Agile is appealing to Architects, Specialists and other technical professionals in IT Industry
Agile is ubiquitous nowadays, showing itself in all industries and many business domains. However, it is more noticeable in IT industry and particularly in Banking recently. Most of my recent projects in these domains are based on Agile approach.
Let's briefly touch what Agile is before discussing its significance. In a nutshell, Agile is a method based on iterative development. In Agile, requirements and solutions evolve with strong collaboration among self-organizing cross-functional teams. In this sense, it is a distinct method and differs from other methods such as waterfall. Now, one may ask, why is it so important or why did it get such a wide spread reputation particularly in IT world?
First of all, the key focus is on business value and user satisfaction with a vital focus on acceptance criteria and user stories. New features in Agile projects are delivered quickly and frequently, and more importantly with a high level of predictability.
Agile projects are transparent to stakeholders from all aspects particularly to the client or sponsor. This means that the client can prioritise features, plan iterations and review sessions. In Agile projects, costs and schedules are more predictable and managing change is relatively easier, and quality management is more efficient.
After this background to Agile, let's briefly touch on its importance for the IT Architects, Developers, Testers, Implementors and other technical professionals who participate in the Agile life-cyle in their day to day interactions.
In my experience, the key point for these professionals is focus on the actual technical delivery in achievable pieces such as taking an incremental user story based on a Sprint.
This concept is so crucial for the technical professionals because proverbially they bite as small as they can chew. This makes the delivery effective. A Sprint usually takes 2 to 3 weeks and demonstrates a tangible achievement for the project progress. It has deadlines and this encourages the technical contributors to fully focus on their committed delivery.
Deliverables and achievements are transparent to all stakeholders and stringent deadline measured by an Agile management system such as Atlassian's Jira or IBM Rational Team Concert . This transparency makes Scrum Masters' and/or Product Owners' job more efficient. It empowers them! The Scrum Master and the Product owner are the ones who monitor the Agile projects day to day and report to their sponsors and other stakeholders. They are true Agile champions.
Agile is a method that keep technical professionals active at all times. There are never dull moments in Agile. It is a continues improvement process. It keeps the team on their feet. Since they taste the rewards of achievement in each Sprint frequently, they tend to get energized to achieve more in a natural way. They are in heightened state at all times.
It can be said that Agile is the most natural and rewarding method for IT professionals hence it is an extra pleasure to work in an Agile team and environments if success is one's value and immediate rewards mean something to them.
My organisation (IBM) empowers us to use Agile and be successful in use of this method in order to support our clients in agility for their growing business demands. For example, recently we have a number of digital badges recognizing Agile activities for practitioners. I personally achieved 3 Agile badges recognizing my achievements in Acclaim. This certification and recognition is also an award for the technical professionals.
Since productivity and efficiency are maintained by these professionals with ongoing motivation and agility in Agile project, these merits are consequently translate to win-win-win+N prospect for all stakeholders.
Problem Solver
7 年One key aspect of Agile that is missing in t his description is the frequent feedback from the stakeholders on working software and the team leveraging that feedback to better hit the intended target and to improve their understanding and their process. That is the main point of the short iterations. Progress is only measured by the delivery of working software, not of intermediate deliverables, so it is easy for everybody to be aware of progress. It does not require detailed monitoring by the SM, PM, PO, or any specific role.
Principal Enterprise Architect at MGM
7 年The two major adaptations we needed to make are first iterative artifacts - rather than perfect a design you must give enough guidance to stay ahead of the sprints. Second collaborative design - we always should be working with our peers, but agile means we have to work closer to engineers than waterfall which looks for complete designs as a gate and handoff.
Enterprise architect
7 年Overall I think this piece is thematically right. However I'd perhaps unpick the concept of agile versus implementation and outcomes versus goals. Aspects like iterations, user stories acceptance criteria, plans, sprints are really implementations of a specific agile process (i.e. SCRUM) rather than core elements. For example; working software and customer collaboration are goals, smaller deliverables might be an outcome of those goals however in a different business and technical context you might find a different solution fits. Also specifically in SCRUM I would slightly reframe your proposition around empowerment. Teams are given responsibility, they are (or should be) empowered to do whatever it takes to achieve their goals. That tends towards greater ownership, involvement and passion in meeting those objectives. Product Owners are less empowered (typically they have the power anyway) than they are given confidence, in both terms of predictability and quality. Ultimately I go back to the agilemanifesto.org, those are the core principles. As you correctly say, the outcomes of targeting them are generally appealing!
Independent Consultant at Epic Trading
7 年Great Article Mehmet. I like the win-win-win results!