Although the topic has been around for some time, Agile is still a
relatively new way of working for many organisations. Its adoption doesn't happen overnight and as
a methodology it comes with its own set of challenges.
We recently held a round table discussion which focused on the adoption
of Agile and whether it is always the answer. Key contacts attended from a
mixture of organisations and industries to take part in a lively conversation.
The audience had differing levels of experience in the use of agile with
some organisations practicing agile across a number of projects
for longer than a 12-month period with varying degrees of success, whilst
others were just about to dip their toes in the water. The general feeling among our invited guests however, was that Agile:
- is a strong way forwards for companies that want to deliver services to the market.
- facilitates flexibility and allows you to adapt quickly to change.
- is not a simple answer and requires more structure in terms of process and prioritisation.
So how do we adopt Agile?
However it became apparent that adopting Agile isn’t as simple as
running a few daily scrums. An organisation needs to change the way it
operates.
It was identified that to introduce Agile into the organisation
successfully there also needs to be a change in the culture with a change in
mindset from rigid and liner work practices to collaborative and iterative
processes. A number of organisations
highlighted that it can be hard for teams to let go of past working habits and
shift to self organising teams. The emphasis is now on stakeholder management
rather than hands on with Prince2.
