There is a common occurence that happens in many organizations that embark on an agile journey. The change typically begins in the IT department. Most of the information online and in books about agile pertains to IT. However, most organizations consist of more than just technology. What about Human Resources, Marketing, Communications, Legal, Facilities, Accounting, Finance, etc? Keeping in mind that this transformation is about shifting a mindset, it should go without saying that the entire organization must be along for the ride.
The idea of completely changing how you work can be incredibly daunting even for someone who is excited to try something new. Something I have heard quite often from people in areas outside of IT is, "I want to make this change but I don't even know where to start." Sound familiar? Quite frankly even if you work in IT, you may still have trouble knowing where to begin. The first few steps are usually the most difficult because you might not know what those steps should be. Spend the next few minutes reading this post and you will be ready to start working better today!
1. Decide on the length of your iterations (sprints). This may sound more complicated than it is. Sprints or iterations can be anywhere between 1 day and 4 weeks. The most common length, in my experience, is 2 weeks. You really want to consider how long you can typically plan without interuptions or major changes.
2. Visualize Your Work. Create a task board. Yes, a physical board. Whiteboards work perfectly. Start simple with three columns; To Do, Doing and Done. Of course, these columns can change over time as your work changes or as the need arises. You may add a column for research, testing, waiting for response, etc. For simplicity, it is best to start with just the first three columns mentioned.
Next, use sticky notes to write down everything that should get done in your next iteration. Each sticky note should represent a piece of work/task that can be completed in one iteration or less. If it is too big, split it into different parts.
3. Regular Planning. Before you start your iteration, you should plan what you will do and prioritize what is imperative to complete first. Everyone in your department or team should know the priority of the things that need to be done. One effective way to keep everyone focused is to set a goal. Everyone works to achieve the goal before they pick up any additional tasks.
Make sure you are not trying to squeeze in too much work. Remember that you should be aiming for a sustainable pace. One technique I like to use at the end of the planning session is the "Fists of Five." When you think you have your iteration planned, everyone holds up one fist and displays 1 finger, 2 fingers...5 fingers. The number of fingers represents how confident they are that the team will be able to finish all the tasks that are planned, 1 means not confident at all and 5 means they are extremely confident all the tasks will be done. If even one member is not holding up all 5 fingers, discussion needs to take place to figure out why and determine if anything needs to be removed from the iteration.
Regular planning means you do this for every iteration. When the sprint ends, you plan a new sprint with new tasks. Keep in mind what you accomplished in the last sprint to determine what could be completed in the next one.
4. Dailies. Find a time in the morning that works for everyone in the team to meet face-to-face for 15 minutes. If you have people who work from home or offsite, use Skype or some sort of video chat tool. There are two important things to keep in mind for the dailies (daily standups): keep this event to ONLY 15 minutes and do not use it as a status meeting.
A common technique is for each person in the team to answer 3 questions: what did I achieve yesterday to help the team, what will I work on today to help the team and what are any impediments I am facing? I actually do not like this method. Why? I do not like it because it sounds exactly like a status meeting and that is not the purpose for the daily. However, I believe this is a nice starting point for a new team so feel free to use it.
Once a team matures and perfects their planning, the dailies can be far more effective and efficient. You plan one day and the next day during the daily, you only need to discuss anything that has changed in the last business day. The dailies are for "re-planning." It is still important to discuss any impediments. If you are falling behind because a task is taking longer than expected, the daily is an opportunity to discuss with the team. Do you need help? Does the team need to re-plan?
Staying strict with 15 minutes is difficult for many teams when they start. They start to try to solve issues in the daily or discuss tasks in more detail. They may even try to solve impediments in this time. Try not to fall into this habit. If you need help on a certain task or you need in depth discussion about it, mention it in the daily and tell the relevant team members that you would like to discuss further after the daily is over. This method will help keep your dailies to only 15 minutes.
5. Regularly Reflect and Adapt. If you do nothing else from these 5 steps, please do this! Retrospectives are imperative and their importance should not be underestimated. This should happen at the end of every iteration. There are countless ideas for fun retrospectives but the main topics that need to be addressed are: what went well in the last sprint, what did not go well, what can we change? Do not forget that last question. The purpose of the retrospective is to inspect and adapt. Don't forget to adapt!
My suggestion is to start with what went well. Let everyone share their thoughts. Then move to what did not go well and allow everyone to share their thoughts. Now discuss ideas for improvement. These ideas should be small enough to implement in the next sprint. Take the idea and formulate a hypothesis for what you think will be the result. Another technique I like to use for the "action items" is to have someone from the team take ownership of the idea by writing their name or initials on the sticky note. This does not mean they have to implement the idea alone. It only means they are taking responsibility for driving this idea forward.
During the sprint, implement the idea and examine the results. At the next retrospective, discuss the results versus the hypothesis to determine if you want to continue with this idea. Continue in this way indefinitely.
Changing the way you think and work does not have to be a monumental challenge. Starting with these 5 simple steps will help set you on the right path for continuous improvement and happiness in the workplace.
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