Agile – “A state of mind”

Organizations are adopting Agile methodology for software development. Moving from waterfall to Agile methodology, what is first thing to change or what should be done to adopt Agile methodology easily?

Before finding this answer, lets talk about the principles on which Agile works:

·        Active users’ involvement is crucial: End users are key of success of the project. Ultimately end user is going to use system. Each user should be asked to provide feedback time to time.

·        Agile team must be empowered to make decisions: Agile team, working on project, should be involved to make decision as that team know ground level reality of project. Team is involved in planning, estimation, Kanban, retrospectives etc.

·        Requirements can evolve but the timescale is fixed: Requirement can be changed or re prioritize based on new conditions in a sprint. However, timescale of sprint is fixed.

·        Capture requirements at a high level, visual and lightweight: Most of time, end users are not very much sure about the requirement as it is tough to visualize the outcome at initial stage. Therefore, requirements are captured at high level or in flexible form (as an Epic).

·        Develop small, incremental pieces of product and iterate till it is achieved: Requirement which is captured as Epic are broken in stories then sub-tasks etc to make small pieces of product. After a specific period (which is end of the sprint), readiness and accuracy or the piece (whether piece will fit in product or not) is checked. This process is continued till the result is satisfied.

·        Focus on frequent delivery: It helps to know, where are we heading towards and if there is any change needed, can be decided in early stage. Most of the time, vision remains same, but strategy can be changed to achieve it.

·        Complete each feature before moving on to the next one: First complete the basic and high priority requirement before moving to less priorities to stabilize basic structure.  

·        Apply the 80/20 rule to know which is most important: As per 80/20 rule, 20% of activities will account for 80% of results. Therefore, focus should be on 20% requirement while preparing backlogs.

·        Testing is integrated throughout the project lifecycle: Testing of deliverable goes parallel with development in every sprint to visualize the results in early stage.

·        A proper coordination between all stakeholders is essential: It is most important principle of Agile. Every stakeholder should be on the same page at each stage of product development. 

Now, let’s go back to the question: what is first thing to change or what should be done to adopt Agile methodology easily?

If we investigate Agile principles, it talks about to rearranging and upgrading the existing approach to get better result but to achieve same stuff, which is final product.

Therefore, the first thing, which is required to change to adopt Agile methodology, is the “state of mind” which need:

•  To work as a team to achieve common goal and get/share team member’s views, rather working in isolation
• To find issues/mistakes/changes and correct it, as soon as possible, before it’s too late
• To align the priorities as per current situation  
• To get the feel and look of developing product, after every interval 
• Effective communication between stakeholders holds the key of success