We are still developing Agile Intervision; this page shows the current state of the in-person format we use. Read about it below, download the pdf here and watch our introductory video, to see excerpts from a real case.
We encourage you to use it as-is the first time, and to incrementally improve it from there. The format also works online, with some adjustments: see Online Tips.
Please report back below with a Comment on what works for you, what’s puzzling, or what you want to tweak next time!
This ‘hot-seat’ format is derived from a peer supervision format, called the Heilsbronner Modell, widely used and adapted in Germany (german description is here). We’ve added tweaks that make it a better fit for the purpose of facilitating Agile Intervision. The rules have been carefully selected, and proven by trial and error, in numerous in-person Intervision sessions since 2015 by our team.
Agile Intervision
– In-person Facilitation Format –
version 1.0
(CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) 2016 Michael Malhberg, David Schmithüsen, Falk Kühnel
Licensed under Creative Commons, some rights reserved. Please use with attribution.
Preconditions and agreements
Some preconditions should be met to support a successful Agile Intervision session.
- The participant within one group are from different work contexts.
(not in the same project, not line manager and employee, etc.) - ‘Vegas rule’: What is said in the circle stays in the circle
- three to six participants per group (plus facilitator, where applicable)
- Strictly no chat about the case in the breaks or after the Intervision.
- Every participant is required to explicitly agree to these rules
The hot-seat Intervision format
The session itself consists of five distinct phases. Some of the phases are timeboxed, as is the overall session. Some tweaking of the times may be necessary (e.g. according to group size), but once you begin a time-box, honor it. Inspect first and adapt in the next iteration.
Remember: it’s a 30 minute time-box per case
- Explain the Case (case giver: <= 7 minutes)
The case-giver describes the situation they want to investigate and tries to give as much relevant information as possible to the observing peers. - Share Observations (other participants: round robin)
Each participants describes two observations about the case or the case giver they actually observed during the previous 7 minutes
(No suggestions for improvement, no general facts, suggestions or assumptions etc.) - Select and Deepen Aspects (case giver: <= 4 minutes)
The case giver deepens the description around those observations they deem most relevant for their situation - Share Observations (other participants: round robin)
Each participants describes two observations about the case or the case giver they actually observed during the previous 15+ minutes (round robin)
Still: No suggestions! - Open discussion (facilitated by the case-giver)
This discussion is facilitated by the case-giver until the end of the overall time-box allowed for this case (30 minutes).
This is the only portion of the session where suggestions are possible, though not encouraged
Important notes
Ask participants to talk about something completely different in the break after the case. Do not pick up the case again.
What have you learned by using this format? What works? What experiments have you tried? We’d love to have your comments below.