Being Agile — Few Pointers on adopting Agile Processes in an Organization

The Agile processes have grown increasingly popular as it allows for the changing requirements throughout the Development Life Cycle and encourages collaboration among all stakeholders primarily the Software Developers, Customer IT and the Business Teams ensuring timely Delivery of a Quality Product.

Agile establishes a common framework for processes and tools enshrined in its Key Values and Principles as below:

· Value individuals and interactions over processes and tools

· Working software over comprehensive documentation

· Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

· And responding to change over following a plan

The projects could be complex and may involve distributed teams. Some will be straightforward and others involve collocated teams. However even a simple project can have involvement of many departments and functional areas. Therefore, it is important to make the Agile process successful in all areas because a failure in even one can negatively impact the overall project outcome.

The processes most commonly considered agile include Scrum, Kanban, Xtreme Programming (SP), Lean Development, Crystal and others.

Agile Process Impact on Management, Team and the Resources

While adopting Agile process for an organization, Management must think of all possible scenarios:

· How can we promise on new features to the customers?

· How will be the work tracked?

· How will implementing Agile process for one group impact the other groups in an Organization?

· When does a Project end?

The introduction of Agile Methodology may impact the team and as well as their managers in both positive and negative ways. Some team members will be reluctant to accept the change and will try control the Gantt charts and other plan driven process artifacts. A few Managers used to traditional ways are comforted as they feel that they know the exact amount of functionality the development team will deliver on a specified date however many a times those commitments are not met. Some managers worry that they are unable to make product commitments due to the Agile Process.

Traditional Project Plan for Waterfall process appeals to many Senior Managers because they feel that it facilitate on progress tracking. There are numerous reports through which the process can be tracked. However Agile as well provides many status reports including a list of key dates, details on the project status, a burndown chart comparing progress to planned work, key metrics like defect inflow, test percentage and so on appropriate to the projects current state and list of key risks if any.

There are also concerns if Agile process benefits the Development teams, it might adversely affect one or more other groups. This concern becomes valid if another group who does not follow agile process might negatively impact the development team’s work. For example, the Development Team uses Scrum but if the Product Management group that provides all specification and requirements is still following a waterfall approach, this will result in list of Requirements delivered to the Development Team that was actually looking for a prioritized List thus resulting in people guessing from a list of yearlong Requirements. Thus it is always important that while introducing an Agile process to an Organization, the management must know how to agree and resolve such conflicts and find ways to adopt Agile process for a successful transition to Agile.

When an Agile process is introduced to the organization all Departments including the HR should be in sync. How an agile process is introduced to an organization will significantly impact the ultimate success of the Change Process. Any new process is likely to appeal to some and few will oppose the change. The opposition stems from their unwillingness to consider or try anything new or different. However with good planning, trainings and collaboration such differences in perspectives can be aligned towards positive outcome.

Project Completion & Timelines

Every organization will look for timely completion of the project and within the approved budge. The Agile process might create a concern for the Sr. Management whether the project iterations will persist as long as the customer continues to identify high priority and high value work.

Strategically planning activities and aligning budget around Agile Project Releases can address some of these concerns. Also the status reports will keep the Management up-to-date on progress of the Agile Project.

Agile is the new normal

Agile processes have continued to evolve over past years. The processes that have worked in one Organization might not have worked for others. The best practices while introducing the process needs to be identified within an Organization such that peers can successfully implement it.

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