I previously work with a “big” project organization which was interested in growing up in an agile stack. They were facing a deadline configuration and need to manage their needs. They call their processes as “agile” because everybody's running everywhere, talking to everyone without knowing what to do.
Symptom : 50% of people are “chief of”, 50% in delivery.
I was dedicated to manage one of this team with mission to “agilize” it.
And because it's different to face with a "single lonely project" and act in a big organization, i found there 5 traps that became for me "the check list before going to act agile" and that i want to share with you :
1) A real sponsor
Specialy in big organization, the sponsor has an important role. Because without a real intention to crossing the gap between old reflexes and agile organization, it’s very difficult to be heard by people. Further more, this sponsor should be active at the good level.
What’s the good level ? For me: the level that permit to do connection with team and users. ie Product owners and Team masters (scrum, kanban or what ever).
2) A REAL intention to improve
Improving means being ready to test and to have a face to face with reality.
It means indeed be confident with a self improvement team vs a "one head" decision.
One way to test it : Retrospective.
One way to test it : Retrospective.
3) Guarentee a "confortable" context
Because improvment needs fail and testing,Team should know that it's a protected area : The good time space (not during a major release launching for exemple), a benevolent ambiance without any pression or deviant sponsorship.
4) Great Tools
Agility means processes and lots of methods like TDD, Continous integration, XP helped by great tools like JFrog, Jenkins, Test frameworks ...5) And finaly, objectives sharing
Around indicators !Velocity, customer satisfaction ... team moral ?! help showing that agile steps go to the right way.
Voilà
I hope this list will help
Feel free to come back to me to exchange on it ... sharing or changing
