. We’ll compare and contrast the manifested behaviours of resistance to Agile – both overt and covert forms. We’ll see how the people perceive and react to them. We’ll also dive deeper into understanding the various sources of the resistance.

Through the UK and US viewpoints, are we going to find the problems divergent across the pond, or are they ubiquitous? And would we be able to find the same solutions to the middle management, team and individual resistance problem?

Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #6 – Our Agile Tales

Welcome back to Our Agile Tales as we continue our conversation with Bjarte Bogsnes, exploring case studies from his latest book, This Is Beyond Budgeting. The book distills nearly three decades of experience challenging traditional budgeting, targets, and control-based management.In this episode, we ask why Silicon Valley firms rarely appear in Beyond Budgeting case studies; Bjarte posits that these companies excel at technology innovation but fear management innovation, sometimes reinforced by IPO-focused CFOs, though being public is not a true barrier (Many Beyond Budgeting adopters are listed on Wall Street.) He explains Beyond Budgeting can improve performance in both good and tough times and cites Handelsbanken’s long-term stability. The discussion covers Morningstar’s self-management and the need for enterprise-wide coherence, then Haier’s radical micro-enterprise model and rapid evolution.Finally, Bjarte details Equinor’s (formerly Statoil) beyond budgeting journey since 2005 via “Ambition to Action,” integrating strategy, risk, actions/forecasting, indicators, and HR with a 50/50 split between “what” and “how,” emphasizing transparency, event-driven cadence, decentralized ownership, and holistic performance evaluation.Key topics and timestamps00:00 Welcome01:05 Why Silicon Valley Lags in Management Innovation04:11 Public Markets and Budgets04:53 Boom Bust and Stability06:40 Morningstar and Self Management08:48 Haier Radical Micro Enterprises13:00 Equinor Beyond Budgeting Origins16:32 Ambition to Action Framework20:11 Alignment Cadence and Transparency25:37 Holistic Performance Evaluation28:15 Wrap Up and ConclusionAbout Bjarte BogsnesBjarte Bogsnes is Chairman of the Beyond Budgeting Round Table, a former global finance executive, and a leading thinker in management innovation. He is the author of Implementing Beyond Budgeting and This Is Beyond Budgeting, showing how organizations can replace rigid, calendar-driven systems with models built on trust, transparency, and adaptability — creating companies that are both more responsive and more human.Follow Bjarte at:https://www.linkedin.com/in/bjarte-bogsnes-41557910/Music: https://www.purple-planet.comVisit us at https://www.ouragiletales.com/about
  1. Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #6
  2. Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #5
  3. Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #4
  4. Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #3
  5. Beyond Budgeting: 25 Years of Management Innovation Episode #2
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