At QUARKS, we have dedicated consultants in agile advisory and agile team and project roles. In this article, we will share some thoughts about agile work methodology, why it's beneficial, and important aspects to start or continue the agile journey.
Why we work agile
The world is unpredictable, so project work in today's society must be able to adapt to constantly new challenges and opportunities. A study from 2015, which covered over 1000 projects across various industries and countries, showed that efficiency and overall satisfaction increased when using agile methods. The study is published in the International Journal of Project Management.
In this customer case, you can read more about one of the leading methods for implementing agile projects in large companies.
There are several specialized methods and frameworks within the agile work methodology. These methods all share some common characteristics and are designed with specific purposes in mind. We will go through some of the key characteristics below.
Characteristics of Agile Projects and Teams
In short, agile project management is about reacting quickly to changes rather than following a fixed long-term plan. We must be able to collaborate with the customer and adjust the course along the way. Another aspect of this is important factors related to the interaction between people, processes, and tools.
Goal Achievement.
Even though we free ourselves more from plans and the path emerges as we go, we continuously work towards achieving the goals set for the project. To achieve this, agile goal management is important, focusing more on facilitating and monitoring the project. In this work, it's useful to use the OKR (Objectives and Key Results) tool. This tool aims to ensure good goal management and a common direction for the entire organisation.
Efficient System Development and a Culture of Learning.
One of the points of working agile is to achieve efficient deliveries and products. This means that the time from product development to market availability – "time to market" – should be efficient.
The reason efficiency is crucial is that needs and competitive advantages change rapidly in today's market. To meet market demands, you must develop functionality or services in shorter timeframes than before, and you must continuously work to create improvement. This involves reacting to all changes along the way. At the same time, the cycle between specification, development, testing, and production deployment should be as short as possible. To succeed with efficient deliveries, the culture should be characterized by well-being and learning.
How We Assist with Agile Consulting
When we help our clients with agile projects, there are many aspects that need to be in place to succeed. We'll go through the various steps in the process below.
We assemble a functional team 👷♀️👩💻👩🎨👩🔧
When working agile, teamwork is key. To harness the potential of teamwork, it's important that teams are interdisciplinary and cross-functional, as it provides multiple perspectives on the work to be done. The result is entirely new perspectives and better insights into the tasks the team needs to solve, increasing the chance of finding good solutions. As they say, two heads are better than one.
We ensure that the necessary expertise and experience to achieve the project's goals are included in the team. It's the holistic competence that matters. Some of the roles and skills that should be represented in the team are project manager, scrum master, product owner, tech lead, developers, and testers.
Most importantly, the team should have a culture of working agile. Communication is central in such a culture. Our specialists have extensive experience in developing an agile culture with engaged employees.
We ensure ownership of the projec 📇
The first thing we do when assisting clients with agile project management is to ensure that leadership and teams have ownership of the project. This means that participants must have ownership of the project's mandate and goals. When ownership is established at the outset of the project, it becomes easier for the team to work independently on deliveries. This will also lead to more motivated and productive employees.
We monitor the optimal functioning of the team 🏆🙋
It's not always easy to discover why a team isn't functioning optimally. Beyond ensuring the right internal competence in the team, it has proven beneficial for the project leader to consider human factors, such as communication, mood, and satisfaction. This way, the project leader will build trust within the team. Moreover, it's important that the project leader is organized, can handle stress, communicates effectively, and is focused on improvement.
We ensure that the project meets expectations 💎
The project leader should lead self-directed teams to a greater extent than before. The degree of self-direction varies among teams, and therefore, the need for an involved project leader varies. When a project is in a maturing phase, there is often a need for a project leader who prioritizes between quality, time, and costs, also known as the prioritization triangle. We have project leaders who actively consider all three factors during the project, in addition to guiding the team to work more agilely. The significant challenge is to find a good balance among them.
Contact us if you want to learn more about how we can assist with agile consulting, or if you find this exciting and want to join the team 👩💻⛳