Agile Driven Impact
Evolving your work, accelerating your impact
“Agile Driven Impact” is the podcast for changemakers who want to learn how to apply Agile values, principles, and practices to effectively steer their work and achieve meaningful impact.
Diane H. Leonard, GPC, RST
Erich Leonard, RST
Season 1: The Pit Stop
In Episode 1 of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich Leonard take you back to where it all began: the intense world of college Formula SAE racing. 🏎️ They share their unique origin story, revealing how they developed a powerful, collaborative, and resilient mindset, building a race car under pressure—all without ever hearing the term “agile.” This episode sets the stage for the entire series, connecting their firsthand experience of “unlabeled agile” to Diane’s success in nonprofit grant writing and capacity building and Erich’s decades of work in the transportation industry. Tune in to discover why these core principles are the secret ingredient to turning passion into measurable impact.
Ep2: The Garage - Your Dashboard for Change - The Agile Mindset
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich Leonard introduce the agile mindset as the core operating system for change-makers. Moving beyond buzzwords, they use relatable analogies from the racetrack to demystify principles like adapting to change and valuing collaboration over rigid plans. The hosts share how their Formula SAE advisor’s “enabling constraints” taught them to build resilience and trust the process. You’ll learn how to adopt a “pit stop” mentality, viewing setbacks not as failures but as crucial feedback. This episode provides the philosophical foundation you need to navigate any project with confidence, empowering you to make smart, real-time adjustments and drive lasting impact.
Ep3: The Garage - Building Your Team for Impact
Drawing on their experience from building a race car and their professional careers, hosts Diane and Erich Leonard bring you into the “Agile Garage” for a focused pit stop on team dynamics. They discuss how to determine optimal team size and composition, emphasizing the value of having a diverse range of skills. Learn how to foster structured interactions and healthy debate to build a resilient, high-performing team that can drive a project to success.
Ep4: The Garage - Stakeholders, Customers, and Community Members, Oh My!
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich Leonard bring you into the “Agile Garage” to discuss the art of collaborating with your project’s stakeholders. They explore the importance of customer collaboration over contract negotiation. Learn how to identify and effectively engage different stakeholders—from sponsors to community members—to ensure your project stays on track and achieves its full impact.
Ep5: The Garage - Feedback, The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich Leonard bring you back into the “Agile Garage” to discuss the art of getting feedback from your team and your project’s stakeholders. They explore the importance of working product over contract negotiation. Learn how to invite candid, meaningful feedback about whatever type of work product your team is creating.
Ep6: The Garage - Responding to Change - Hairpin Turn or Dogleg Straightaway
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact hosts, Diane and Erich focus on the core Agile value of “Responding to Change over Following a Plan.” They address the common fear of altering plans once set, using driving as a metaphor to illustrate how adaptation is the fastest and safest route to impact. The episode will guide listeners on identifying when changes are necessary and how to implement them effectively, concluding with a practical challenge to help them create adaptable plans.
Ep7: The Garage - More than Language and Labels - The Core of Successful Agile Teams
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Erich and Diane focus on how Agile is about achieving outcomes like clear focus, better collaboration, and greater impact, not just adopting practices. They talk about how the true goal is a resilient team delivering real results. The discussion emphasizes both effectiveness and efficiency, detailing five core activities high-performing teams master: visualizing, focusing, interacting, measuring, and improving. The episode offers a practical challenge focusing on the five activities as options for fostering an agile mindset, reinforcing that true agility drives relentless improvement and delivers real outcomes for real people.
Ep8: Co-pilot - Life as a Part-time Scrum Master
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, host Diane and guest Beth Archer, GPC, RSM, a professional who serves as both a part-time Scrum Master and team member, explore the unique dynamics of this dual role. They discuss the advantages, such as enhanced flexibility and a fresh perspective, alongside potential challenges like context-switching and the need for strong time management. A key segment delves into how professionals like Beth utilize AI as a brainstorming partner to overcome hurdles, refine problem-solving, and boost efficiency in the Scrum Master role, offering practical tips about integrating AI as a support.
Ep9: The Scrap Yard - Anti-patterns - Guaranteed Project Failures
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Erich and Diane dive into the “anti-patterns” that when present in a team practically guarantee a slow, ineffective, and demoralizing team environment. The discussion of the “anti-patterns” is meant to serve as a diagnostic tool for listeners to identify and avoid common pitfalls. These situations can work there way into Agile teams with the best of intentions, so your job is to help keep an eye out for them, and then work as a team to address them. The episode challenges listeners to identify one anti-pattern in their team and apply the corresponding positive pillar to people, visualization, or coordination to fix it immediately.
Ep10: Pit Stop - Creating Focus: Short-term Goals
In this episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich tackle the critical skill of setting short-term goals. They share why relying on year-long plans is inefficient and introduce the power of the “Time-Boxed Focus”—a fixed period dedicated to a single, unifying objective. Learn how to stop being overwhelmed by a massive project and start gaining momentum by breaking your journey into manageable “test laps.” This episode provides practical advice on how quick daily check-ins protect your focus and ensure your team is always driving toward impact.
Ep11: Pit Stop - Adapting for Success: Fix Your Daily Check-in
In this crucial Pit Stop episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich tackle a universal problem: the daily check-in (or stand-up) that always runs past its 15-minute time limit. They reveal why this meeting becomes a momentum killer and how to fix it by getting back to the core principles. Learn the two most important rules for protecting your time: stop solving problems during the check-in and strictly focus every statement on the shared short-term goal. This episode provides actionable techniques, like using a “Parking Lot” and visualizing your work, to ensure your daily coordination session is a quick, effective diagnostic, not a time sink.
Ep12: Pit Stop - Handling the Urgent: Interruption Management
In this crucial Pit Stop episode of Agile Driven Impact, hosts Diane and Erich tackle one of the biggest threats to momentum: unexpected urgent interrupts. They reveal the root causes of these distractions, explaining that most are due to a lack of visibility, not true emergency. Learn how to insulate your team by establishing a single point of contact to act as a shield against non-critical requests. The hosts provide a clear protocol for handling true emergencies and share techniques to ensure new requests are disciplinedly prioritized against your short-term goals, keeping your team focused and on track to deliver maximum impact.
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