Outside leaders are those that are not directly within the team or project that is being delivered but need to be kept in the know of its delivery.
An Outside Leader can offer feedback, guidance, and mentorship in the delivery of a solution or they can be handed off only requesting updates where necessary.
The Outside Leader doesn’t care what methodology, framework, or tools you use – if you need something, they want to get it for you – otherwise, it’s not in their purview.
Your challenge as a leader of the immediate is to ensure that you are keeping the Outside Leader informed as to progress, information, and delivery in the form that they need to be able to know where you are at without having to reframe the context against other deliverables in their mind.
It’s not that leaders outside of Agile don’t understand what you are doing, it’s that we haven’t done a good enough job of ensuring what they need to know enables them to lead outside the deliverable.
