Agile

Agile

The world of technology and human advancement is changing at a pace never seen before in humanity. The volume of information and data available to the world has exploded. Unless you have been living in a rainforest and hunting and gathering, or under a rock you have seen these changes first hand.

So the rapid change and adoption of new technology presents opportunities to industries creating new revenue streams as well as a vast previously untapped customer opportunities. However its not all flowery meadows and unicorns with pots of golds under rainbows, industries need to fundamentally change the way they are structured to deliver innovative products that respond to the change..

Drum roll please….. The silver bullet = Agile.

…Ok ok its not a silver bullet! Its a way of working and if used within the good will of the Agile Manifesto, can drive the adoption of value to the customer as fast as but as safely as possible.

The Agile Manifesto is based on 12 key principles, which I have changed slightly below to remove the reference to technology. Agile is no longer for software development it can be used for any change.

1. Customer satisfaction by early and continuous delivery of value
2. Welcome changing requirements, even at the last minute
3. Working product delivered frequently (weeks rather than months)
4. Collaboration across all teams so they are working as one team
5. Projects are built around motivated individuals, who should be trusted
6. Face-to-face conversation is the best form of communication (co-location)
7. Working product is the principal measure of progress
8. Sustainable development, able to maintain a constant pace
9. Continuous attention to excellence and good design
10. Simplicity—the art of maximising the amount of work not done—is essential
11. Best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organising teams
12. Regularly, the team reflects on how to become more effective, and adjusts accordingly

My personal view of Agile is that it helps people respond to unpredictability through iterative work using feedback to navigate the future product.

This Dibert Cartoon strip has some truth in how some organisations implement Agile….

 

How you choose to adopt Agile and which framework to use requires some thought, there are plenty of Agile Methodology the key to making Agile work succesfully requires these key things.

1. A deep understanding of Agile and more importantly how you can synthesise Agile to delivery value.
2. A focus on culture and how Agile can be adopted within the context of the organisation culture.
3. Pragmatic adoption of Agile, use what works and stop using things that do not work.

You do not need expensive tools or pay expensive consultants to get started just

Get a white board, Sharpies and some Post-its

Read a few good agile books / blogs and get the party started!

Some blogs I really like are below.

1. User Stoires Applied
2. Mike Cohn’s Blog
3. Kanban Blog
4. Dan North

I hope you enjoyed my blog and it has inspired you to move towards the light side of Agile. I look forward to your comments, be brave, be pragmatic and make the change to Agile.