Colleges and universities are teaching Scrum and Agile throughout the country. The Scrum Alliance continues to increase offerings throughout the globe with an increased footprint. Even the Project Management Institute (PMI) is adopting more Agile techniques in the PMBOK while many other organizations trying to carve a niche out for themselves in the space of continuous learning and improvement as Agile continues to thrive throughout the world of software, manufacturing, government and beyond.
Where does your organization find itself trying to improve? Are you thinking… yeah, no thanks, we’ve got this Agile thing down pretty good with what we are doing. Please don’t try to tell me why the use of T-Shirt Sizing or Story Points is going to make my teams more accurate. We are doing good enough. Thank you Mr. “Agile Enough”.
Agile is not a once and done option in the same way it likely isn’t a one million and done technique or set of practices. When we are always looking for ways to improve and enhance what we are doing we will find them. The set of practices employed help set fundamentals up to see where change can be employed and then also identify areas where change cannot happen right now. Patience, persistence and dedication to continue to work on those areas that can change right now oftentimes change the landscape around Mr. “Agile Enough”. At some point, everything around him has changed so he is forced to ask the question of whether he should also be changing.
There is nothing wrong with being satisfied with progress that has been made with your implementation of Agile, but there are things that can always improve. Sometimes you may even have people around you saying that they wish planning was more efficient or they were using User Roles or Personas. It could even be something else such as team size, effectiveness of standup meetings or anything else.
If you find that you are regularly told that you are Agile enough, you may need to influence change all around the person or area where resistance is occurring. Oftentimes those areas of change will help the right change to happen. People don’t change people. People learn to change their environment and that in turn can help other people decide to change themselves. Be patient. Be persistent, Be disciplined. Be Agile!