Why did my Transformation fail?

What is the role of any transformation professional?

In many companies, often someone from IT or HR is “repurposed” into a transformation role and given the job of leading the Digital Transformation effort. This usually includes the Agile Transformation effort.

Let’s start to highlight the differences between the two.

An Agile Transformation is a plan to change an entire company into an environment that is collaborative, flexible, self-organizing, and changes quickly, based on Agile Values and Principles. Here, the phrase “entire organization” stands out. Not the team, or dev teams, but “entire organization”.

Digital Transformation is the process of changing a business by using digital technology to replace or change human/manual processes with digital processes. In fact, this kind of change is meant to make internal processes more efficient and improve overall customer experience. Digital solutions make it possible for companies to automate jobs and processes, which can lead to big changes in the organization and give clients more value.

It immediately becomes clear that one is different from the other. So this is often the first mistake when companies start the Transformation endeavor. The type of professional you need to lead one effort is not the same as the type of professional you need to lead the other.

If we overcome that first bump and eventually agree on who should lead the Agile Transformation — and hire someone with the ability to lead such transformation — our companies will often ask for a Transformation roadmap, a document with dates, milestones, and budgets. Let’s dig a little deeper into this particular phase. For this to happen, we need to know where (and who) we are, where we want to go (and be), and conduct a thorough gap analysis to evaluate what we really need to get from point A to point B. And this is where the trouble starts.

Regularly, it’s at this stage where you start hearing things such as “we really need to keep doing things this way, because of…”, or “we cannot change that process because it impacts...”. Well, there's no harm in that, if those cases are really, really, legally, intrinsically, binding to our business model. We need to find ways to go around them. But then, as we move along in our analysis, we discover that many, if not most, are not willing to change, and do not even consider training in Agile a priority. Also, most of our recommendations start to be put off “because we cannot change everything in one go” and “we need to start by choosing the proper tool." and other similar arguments arise. Sound familiar?

Overall, more often than not, Agile Transformations are doomed before they even begin. Here are the main reasons (but not all):

• Organizations consider an Agile Transformation as a sub-task of a Digital Transformation: although both could be done simultaneously, different professionals are needed
• During gap analysis obstacles are created, mostly due to the impact or need for change that the actions needed to evolve towards agility imply. Often these are related to either the fear os losing power (from middle management mostly) or just because change means to leave behind what has been the comfortable way of working, regardless of being effective or not.
• When the Agile Transformation plan is finally created, organizations focus on implementing tools and processes, rather than training people and pushing for change. Even worst, usually tools and processes are put in place on top of existing ones.
• Last, but not least: when you hire an Agile professional, you are doing it because you want to change, right? If the answer is a heartfelt yes, then you would listen to what he/she has to say, right? — Agile Leads, Agile Coaches, Scrum Masters, and so on. These are professionals skilled in Agile values and principles, frameworks, techniques, and soft skills as well, focused on improving the ways your organization works, from the development team all the way up to the management level. If you are hiring someone to be a part of a transformation effort just because that’s the “next big thing”, you are doing it wrong. What they say, what they find, the changes the highlight should not be taken as mere recommendations that you may or may not follow. Agility is not doing whatever you want and call yourself Agile. Agile is change, is culture, is mindset. If not, you’ll end up with a bunch of people using (sometimes) expensive tools, and following processes they don’t fully understand, to have a small bump in productivity, if any at all, and not changing anything really.

In conclusion, sadly, many organizations still fall short on transformations because they really do not want to be transformed. Or, if they do, they want it to happen by miracle, without them having to put in the work needed for transformation to happen. They go after the silver bullet, the buzzword. This is not how transformations work. Take a long, hard look inside the core of your organization, and the people that make up that same organization. Do you want it to change? Then you’ll have to change as well. All of you.

Article originally posted here .