This is the final installment of “The Evolution of Daily Standups” series, following Why your daily standups need to evolve and 5 practical ways to make daily standups matter.
Now let’s address why many standup transformations fail despite good intentions. Rather than blaming teams or methods, we can apply research from “Managing from the Boundary” by Druskat and Wheeler to explain leadership gaps.
The awkward truth about “self-managing” teams
Here’s the central paradox: self-managing teams still need leaders. Teams don’t automatically embrace new practices without guidance. Leaders either step back too quickly, expecting teams to magically embrace new practices, or hover anxiously, undermining the team’s ownership.
A Scrum Master once shared a candid experience: announcing a new format Monday, watching it collapse by Wednesday, and reverting to control by Friday. Sound familiar?
How to tell your stand-up transformation is failing
Watch for these warning signs:
- People deliver updates with minimal enthusiasm
- Sprint goals are ignored in conversation
- Teams revert to scripted updates within days
- Participants disengage during others’ contributions
- Rapid team dispersal after meetings end
- Increased cynical commentary about “agile theater”
Leading from the boundary (what actually works)
The research identifies four critical leadership functions:
1. Relating: Cut the BS and build real trust
Teams won’t adopt vulnerable practices without trust. The key is having direct conversations addressing frustrations honestly rather than asking generic improvement questions.
One tech lead explained their resistance: “I told him it exposed that I didn’t understand half of what other teams were doing, which made me look incompetent. Once we addressed that, I could get on board.”
2. Scouting: See what’s actually happening
Leaders must gather authentic intelligence beyond assumptions. Use three anonymous questions:
- What’s working better than before?
- What’s worse than before?
- What would make this valuable for you personally?
If you don’t know where the resistance is coming from, you’re just pushing rocks uphill.
3. Persuading: Make the case, don’t just announce changes
Good leaders influence bidirectionally—convincing teams while advocating upward. The strategy involves collecting specific examples demonstrating value:
“When Wei mentioned his API changes yesterday, Sophia realized she needed to adjust her implementation. That saved us at least a day of rework.”
Concrete stories like this are more persuasive than abstract arguments about “agile transformation.”
4. Empowering: Give real authority, not fake autonomy
This is where transformations typically die. Empowerment requires setting the team up for success in decision making, not merely delegating without authority.
The recommended approach: after modeling the approach for two weeks, explicitly transfer ownership with parameters—focusing on sprint goals while allowing teams to determine implementation methods.
Why your leadership approach is probably backfiring
Pitfall 1: You’re only solving half the problem
Leaders typically focus either internally (team dynamics) or externally (organizational demands), rarely both. A developer’s complaint captures this perfectly: “Our Scrum Master keeps pushing this goal-focused stand-up, but then our product owner storms in with ‘critical’ requests every afternoon.”
The fix involves using your boundary position to align conflicting expectations.
Pitfall 2: You’re still controlling everything
One external leader reflected: “For 20 years, I always made the decisions… To now turn it over to an hourly person and say, ‘You go ahead and make this decision.’ I was so afraid they would make the wrong decision that I wouldn’t let them sometimes.”
This manifests in standups when leaders jump in to correct conversations or undermine team decisions. The solution requires deliberate disengagement and willingness to tolerate initial awkwardness.
Pitfall 3: Your organization is working against you
When organizational culture prioritizes speed over collaboration, standup transformations face headwinds. Get ruthlessly practical about the business value by tracking metrics leadership cares about—velocity, release predictability—before and after changes.
Building standups that survive without constant intervention
Sustainable practices emerge when teams see clear connections between behaviors and outcomes. Self-reinforcement happens naturally when improvements are tangible and attributed to the new approach.
What to do tomorrow morning
Three immediate steps:
- Check your boundary work — Are team practices connected to organizational realities? Are you protecting teams from external chaos?
- Identify where you’re still controlling things — What makes you nervous about team autonomy? Challenge yourself to release that grip.
- Find your allies — Which team members and stakeholders see value? Build coalitions rather than fighting alone.
When standup transformations fail, it’s rarely about the technique. It’s almost always about the leadership context. Fix that, and the practices will follow.
What leadership habit will you change before tomorrow’s standup?
This is part 3 of the “Daily Standups Through the Lens” series:
- Part 1: Why your daily standups need to evolve
- Part 2: 5 practical ways to make daily standups matter
- Part 3: How to fix a daily stand-up format that isn’t working (you are here)