Agile is the ability to respond to change while controlling risk. It is a way of dealing with and succeeding in an uncertain and changing environment. It is about understanding what is happening in your environment and adapting as you proceed.
Agile has emerged as a huge global movement. It enables organisations to succeed in an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world. The rate of change has accelerated dramatically over the past 25 years, and all indicators point to this trend continuing. Today’s “fast enough” will likely not be fast enough in future. To remain competitive, organisations need a process that can help them keep up with this accelerating rate of change.
Agile frameworks like Scrum help organisations deliver products earlier and at lower costs, giving them a competitive advantage in a fast-paced market. They can better rapidly adapt to meet the market’s and customers’ needs.
The Agile Manifesto
The Agile Manifesto was created in 2001. It was intended as a response to the heavyweight, documentation-driven software development processes that were in everyday use at this time.
Software was a new industry as the first computers emerged shortly after the 2nd World War. For the following decades, only a few computers were in use. This changed in the 1980s and 1990s with the birth of the personal computer and the internet. In a few years, millions of people had begun creating software to help businesses gain a competitive advantage and provide new services for customers.
The volume of software in everyday use proliferated. A new industry was born. However, this new industry lacked effective processes, and many problems marked the early years.
In many organisations, people did not understand or accept the complex nature of software product development. Irrational demands were often placed on people to complete a fixed scope of work by an unrealistic deadline. This prevented those involved from making vital trade-off decisions early enough in the product development process to avoid delays and overruns. It was common for projects to fail to deliver the outcomes that were initially intended, to deliver late, be over budget and have significant quality issues.
The industry was not in a good place. Low-value, low-quality products and frustrated and disengaged people were commonplace. And the pattern repeated itself, company after company, project after project, year after year.
This was the reality of the industry when I joined it in the 1990s. For many organisations who have not yet embraced better working methods, it still is the reality!
Traditional management practices are not easily replaced. Agility means embracing change and identifying and accepting certain risks. This is uncomfortable for people who may have spent decades using traditional management practices to limit change and lower risk.
So what is Agile & Agility? Well, let’s look at that manifesto. The values of the Agile Manifesto are:
Individuals and interactions over processes and toolsWorking software over comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiationResponding to change over following a plan
And while there may be value in the items on the right, we value the things on the left more. This is where the focus should be placed. You can find the Agile Manifesto at agilemanifesto.org.
There are also 12 supporting principles which provide further supporting details. You can find the principles at agilemanifesto.org/principles
So, Agile is a set of values and principles. It can be compared to a philosophy, and as such, it is widely open to interpretation. The term has been much misused since the creation of the manifesto.
The manifesto is a set of values and principles. People interpret the meaning of these values and principles through their own life experiences, interests and biases. As a result, it means very different things to different people. I typically get ten different answers when I ask ten people what Agile is.
Despite this, taking an Agile approach is now the default way to develop products for most organisations today. However, transitioning to a new approach can be hard, and the benefits of adopting Agile must outweigh the cost. Here are the most common benefits of an Agile approach:
Faster deliveryHigher productivity and qualityHigher engagement, purpose and motivationLower costs and less wasteImproved stakeholder satisfactionImproved predictabilityFaster feedback & learning cyclesEmbraces the reality of constant changeEasier to adapt and pivotReduced risk
At the same time, Scrum has emerged as the default way for those organisations to become more Agile. Scrum contains specific rules that, when used correctly, i.e. with the Agile values and principles in mind, can enable greater Agility. Scrum is not the only way to be Agile, and Scrum does not guarantee Agility.
The best definition of Agile is that it is about responding to change whilst managing risk. Those seeking to become Agile want to embrace change and make it an advantage whilst balancing the risk that this brings in a way that is safe enough in their current environment. So, there is not a one-size-fits-all way to be Agile. It depends on your desire for change and your risk tolerance. A small startup will naturally be more Agile than a large, hundred-year-old Bank. Frameworks such as Scrum can help people find their path to Agility.
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