Overcoming the Agile Dilemma of Non-Tech Companies
It’s been sixteen years since the Agile Manifesto proclaimed its set of principles that became the cornerstone for IT/Software firms to enhance employee productivity and optimize the product delivery cycle.
According to the report published by computer economics, the rate of adoption of agile software development in different size of companies is astounding.
I was curious to know which industries these small, mid and large organizations belonged to. And my curiosity was worth pursuing after I found out the answer to my question.
High Tech — 74 percent
Banking & finance — 65 percent
Discrete Manufacturing — 74 percent (non-tech)
Retail — 63 percent (non-tech)
It was quite evident that the agile ball started ricocheting back and forth between the courts of tech and non-tech companies a few years back. But right now, it’s at the precipice of tipping over to the non-tech side. Agile is gradually becoming the breeding ground for non-tech companies to enhance their team productivity and a means to join league with the tech companies in the conquest to optimize their business processes. As a matter of fact, 52% of non-tech industries are currently using agile methodologies to succeed in different business verticals i.e. marketing, sales etc.
Quite a Number! Right? The Stats Reveal A Lot, But How Did This Happen?
The Journey of Agile From Tech to Non-Tech
Instead of telling you how agile permeated from tech to non-tech, let me tell you how I came to notice this change and my consequent switch of allegiance from traditional project management approach to a more agile approach.
Before I started working as a growth hacker for Orgzit, I earned my living working as a content editor for a certain IT/software firm. The product team there applied facets of the waterfall practice of structured development from the initial phase to the final phase of the project.
Once they gathered the requirements from the client, they launched a dedicated product development cycle –
The Process —
Planning → Designing → Building → Testing →Production
Depending on the complexity of the requirements, they were able to discuss the project feedback only after the completion of a phase. Tasked with drafting a report back to the client after each phase,
I was never less surprised by the time and effort wasted by the product team in resolving the ‘Re-Do’s and ‘Errors’ listed by the client. After the production phase was over, my efforts were equally wasted in writing the case study as no individual team member could clearly tell me his/her role played in the project or the work done by them in the product development.
Of course I didn’t realize it at first while I was working there. But then epiphanies do only come at times when you need them the most.
Here they go -
Organizational Shortcomings –
1. Longer project phases, shorter client interactions
2. Inefficient company data organization
3. Few concrete project statistics
Personal Shortcomings –
1. Improper time management
2. Difficult collaboration between distributed teams
At Orgzit, the change was as perceptible as light.
I watched firsthand as the Orgzit’s team brainstormed the client requirements for automating their business processes and help teams and businesses better organize and collaborate on their work around their data.
The process -
Create a user story → Break down the tasks in a set of Deliverables → Feedback after each sprint
There was a clearly defined structure to the progress of the project — right from handling client requirements to quoting the final price, and a brief documentation for all to follow. Not only was it much better organized, but each project sprint had actionable insights which could be easily identified and worked upon.
Tasked with more or less the same job, at the end of each sprint, I created a form in Orgzit itself for the client to incorporate the changes and customizations required to make Orgzit their own business automation tool. It looked something like this -
Yes! It was that easy.
Not only did it give a bare-bones version of Orgzit into the hands of client as soon as possible, the Orgzit team got feedback as to how can they customize it to better fit the use case scenario of the client. For me, the case studies became easier to publish as I knew exactly who did what and when.
I was even able to create a central repository of all the articles that I wrote and track their progress as they graduated
From Post-its…
…To Digital Post-its
Wait, did I just use agile for content management? I believe so!
And that’s exactly how it dawned upon me that the expanse of agile practices can’t be completely encompassed into the four principles set in the manifesto, but they needed to be aggressively molded and re-molded to see where they find the best fit — tech or non-tech or both. .
What Did I learn?
Adapting to agile methodologies can seem intimidating for non-tech companies with a long history of command-and-control leadership.
For example, there is a huge gap in building infrastructure (roads, power plants) and building software. The former might take months to years but the latter might just take weeks. We have already seen that agile works best for software development, but how can you define its use case within an infrastructure firm?
(Check out the first point of the next heading)
The definition of agile changes with changing industry.
For a salesman, it might be converting twice the amounts of leads like before. For a trader, it might mean signing more deals. But for me, as a marketer, it was producing twice the amount of value-adding content and engaging twice as many prospects.
I have written a blog as to how I did that –
Orgzit’s Role in Bringing Agile to Non-tech
I will just roll back a year and tell you guys as to how Foodpanda was unable to realize (or was it?) in time about the apparent shut down of a restaurant through which orders were still going through.
(Check the full story here).
To quote from the article –
After spending two months inside the company, Bharadwaj was disturbed about the lack of processes and had uncovered several discrepancies — fake orders, fake restaurants, no automation, overdependence on open Excel sheets, which were prone to manipulation, and suspicion over contracts awarded to vendors.
If Foodpanda had a dedicated platform (just like Orgzit) in place which enabled them to track each order from the customer to the restaurant and into their system, they could have averted the situation they had to face.
Since my association with Orgzit, I have realized it works better for people who are looking to get better organized in automating their business processes and create a more productive working environment. It is bringing a new wave of simple task management to both tech and non-tech industries alike whilst adhering to a very modular agile approach.
Here are a few ways how -
Solving the Dilemma of Distributed Teams
Orgzit is enabling distributed teams to connect with each other and make collaboration easy. Be it a sales manager trying to manage his remote sales team or an engineering company trying to manage its engineers at site, it is getting people to self-organize and talk to each other about what they’re working on and set goals for themselves.
Take example of the latter case -
Subhash Verma is the Director of Spans Envirotech, a full-service engineering company. The company has about 25 employees working at remote sites on water & wastewater management plants.
Subhash says that initially, stakeholders (and even his own team) didn’t have an understanding of how would they be able to collaborate with their engineers working at remote sites. So, he and his team started using the agile practice of keeping a prioritized backlog in an Orgzit app board. Right from recruiting an engineer to deploying him in the field, they used Orgzit store and better organize their data. Subhash started sharing site pictures with their external and internal team and vice versa, and the whole process of working an engineering site became more streamlined.
Getting Things Done — Fast
Many small and medium businesses in the non-tech sector (manufacturing) end up using multiple tools to organize their data, unify their internal and external communication, and find it difficult to keep tab on growth metrics. Even employees of multinational firms get tired of using the complex and expensive ERP systems integrated within their system. But Orgzit comes as a savior in disguise.
For a task management app, you can do a lot in Orgzit. But its use cases make it an ideal platform for a lot more.
From recruiting an employee, handling your CRM, managing your projects, it can be customized to fit your business needs.
I should rather say that Orgzit is agility in disguise.
What’s more?
Orgzit is enabling small and medium businesses to setup their CRM with a deployment period of as short as 7 days.
Put 100% In Getting Customer On Board (& Making Him Stay)
There are so many articles on the World Wide Web regarding customer acquisition, but very few about customer retention. Why?
Because very few saddle up to do what it takes to ensure the customer stays on board i.e. make him feel special. A Welcome email is the first step. Book a demo and see for yourself if you want to stay and make Orgzit your very own agile business tool.
Be Flexible In Your Work Routines
The best thing about its Orgzit is its ability to adapt to change. If your business processes have changed and you need minor enhancements in your app, you can do that quickly with no code required. It is quite the scalable tool.
Though I am still getting used to the nuances of using Orgzit for all my personal and professional tasks, take it from a 20th century millennial –
Agile and Orgzit both grow on you.
I am a growth hacker and love to find new ways to close the gap between businesses and optimum workplace productivity.
Recommend this article to let more people know about how can they organize their life twofold with Orgzit.
Over to Humans of Medium!
