7 tips to successfully lead Agile Remote Teams | Managing Agile Teams| Being Agilist

That era is bygone when there were a limited number of individuals working remotely. Conferring to a statistic report by Remote Work Report, there has been an upsurge in the trend of working remotely where out of those who are 100% remote said that they have been working from home for more than five years and the ratio was 42% to be exact.  A percentage of 28% said that they have been at a remote position from 3 to 5 years, correspondingly, 19% to 11% said that they have been working for 1-2, or less. The respective report came out on Feb 13, 2020. 

In modern software development or contemporary businesses, Agile has become a sunshade for almost every business in terms of planning technical methods, overall development & management, and for successfully managing projects or software projects. Almost every organization is positive towards distributed teams and it is not uncertain that many have successfully hunted strong talent. It is fathomable that being agile in a remote environment can be challenging but it is not dreadful. It is manageable by focusing on all the challenges of building a team and consolidating them. The common challenges faced can be undefined team structures, endless customer feedback, overall project predictability, and constant change of scope. Others can be coordination, scheduling meetings or informal conversations, etc. etc. These are real teething troubles, but completely solvable. 

Let’s cover our top 7 tips and guidelines on how to efficiently lead agile remote teams. EXCITED? We know ?

Set up a clear Product Road map 

If the customer is gratified, requirements and filled, expectations are met on time and within the defined budget, then the true sense of having an agile remote team is fulfilled. Traditionally, project managers gather all the required information from the customer before starting the project, requirements are then shared with the dedicated sources, and the project is delivered. The problem occurs when an agile team is not in close interaction with prospects to clarify expectations. It is recommended to ensure that you along with team members fully understand the scope and backlog, and the expected value to be delivered sprint by sprint. 

Conduct regular Demos

In Agile software development, Demo stands for demonstration of whatever the work is done by the team members at the end of each iteration. The idea is to share the completed work with key stakeholders, be it an app, website, prototype, etc. This collaboration between key parties can prove to be fruitful, as well as for the team to respond to change and gather feedback. 

Encourage collaboration

Thanks to all the latest tech advancements, a bridge gap between office workers and remote employees can be fulfilled. Jira is an amazing tool developed for Software project management – you can capture organizational issues, allocate work to remote employees, and follow-up on their daily assigned activities related to project development. 

We also have other incredible tech tools such as Slack – a chat room designed for a whole company acting as a primary method for private message sharing, file distribution, and much more all in one place. Zapier is an online automation tool connecting over 1000 apps to automate repetitive tasks by relying on codes. Almost everyone has a skype account these days. Millions of individuals are using it to conduct group audio calls, free video calls, the sharing of files, and you can use it on your mobile, computer, or tablet. 

Zoom is one of our favorites, it’s a desktop and a mobile app that allow users to conduct online meetups, with or without videos. It’s easy to use the platform, also you can achieve screen sharing to convey a clear message to your remote teams. Google hangouts is a part of the G-suite group of services to have video/audio calls, screen sharing, and, many more. 

A self-organizing team in Agile 

Self-organizing enhances our agility – leave it on your team to decide and meet the deadlines. Having this understanding can enable them to prioritize critical tasks that have a higher ROI. Instead of doing the work for them by dividing tasks yourself, have them focus on what the customer really wants; you can achieve less need for team management. 

In a self-organized environment, team members get to decide who does what, how to work on problems yourself and have some authority to remove their own backlogs. There will be no active day-to-day management of tasks, the team will take care of their own work. 

Make time for both sides 

Conduct a daily 15-miniature call to set up an agenda, allowing communication to remain open. Give each party an opportunity to share their feedback, goals of the day, or discuss any arisen problem. The team should ensure that the agenda of the meeting to be set prior to every call to save time. 

Have a DVCS

A Distributed Version Control System is a place where the complete code base is measured on every employee’s computer enabling automatic management branching and merging, speeds up pushing and pulling of most operations, improves the ability to work offline, increases productivity, provides visibility to broken builds, allowing members respond timely when build issues are not addressed.

Prioritize Asynchronous Communication

Having a distributed team across many countries, communication and collaboration become top struggles in between. One of the fundamental pillars of Agile methodology involves effective communication, and asynchronous communication is an enduring staple for remote development. 

Best practices can include: 

• Clear processes/clear instructions
• Know what’s urgent or non-urgent
• Communicating everything upfront
• Resolve issues in a timely manner
• Transparency
• Short status meetings

Optimistically, the above 7 mentioned guidelines will help you overcome the trials faced in managing agile remote teams. If incorporated as a part of business strategy and software project development goals, it can bring higher benefits to the organization’s overalls structure.

What’s your best advice for agile remote team success? Let us know in the comment section below.