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In this episode, I meet Amanda Falshaw, a seasoned program and agile delivery leader and author of the new book, The Modern Delivery Manager. Amanda’s career journey is anything but conventional, starting her professional life training as a nurse before pivoting into the fast-paced world of tech and transformation.
We dive deep into how early lessons translated into an extensive career scaling delivery across SaaS, media, and digital organizations. Now serving as an AI Enablement Lead, Amanda shares her unique perspective on human-centric leadership in a world of cutting-edge technology.
Key Topics
From Healthcare to High Tech
Amanda’s journey into project delivery is as unique as her perspective. She originally trained as a nurse, a role she credits with teaching her the fundamental human skills required for modern leadership: empathy, deep listening, and triage. These early experiences in high-stakes environments provided the foundation that allows her to navigate complex organizational challenges and prioritize effectively today.
Key Discussion Themes & Lessons
Redefining the Modern Delivery Manager
The role of a project lead is evolving from a technical coordinator to a strategic facilitator.
Beyond Ceremonies: Modern managers must move past simply "policing the Jira board" or managing ceremonies. As teams become more agile-mature, the leader’s value shifts to high-level strategic enablement.
The Single Point of Accountability: Despite agile’s collaborative nature, there remains a critical need for a leader who maintains a "breadth of understanding" across multiple streams to ensure end-to-end delivery success.
The AI-accelerated team
Amanda views AI not as a replacement, but as a "shadow" that augments human productivity.
AI as an Efficiency Tool: AI should be used to automate "mundane" tasks like meeting transcription, summarizing debates, or drafting requirements, allowing leaders more time to make better decisions.
Context is King: AI is most effective when working with content you have created (e.g., turning a meeting transcript into Jira tickets or requirements) rather than blindly relying on it for external facts, which are often inaccurate and need fact-checking.
The Human-in-the-Loop: Professionals must remain the final editor, providing the uniqueness and critique that AI lacks.
Prioritising flow over process
A core lesson from Amanda’s book is that flow, the rate at which work moves through a system, matters more than rigid adherence to process.
Unblocking the System: Delivery managers should act like factory foremen, constantly looking for bottlenecks and "unblocking the materials" to ensure predictable outcomes.
Metrics as a Light Touch: Use agile metrics as a diagnostic tool to indicate where flow is stalling, rather than using them as a "weapon" against the team.
The “Social Capital” Moat
In an increasingly remote and automated world, the human connection that cannot be automated is a leader's greatest asset.
Protecting Team Time: Amanda advocates for protecting informal time free from talking about work issues “talking Shop”, such as 20-minute "game afternoons" every two weeks to break down barriers and build trust.
Active Listening: The most valuable time in an AI-accelerated team is often when the technology and productivity tools are put away in favour of face-to-face (or focused remote) conversation where leaders can actively listen to concerns and teams can strategise. In an ideal world, AI will be doing the more mundane tasks in the background.
Actionable guidance for aspiring change professionals
Upgrade Ceremonies: Don't let your stand-ups or meetings go stale. Change the format one ceremony at a time to keep the team engaged.
Be Brave: If something "feels off" in a meeting, have the courage to call it out. Your intuition is a product of your irreplaceable experience or character.
Invest in Creativity: Amanda finds relief in digital doodling, recommending a high-quality stylus and tablet as just one example, for anyone looking to balance technical work with a creative outlet.
If you want more insightful nuggets from brilliant minds related to leading change and technology, keep reading and watch below.
That’s it for this edition, for more delivery leadership insights, subscribe to the Change Leaders Playbook podcast series on Youtube, Spotify, Apple and Audible.
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