With more organizations adopting Agile practices, it is becoming evident to those implementing it that doing Agile is not the same as being agile.
With an abundance of Agile resources (articles, books, courses or workshops) available to help businesses adopt Agile and DevOps practices and the shared knowledge from the larger Agile community, why are so many of us still finding that Agile is not that agile?
Now, if you were looking to find the answer in this article you won’t find it (spoiler alert) but what you will hopefully find are some tips to make you consider how you can make your Agile implementation and transformation more agile.
Focus on agility
Let’s start by saying that frameworks and methodologies are a good starting point; they are not the be-all and end-all. They should be used appropriately in a given context and tailored with business agility in mind. Let's remind ourselves that Agile is not a methodology but a set of values and principles as outlined in the Agile Manifesto.
That means it’s not about whether we are following every single practice in an Agile or Scaled Agile framework of choice, but rather that we are working by following its overall values and principles.
Avoid arguing semantics
While every framework has its strengths and weaknesses, a lot of frameworks were designed for specific scenarios. In a lot of cases they were only designed to be used on their own, and more often than not they need to be tailored and tweaked to work with existing processes and terminology within your company so it will make sense to your teams.
It’s important to remember to be pragmatic rather than a purist when working on increasing your agility, so long as a common understanding across your company has been established. It is not beneficial to get bogged down in the finer details of the practices or terminology. It is cohesion within the team that gets results.
Agile is a mindset
We have seen a lot of companies and teams who perceive themselves as being agile because they do Agile, i.e. following a set of practices. Still, they somehow lack true agility.
At its core, Agile is about being able to adapt and effectively respond to change. Agile was built on the principle that things change and that you must be ready to adapt. Going through the motions and ticking activities off a list is not agility; agility is constantly planning, inspecting and improving how we work as well as implementing incremental changes.
Agile is not a body of practices, but a set of values and principles. It is a way of working, which is founded on a mindset.
Agile Transformation is a journey
While many of us acknowledge that a cultural change is required to achieve agility, the amount of effort required to facilitate this change is often underestimated. Agile Transformation has to do with the way organizations enable and manage agile productivity across their enterprise, portfolios, programs, and teams by aligning business strategy with technical execution.
Changing the way people and teams work and collaborate is central to every effective transformation. To change the way people work, their habits and their mindset - we need not only change their routines and actions but more importantly transform their mindset and behavior.
Building a culture of agility requires constant and consistent effort on multiple levels. By definition and like anything else in life, a true change does not happen overnight.
We are creating a responsive organization
When your organization commits to adopting Agile practices to increase business agility you are set on achieving a more responsive organization. Transforming the mindset and the way people and teams within your company work and behave requires empathy, patience, open communication, and consistency.
That's where we can help. RESTRAT® consultants and coaches are trained to help your business adopt Agile best practices, optimize your tools, and tailor scalable frameworks in a way that makes sense to your business and teams.
You won't have to take this on alone and you'll have experts helping you every step of the way. Schedule a free consultation to get started.