Agile World: Reasons to Adopt Agile Practices in Your Workplace (and not only)
Dear Alice,
Today I would like to talk to you about a very interesting topic that I really like, and that is agile practices and methodologies. I am not sure if your are familiar with this subject, but if you are a person that is open to new opportunities, if you like learning new things in general, if you like challenges and if you are passionate about creating solutions to simple or/and complicated problems that arrive your way (both professionally and personally), then this topic will definitely appeal to you (both short and long term). So welcome to this series, and please stay tuned, we will get to discover together a wonderful topic series, I can assure you.
Since I am very passionate about agile practices, mentality, methodologies and everything that comes with it in general, I would thus like to start a new series with you concerning this topic. Let’s call this series for now “Agile World” and I hope it is okay with you. Why? Well I definitely believe that we (as individuals, or groups of people) are currently heading towards an agile world 🙂 .
Okay so let’s start with the beginning: Was I always as passionate about agile and everything that comes with it? No, definitely not. Well officially I got to know the term approximately 4 years ago and this was strictly at my work place. At that time I was working as a software developer and I was part of a team starting to adopt the agile software development methodology for delivering projects. I was not passionate about the topic, but I was ready to learn new things (I always liked to do this, I think it helps me to evolve and to develop myself as an individual). And agile was at that time a new thing for me. It definitely took me some time to adhere to the topic, but after a couple of months I definitely started to see the benefits of this new “approach”. And I noticed that I even started to use the agile approach not only at my workplace, but also at home 😉 . From this point of view I must say that I am also very lucky, because at home we are all very passionate about agile and active in the area. Still enough (for now) about my fast adherence to the “agile movement”.
So what does the term agile stands for? Exactly what you think of: agile means “able to move quickly and easily”. In software, “agile is a time boxed, iterative approach to deliver software, approach that builds software incrementally from the start of the project, instead of trying to deliver it all at once” (as stated on http://www.agilenutshell.com/. This is a great reference for agile if you are now curious about it). Yes, agile is definitely a framework used for software product development, but it can be applied to products outside of the non-software area, such as motors industry, vehicles industry, etc.
And now let’s come back to the core of agile practices: why is it beneficial in my opinion to adopt agile to your workplace (and not only)? So here is my list:
- Flexibility/Agile. Be open…Open to change. Open to the unknown. Open to new environments and to new problems. Learn to adapt fast by increasing knowledge transfer in the team, by increasing transparency, by regularly inspecting and adapting your developed product. Flexibility also helps to react fast to changes, which is a very important action for building complex systems. Plus, being flexible and that is adaptable in general is something that will help you in your every day life as well.
- React Fast to Changes. Reacting fast to changes is nowadays a decisive action to building any complex system. We live in a complex world, and when we want to build complex systems or products we need to react fast to any changes coming our way. Lingering too much and analyzing the causes of the change or how to control them is something that will not bring you very far. We cannot change the past, we can only learn from it and we can train ourselves to be flexible and to be agile so as to react to changes. In agile, change is allowed, and thus any requirements can change during the project evolution, as opposed to the traditional development methods where all the requirements need to be known from the start of the project and which cannot be changed. And the chances are quite high that the requirements will change in most projects. And this because “the only thing constant in life is change” ( by Heraclitus of Ephesus). Yes very wise and true indeed, I would say.
- Increased Quality. Since testing is integrated in the life-cycle of the product, this will bring an increased quality to the products themselves. Also working in incremental phases allows the inspection of the product and the inclusion of feedback into the developed product. A great plus.
- Customer Satisfaction. The flexibility to change, when this is needed, the increased visibility of the product and its progress, the active involvement of the product owner brings an increased customer satisfaction. Another substantial advantage.
- Makes People Happier. I do believe that the main core principles of the agile development methodologies make the people from the team happier (at least as I experienced the process and at least as I see it), since the core agile development practices are grounded on individuals oriented beliefs such as: in agile, the team is empowered to make decisions (this as apposed to long planning meetings and management decisions); in agile, the team collaborates around a board to discuss the current progress, to synchronize themselves and to come up with a new plan in case of problems (this as opposed to long status reporting meetings). And I am a strong believer that people can be motivated by giving them the freedom to make their own decisions, to be empowered to be self-organized. In agile, leadership is a collaborative practice. I believe that agile brings people together by encouraging an environment based on mutual respect, cooperation and communication, as opposed to the command and control environment. Bring people together is something that is definitely a big plus in any situation as I see it.
As I heard it from some very wise agile gurus once you are part of an agile team or environment, you will not want to go back anymore. I find this a very deep saying, which I believe is quite true. I hope this topic brought some new perspectives to your field of expertise. Till our next “Agile World” encounter, I wish you a great week!
Sincerely yours,
Madalina