Implement Agile Practices That Work
Agile is a cultural shift. Don't just do Agile, be Agile.
- Many Agile implementations fail due to the lack of experience and understanding of what Agile really is, and the problems it is trying to solve. When these projects fail, Agile often gets blamed for it.
- The lack of management support, inflexible organizational culture, resistance from team members, and insufficient training are some of the biggest contributors to failed Agile practices.
Our Advice
Critical Insight
- Agile is first and foremost a cultural shift. Culture is often the biggest challenge to Agile implementation. Don’t take this as a sign that Agile is failing. Instead, consider it a lesson to bring forward improvement opportunities.
- The Agile mindset must be created at every level of the organization. A top-down approach to Agile implementations often leads to failure.
- Don’t let your organization get carried away with the hype around Agile. The quantitative benefits of Agile are not realized by most organizations due to immature implementation and adoption of Agile principles and practices.
Impact and Result
- Educate and train your executive, management, and delivery teams to adopt Agile the right way.
- Assess your current software development lifecycle (SDLC), culture, and environment to evaluate Agile fit and determine what changes need to be implemented.
- Conduct a structured evaluation of Agile to assess and recognize the benefits of Agile in your organization and teams.
- Develop an iterative approach to rolling out Agile within your organization to fail fast and recover quickly.
Start here – read the Executive Brief
Read our concise Executive Brief to find out why you should implement Agile, review Info-Tech’s methodology, and understand the four ways we can support you in completing this project.
1. Facilitate Agile learning
Begin your Agile journey by facilitating learning at every layer of your organization to ensure all stakeholders and team members are aligned.
2. Assess current state
Obtaining a holistic view of your development environment allows you to pinpoint the root causes behind the issues that can derail your Agile implementation.
3. Execute your structured evaluation
Begin with by-the-book scrum to gain a grounded understanding of Agile behaviors and mindsets and then customize it to fit your context.
Guided Implementations
This guided implementation is a nine call advisory process.
Guided Implementation #1 - Facilitate Agile learning
Call #1 - Discuss how to facilitate learning about Agile across your organization’s executive and management teams.
Call #2 - Discuss how to facilitate learning about Agile with your application delivery teams.
Guided Implementation #2 - Assess current state
Call #1 - Discuss your team and organization’s readiness for Agile.
Call #2 - Discuss your team culture and the different components that can be drivers or roadblocks to adopting Agile.
Call #3 - Review your SDLC process to identify any changes impacted by adopting Agile.
Guided Implementation #3 - Execute your structured evaluation
Call #1 - Discuss and understand what the scrum methodology is.
Call #2 - Discuss how to identify, assess, engage, and communicate with different stakeholder groups.
Call #3 - Discuss the criteria used to evaluate and determine the right pilot project.
Call #4 - Understand the different practices and ceremonies involved with adopting scrum.
Book Your Workshop
Onsite workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost onsite delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.
Module 1: Lead and Manage Agile
The Purpose
- Build knowledge and support for Agile practices across different layers of your organization.
- Build knowledge of Agile practices and concepts across the executive and management teams to drive the change.
Key Benefits Achieved
- Facilitate learning for your organization’s executives and management.
- Agile practices and principles.
- Baseline Agile practices.
- Key tools that support Agile practices that work.
Activities
Outputs
Compare Agile and Waterfall delivery.
Decode Agile: Principles, terminology, and roles.
Product owners and product agility.
- Agile personal story card.
Enterprise agility and the value of change.
- Identified business value sources.
Lead, manage, and govern Agile teams.
- Organization culture assessment.
Define your Agile principles.
Commit to Agile.
Module 2: Introduction to Agile and Agile Culture
The Purpose
- Determine the gaps in your organization’s current environment and culture before implementing Agile to ensure success.
Key Benefits Achieved
- Understanding of your team and organization’s culture and how this impacts adopting Agile practices.
- SWOT analysis.
Activities
Outputs
Assess Agile culture.
- Evaluation of team and organization’s culture and fit for Agile.
SWOT analysis.
- Completed SWOT analysis.
Module 3: Assess Current State and Understand the Scrum Process
The Purpose
- Evaluate your team and organization’s current environment as it relates to your SDLC process to determine how Agile can best be implemented.
- Understand the baseline scrum process as a starting point to adopting good Agile practices.
Key Benefits Achieved
- Completed SDLC stage-gates.
- SDLC process flow.
- Pain points in SDLC as they relate to Agile.
- Identify and evaluate business value definitions.
- Identify "ready" and "done" definitions.
- Understand the baseline scrum methodology and practices.
Activities
Outputs
Identify and describe SDLC stage-gates.
- Completed SDLC stage-gates.
Draw current SDLC.
- SDLC process flow.
Determine pain points in SDLC.
- Pain points in SDLC as they relate to Agile.
Identify and evaluate business value definitions.
- Completed business value definitions.
Identify “ready” and “done” definitions.
- Completed “ready” and “done” definitions.
After each Info-Tech experience, we ask our members to quantify the real time savings, monetary impact, and project improvements our research helped them achieve. See our top member experiences for this Blueprint, and what our clients have to say.
Client
Experience
Impact
$ Saved
Days Saved
State of Ohio - Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities
Guided Implementation
2/10
N/A
N/A
AgVantis Inc
Workshop
7/10
N/A
N/A
Utah Valley University
Guided Implementation
8/10
$125K
10
MHI Canada Aerospace, Inc.
Guided Implementation
10/10
N/A
2
The Research Institute of the MUHC
Guided Implementation
8/10
N/A
20
Walkers Global
Guided Implementation
10/10
$3,822
5
Employment and Social Development Canada
Workshop
10/10
$1M
50
The Suddath Companies
Guided Implementation
10/10
$7,537
20
Aipso
Guided Implementation
10/10
N/A
20
The Suddath Companies
Guided Implementation
10/10
N/A
N/A
Zimmer Biomet
Workshop
9/10
$31,855
50
Peabody Investments Corp.
Guided Implementation
10/10
N/A
N/A
Victoria Mutual Building Society
Guided Implementation
9/10
N/A
5
University Of Alaska
Guided Implementation
10/10
N/A
N/A
Dark Fibre Africa
Guided Implementation
10/10
$11,305
14
Sasaki Associates Inc
Workshop
8/10
N/A
N/A
Westmoreland Mining LLC
Guided Implementation
8/10
N/A
2
General Dynamics Mission Systems, Inc
Guided Implementation
9/10
$127K
10
Parker Aerospace
Workshop
10/10
$44,567
29
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Workshop
8/10
N/A
N/A
DuPont Specialty Products USA, LLC
Guided Implementation
8/10
N/A
N/A
University of Johannesburg
Guided Implementation
9/10
N/A
10
Calgary Public Library
Workshop
8/10
N/A
N/A
Job and Family Services
Guided Implementation
9/10
$6,366
10
City of Tempe
Guided Implementation
9/10
$63,667
23
Ocean Spray Cranberries
Workshop
10/10
N/A
N/A
InComm Inc
Workshop
8/10
$22,283
14
AARP Inc
Workshop
10/10
$1.27M
120
Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada
Guided Implementation
8/10
N/A
5
Saskatchewan Blue Cross
Workshop
10/10
$50,000
10
