Gil – Like the comments about evidence procedure.

I would say that each and every team needs a “Steward of the Process” and that even an internal coach needs to grow someone into that role.

Scott – I appreciate your comment about prescriptive changes. Out of habit we may treat people in the Shu phase when they are in the Ha phase. The whole point of this is that a coach may explicitly or implicitly decide what to focus on with a team/individual/organization. The change may be brought about through insightful questions or through teaching. This is independent of how we make an assessment.

Svilen – Good point about the Missionary/Evangelist. I’d put this under “Change Agent”. Also, it’s good to keep in mind that Evangelists can sometimes be counter-productive.

i have not been and external coach (yet), but couple of times being internal… There are couple of issues.. some plus some minus. Worst might be that One may never have enough time to pay attention to coaching. Especially if the team/organisation needs much more hard measures for teaching how-to-do-software in general. Another thing is that being inside, one knows the people and relations _very_ well, but either cannot escape the “we” and look from outside, Or it is possible but difficult to achieve, and then even harder to explain to others how they look from outside – they won’t believe as u’re inside.

One more role, esp. applicable to internal “enthusiast” coaching, is a Missionary (evangelist? dont like either word but cant find a better one). u have to sell the idea to people under and above you. AND make sure they understand the after-effects.
For example telling some big manager that once the team gets self-control he won’t be able to kick as he used to before… OR telling some guy that from now on he will be freer but Responsible… might not be the easiest thing – they may just ignore it.

One point that can be controversial is: “one model is to diagnose problems and provide prescriptions/guidance.” I know a common expectation in hiring a consultant is that they are being paid to being solutions and tell people what they know and how to do it. The coaching advice I heard in various sessions at Agile 2009 argued against a prescriptive stance. The general recommendation seemed to be to help individuals/teams/orgs diagnose their own issues and guide them to solutions. I think most Agile coaches advocate this approach, so I would tread lightly on use of the word “prescription” and its variations.

We must distinguish between an external, hired transition coach and an internal one. The internal one ought to be the steward of the process (and a bunch of other things). The external one, if brought in to guide Agile adoption, is only temporarily that. My model — with clients who see the value — is outcome-based, the outcome being Agile self-sufficiency. My evidence procedure is the exhibition of Agile principles and practices without my presence. A necessary part of that is to grow internal coaches, or shared leadership / stewardship of the process.

Gil

http://www.mikecohnsignatureseries.com/books/coaching-agile-teams